Vaniada

Modern physics has significant philosophical and social consequences. Vladimir Nabokov’s Ada is the first serious attempt by a postmodernist author to make use of twentieth‐century physics as a means of investigating the role of literature and language in the shaping of the human worldview. Van Veen, Ada ’s main protagonist, seeks a world of absolute values in order to retain the experience of his memorable summer with Ada, his half‐sister and lover. Nabokov employs Hugh Everett’s “alternative universes” interpretation of quantum mechanics to examine whether such a world can exist in principle, and to estimate the artistic and personal cost of maintaining such a world. Van’s wish to overcome the human limitations of time and space drives him into a futile attempt to refute Einstein’s theory of relativity on aesthetic grounds. Using physical theories as metaphors, Nabokov stresses, at almost every stage of the novel, Van’s lack of social responsibility and his inability to make a humanly relevant redescription of his world. Finally, at the age of eighty‐seven, Van learns how to integrate physics and novel‐writing into a meaningful and rewarding worldview.