Glory’s title, both in Russian [Podvig] and in English, indicates its relationship
to chivalric ideals of the knightly quest. Written in Russian in
1930, while Nabokov was living in Berlin, and first published
serially in 1931-32, the novel was given at least three tentative
titles before Nabokov (then writing as “Sirin”) arrived at
Podvig (“Deed” or “Exploit”). Two
of these, Zolotoi vek (“Golden
Age”) and Romanticheskii vek
(“Romantic Times”) indicate the centrality of chivalric romance to
the novel. But Nabokov’s first working title invokes rather the i…
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