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“As soon as the pegs were driven in and the game started, the man was transfigured. From his habitual, slow, ponderous, rather rigid self, he changed into a terrifically mobile, scampering, mute, sly-visaged hunchback.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“A horsefly applied itself, blind fool, to Pnin's bald head, and was stunned by a smack of his meaty palm.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“He was beloved not for any essential ability but for those unforgettable digressions of his, when he would remove his glasses to beam at the past while massaging the lenses of the present.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“I do not know if it has ever been noted before that one of the main characteristics of life is discreteness. Unless a film of flesh envelops us, we die. Man exists only insofar as he is separated from his surroundings. The cranium is a spacetraveller's helmet. Stay inside or you perish. Death is divestment, death is communion. It may be wonderful to mix with the landscape, but to do so is the end of the tender ego”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“Russia - the country of Tolstoy, Stanislavski, Raskolnikov, and other great and good men.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“...Greek Catholic Church, that mild communion whose demands on one's conscience are so small in comparison with the comforts it offers.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“Он спрашивает: "Вы анархист?" -- "Я отвечаю, -- здесь Пнин прерывает свой рассказ, чтобы предаться уютному беззвучному веселью. -- Первое, что мы понимаем под "анархизмом"? Анархизм практический, метафизический, теоретический, абстрактический, индивидуальный, социальный, мистикальный? Когда я был молод, -- так я говорю, -- это все для меня имело важнейшн значейшн. Таким образом, мы имели интереснейшн дискушн, вследствие которой я проводил две цельные недели на Эллис-Айленд", -- брюшко рассказчика начинает сотрясаться; оно сотрясается; рассказчик корчится от смеха.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“And all these are worlds,�� said Hagen. “Or else,�� said Clements with a yawn, “a frightful mess. I suspect it is really a fluorescent corpse, and we are inside it.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“In life, as in chess, it is always better to analyze one's motives and intentions.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“Here speaks Professor--' There followed a preposterous little explosion. 'I conduct the classes in Russian. Mrs Fire, who is now working at the library part-time--”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“Ich weiß nicht, ob jemals festgestellt wurde, daß ein Hauptmerkmal des Lebens die Separatheit ist. Wenn uns keine Fleischesschicht umhüllt, sterben wir. Der Mensch existiert nur in dem Maße, in dem er von seiner Umwelt abgesondert ist.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“Samo je neki drugi Rus mogao da razume reakcionarnu i sovjetofilsku mešavinu kakvu su nudili kobajagi-živopisni-Komarovi, za koje su idealnu Rusiju činili Crvena armija, miropomazani monarh, kolhozi, antropozofija, ruska crkva i hidroelektrane.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin

“an emblematic couple placed with easy art on the last page of Pnin's fading day”
― Nabokov Vladimir, Pnin

“It was a pity nobody saw the display in the empty street, where the auroral breeze wrinkled a large luminous puddle, making of the telephone wires reflected in it illegible lines of black zigzags.”
― Nabokov Vladimir, Pnin

“There is nothing softer than your heart”
― Vladimir Nabokov, Pnin