"i know french: the book"™

>ne pas savoir le français
plèbe

Wouldn't it be 'connaître le français'?
I thought it was only savoir for savoir parler français

Very, very debatable.

inb4 people just cite the opening

Not him, but both are acceptable.

lol judging by that neither do u

I don't know desu, though it seems connaître for that sense has more hits on google. although I think might be right.

google.com/search?q="sais l'anglais"&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8#q="sais l'anglais"|"sais le français"

google.com/search?q="connais l'anglais"&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8#q="connais l'anglais"|"connais le français"

google.com/search?q="savoir l'anglais"|"savoir le français"&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

google.com/search?q="connaître l'anglais"|"connaître le français"&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

Why do you say that?

That user may be being slightly hyperbolic, but saying Nabokov has the best written prose in western literature is not a crazy thing to say. He has earned his place in the discussion.

Also, of course the opening of Lo is a meme, but it is nonetheless beautiful

>Why do you say that?
also sorry if that comes off as confrontational, my french is p. shit i admit, and without doubt there might be errors in what i posted, so this was a legitimate question.

Savoir : To know something by virtue of practice; having the capability to do X, to know something enough to endlessly repeat it. Savoir implies deep (rational) knowledge of something.

Connaître: To know about something and its value, to have knowledge and practice in a particular subject, to feel or experience something.

In many cases, both will mean very similar things, but in others, the difference will matter.

>You have to be an artist and a madman, a creature of infinite melancholy, with a bubble of hot poison in your loins and a super-voluptuous flame permanently aglow in your subtle spine (oh, how you have to cringe and hide!), in order to discern at once, by ineffable signs―the slightly feline outline of a cheekbone, the slenderness of a downy limbs, and other indices which despair and shame and tears of tenderness forbid me to tabulate―the little deadly demon among the wholesome children; she stands unrecognized by them and unconscious herself of her fantastic power.

"i know every language: the poem"™

This, Ada is "I know french, german aand russian" the book

I hear that book is hard as shit?

>"i know french: the book"™

The family spoke Russian, English, and French in their household, and Nabokov was trilingual from an early age. He relates that the first English book his mother read to him was Misunderstood (1869) by Florence Montgomery. In fact, much to his patriotic father's chagrin, Nabokov could read and write in English before he could in Russian.

>You'll never be this properly raised...

Unless you don't know English, Italian, French, Greek, Spanish, Latin, and Chinese and have a pretty broad knowledge of just about everything, then it's pretty easy desu.

But yeah, it's hard; enjoyable if you can accept that you're not going to be able to fully grasp much of anything on the first read-through though (unless you use a companion).

>they're just there to characterize Humbert as a foreign immigrant.

not only that, but with russian authors french always signals pretentiousness, aristocracy. Basically humbert had his head up his own ass.

>mfw his head was so up his ass he didn't realize he was being manipulated by lolita
>she really is a demon nymphet set out to destroy humbert

According to a list of the ten greatest books of the 20th century, as voted by 125 famous authors, number one and number 10 are both by Nabokov. To have written two of the ten best novels of the 20th century (as voted by his peers), one of them number one, and to be a distinguished writer in more than one language, is strong evidence that Nabokov is the most accomplished writer of the 20th century.

brainpickings.org/2012/01/30/writers-top-ten-favorite-books/

>The Great Gatsby at second
I read this during my sophomore year of high school and I thought it was awful. Did I miss something, should I reread it?

I don't know, wondering the same thing myself. I also hated it in highschool.

>In search of lost time

No one has ever read this.

>Ils n'ont pas la langue la plus haut du Monde

DEGOUTANTE

>using the feminine
>using avoir for the English to have

>avoir la langue
??????

Only someone who has never read any Russian literature would say that.

meh the opening is overwritten by a hair

this is what all rich kids were like (old-world at least) before 60's.
now-a-days they just post shit on instagram and sunbath in Corfu

no. its alright but so overrated. people keep sprouting the "haha highschool kids just didnt understand how deep™ it was" but its not.

also there are some great puns.
personne. je resonne. repersonne.

i feel nabakov is always first a comedian, then a poet.

also how do you not know even a little bit of french? its not like the book is in french, just a few well-known quotations or interjections.

>buy annotated version
>see french phrase you don't understand
>flip to back
>see translation

That wasn't hard.

If I read this book in public will people think I'm a pervert?

Yes
Most people don't read for shit, for them Lolita is "that book about a pedo" and that's all they know about it.

nah ur good m8 its just Veeky Forums

well, ne pas surrounds the verb it modifies.

'ne savoir pas' would be the correct way to write it.

i don't really know much either, took half a year of it in college, 3 years in highschool. i switched to russian tho, because i decided that i have enough of a base in french that when i want to start learning it again i can teach it to myself.

Out of context this is really good writing but in context it just seems retarded and insincere.

Interesting, I still love Nabokov's works though.

these posts have a bit of, hmm, je ne sais quoi about them...

Ne savoir pas is not correct.

Not him but this is the edition I own and I wished I owned a different one. Fucking Barnes and Noble.