Vladimir Nabokov. Un mal día : Клуб изучающих испанский языкVladimir Nabokov. Un mal día
Vladimir Nabokov. A BAD DAY
student, the tutor of the Kozlov boys. He was a fleshy, plump-chested young man with a shaven head. He wore a kosovorotka, a shirtlike affair with side buttons on the collarbone. A rimless pince-nez surmounted his nose, whose chiseled sharpness did not suit at all the soft ovality of his face. When finally Peter approached, he found Elenski and the children in the act of throwing javelins at a large target of painted straw nailed to a fir trunk.
Peter's last visit to the Kozlovs had been in St. Petersburg at Easter and on that occasion magic-lantern slides had been shown. Elenski read aloud Lermontov's poem about Mtsyri, a young monk who left his Caucasian retreat to roam among the moun