Playboy Acquires Rights to Serialize Vladimir Nabokov's Final Work

Every now and then, Playboy publishes something that really does compel people to pick up the magazine for the articles. The latest addition to this list is The Original of Laura, the novella Vladimir Nabokov was scribbling onto index cards until his death in 1977. Playboy founder Hugh Hefner acquired the first serial rights after his publication's literary editor, Amy Grace Loyd, plotted a clever scheme to win over Andrew Wylie, the book's agent: send him orchids.

The orchids were a reference to Nabokov's 1969 novel, Ada, or Ardor, which had been excerpted in Playboy. This reminder of the history between the magazine and the Russian author's works was effective, and Wylie caved, first offering Playboy second serial (meaning they could publish an excerpt after another publication had), and finally first serial rights. Five thousand words of the novella will run in the magazine's December issue, which will be available in stores about one week before the full published version of the book is released by Knopf Publishers.

The intense squabble over publishing rights is a bit ironic, as Nabokov never wanted The Original of Laura to be available to the public. He had written a draft of the work on 138 index cards, and right before his death, asked his wife to burn them all. She couldn't bring herself to destroy the work, and the cards fell to their son Dmitri after she died. The young Nabokov (relatively speaking, as he is now 73) has refused to publish the work for years, but finally enlisted Wylie to find a publisher for it.

Related links:
KnopfPublishers.com
The Original of Laura on Amazon.com
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