A Few Notes on Nabokov’s Childhood Entomology
Journal: Yale University Press eBooks
Year: 2019

Nabokov's lepidoptery long posed a question: Was he an amateur or a professional entomologist? Today, it has been amply demonstrated that he was a professional. Kurt Johnson says, "For Nabokov, as with many, fascination with the big picture books of butterflies as a young child grew to concerted collecting as a youngster. As with many scientists, these impressions of youth become a driving life force."3 Nabokov started collecting butterflies in 1906, at age seven, and never ceased; he published