Any normally-dilligent student would have easily fallen into this booby trap, or at least found it pretty darn confusing.

The AI was clearly drawing on an obscure critical article, uncited, which talks about Chabon's use of Nabokov, and had gotten the timeline backwards. I was probably the only person in the world able to instantly dismiss this info since I'm the author of the obscure critical article!

had no problems featuring zugzwang, but 2) had one problem where he drew on the famous chess player Mendel Shpilman's work with zugswang. The problem with this is that it's nonsense: Mendel Shpilman is a character in a Michael Chabon novel which uses Nabokov as a source, not the other way round.

I recently did a quick google search hoping to turn up an image of a particular Nabokov chess problem involving zugzwang, ie when one player is forced to move even though they'd be better off passing. I didn't want the AI summary but accidentally read it anyway. It claimed 1) that Nabokov

I wish I could like this a second time for the use of "wreckers".

Although Nabokov thinks "vermin" is a better translation; my German isn't up to adjudicating.

'As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect.'

"no sonneteer had insisted on Mr. Casaubon’s leaving a copy of himself"

*weeps with jealousy over her sad desk PB&J*

Yessss. Although scholarship also has its joys. Cf the time I had to specify "Please include an entry for 'fart jokes' in the index."

I'm pretty sure that as soon as Cheney arrived, Satan just filed him in a man-sized safe.

I can eavesdrop pretty well in three languages, and I *never* overhear people saying rude things. It's all "Yuri, which cheese should we get?" or "Kids! We're going home!" Only exception: me and my mom, both native speakers of English, when we switch to Russian. I guess we're the problem.

Or maybe he's unaware it's possible to speak more than one language? like:
Vance: [hears neighbor speaking Spanish] Oh no how will we ever communicate?
Neighbor: Good morning, JD, how are you?
Vance: Now you speak English? This is dark magic!

Theory: JD Vance's neighbors have all learned Cherokee or Finnish or some other difficult-to-learn-by-new-speakers language, and use it exclusively in public specifically to avoid talking to him.

I would thank, had I not lost his name and address, a gentleman in America, who has generously and gratuitously corrected the punctuation, the botany, the entomology, the geography, and the chronology of previous works of mine and will, I hope, not spare his services on the present occasion. —Woolf

Virtual sign up: lp.constantcontactpages.com/ev/reg/7ttdx...