Poor, poor Cincinnatus

Themes of Crime and Punishment in Invitation to a Beheading

The Plot

Our narrator, Cincinnatus C., is sentenced to death for the

undefined crime of gnostical turpitude. The novel takes
place almost entirely in a prison overlooking the town
where he had previously lived. What Cincinnatus considers
the greatest privilege of a death sentence, knowledge of
when one will die, has been denied him. Prison officials, all
of whom try to befriend him, keep information regarding
his death a secret at all costs. Figures from his past come
and go from his prison cell, leaving a pencil and a spider as
his only consistent companions.

Cincinnatus C.

Cincinnatus is, above all, a day dreamer. Much of the

story takes place in his imagination, his only solace.
Prior to his imprisonment, he was married to a
beautiful adulteress, Marthe, whom he desperately
loves and wishes to have visit. Cincinnatus is opaque
in a transparent world and incomprehensibly strange
to everyone around him. We witness his humiliation, as
well as insistence on expressing himself and retaining
his individuality. He is an eminently sympathetic
character, despite being on death row.

The Spider

Cincinnatus cellmate, the spider, serves as a parallel for the

tricks played on Cincinnatus by his jailers: each feeding time
for the spider - always fed by the guard - accompanies an
opportunity for authorities to trap him in a feeling of false
hope, whether drawings outlining an escape plan that would
never come to pass or a visit from his wife deferred. At the
end of his stay in this prison, Cincinnatus finds that the
spider was merely a plush round body with twitching legs
made of springs, and, there was, attached to the middle of its
back, a long elastic. (210) The spiders existence had itself
been a cruel trick.

The Pencil

Invitation to a Beheading is not Nabokovs only exploration of a

pencil as narrative device - having also used it in Transparent
Things - but it is expertly employed as a instrument with which
the reader can measure the length of Cincinnatus life.
Cincinnatus, the diarist and our narrator, uses the pencil daily.
At the start of his sentence, lay a beautifully sharpened pencil,
as long as the life of any man except Cincinnatus (12) on the
table of his cell. On the day of his beheading, however,
scribbling his final missive, Cincinnatus finds his pencil,
stunted. (206)

Gnostical: (adj.) of, relating to,

or possessing spiritual
knowledge.
Turpitude: (noun) vile, shameful, or
base character; depravity.

al turpitude exists, defined as: conduct that is considered contrary to commu

Cincinnatus crime is never fully explained, yet he is often

asked to repent for it. His gnostical turpitude has not
only marked him a social outcast, but his wife as well.
From dreamy flashbacks to his childhood, the reader gets a
sense that his charge is related to Cincinnatus' ability to do
things like levitate with little regard for the social norms he
transgresses. But how can one repent such a crime?
Gnostical turpitude seems explicitly designed to not only
force conformity on a populace, but to be used against
anyone not properly conforming, for any reason authorities
deem appropriate. Cincinnatus, it appears, is punished for
being true to himself in spite of social pressures to the
contrary.

Cincinnatus punishment is two-fold: equally death and

being forced into fend off his jailers attempts to diminish his
dignity. When Cincinnatus refuses to play along with his
jailers games, preferring to read or write in his journal, hes
treated like an indignant child. The layers of his humiliation
become increasingly evident throughout the novel.
The greatest cruelty here - among other great cruelties - is
that Cincinnatus is never allowed any understanding of his
crime. His punishment serves no purpose but entertainment.
Cincinnatus himself is considered a novelty and his former
life - his home, his wife, the park where they spent many
happy times - are all things used to torture and mock him
while in custody.

Invitation to a Beheading ends ambiguously. Many

arguments have been made for both sides of whether
Cincinnatus is in fact killed, or has been rescued by
some sort of resistance group. What is clear is that he
has retained his dignity to the very end, and leaves
behind a city that is both literally and figuratively
crumbling.