Invitation to a Beheading

Invitation to a Beheading is a novel written by Russian-American author Vladimir Nabokov. It was originally written in Russian and serialized in the Parisian émigré journal Sovremennye Zapiski in 1935 and 1936.

The plot centers on a man named Cincinnatus C., who is imprisoned and sentenced to death in an opaque, surreal totalitarian society. His capital crime is the entirely abstract offense of "gnostical turpitude," which essentially means he possesses a soul and is different from the conformist citizens.

Nabokov heavily emphasized that the novel takes place in a completely invented, absurd, and dream-like world, famously comparing its tone to a grotesque nightmare. The oppressive society in the book lacks specific geography or history, serving merely as a stage for Cincinnatus's existential struggle.

At the climax of the novel, just as the executioner's axe is about to fall, Cincinnatus rejects the absurd reality of his world and walks off the scaffold. The artificial prison and execution setting simultaneously crumble and dissolve around him as he embraces his true, authentic existence.