Mr. Nabokov tells us in "The Waltz Invention" that our salvation today rests on a perfect understanding of the human heart.
"The Waltz Invention," written when only a handful of scientists were concerned with atomic possibilities, could have been read as a puzzling, incredible fantasy in those days, but of course today a man like Waltz is at the center of our nightmares.
We had better have a realistic understanding especially of a tyrant's heart in our fissionable age, MR. Nabokov says.
Salvator Waltz is in possession of an infernal machine. He can operate it at will; and the machine is hidden away from all eye in the symbolical country of which Waltz is a citizen.
With the same intricate levels of brilliancy as Vladimir Nabokov's other world acclaimed tales, "The Waltz Invention" write in a play form in 1938, is a classic tragedy and a comedy.