Van's memoir contains numerous instances of life and art reflecting each other, in addition to Ada's orchid painting scenes and the trompe l’oeil roses. Ada's relationship with prior art is an important part of the novel's focus on imitation and resemblance, and allusions to painters and paintings are pervasive throughout. Of the many visual artists evoked in Ada, none is as central to the novel as the Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch (1450-1516). The novel refers to three of his paintings directly, The Ship of Fools, The Last Judgement and The Garden of Earthly Delights, and allusions to the latter are woven into Ada from the largest level of design to the smallest detail of the painting; indeed, Nabokov referred in an interview to ‘the Garden of Delights in Ada’ (SO 306). Ada's emphasis on the planets, Antiterra and Terra, in a sense mirrors Bosch's outer panels depicting the creation of the world, while events within Ada mirror the three inner panels, depicting Eden and the Fall, a fecund Garden paradise of sensual indulgence, and a Hell of demons, violence and cruelty. Allusions to Bosch also relate to important aspects of characterisation. Ada's critique of Bosch's incorrectly depicted Tortoiseshell butterfly demonstrates her interest in Lepidoptera and her attention to biological detail, Demon's interpretation of the sexual delights in the central panel highlights his libertinism, and Van uses the triptych as an analogy in his exploration of time. The Bosch allusions raise key questions of relationship: between art and the world it seeks to depict, between literature and painting, between mimicry and mimesis, and between artistic imagination and scientific accuracy.

The Garden of Earthly Delights in Ada

The Creation of Worlds

When the side panels of Bosch's triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights are closed, their outer surfaces portray the creation of the world, and bear a Latin inscription from Psalm 33: ‘For he spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast’.