Stella Gibbons experience of school, Gibbons found university exhilarating and made numerous friendships, particularly with Ida Graves, an aspiring poet who, although on a different course, attended some of the same lectures. The two shared a love of literature and a taste for subversive humour. Graves lived until 1999, and recalled in an interview late in life that many of the jokes they shared found their way into "Cold Comfort Farm", as did some of their common acquaintances. Soon after Gibbons began the course she contributed a poem, "The Marshes of My Soul", to the December 1921 issue of "University College Magazine".
Ada or Ardor: A Family Chronicle a necessary book, radiant and rapturous" and said that it "provides further evidence that he is a peer of Kafka, Proust and Joyce". According to David Eagleman, Nabokov named the title character in part after his favorite butterfly. An avid (and professional) collector of butterflies, Nabokov especially liked one species with yellow wings and a black body. As a synesthete, he associated colors with each letter; "A" with yellow, and "D" with black. Thus he saw a reflection of his favorite butterfly (yellow-black-yellow) in the name "Ada". His character, Ada, wanted to be a lepidopterist. "Ada" is also a pun,