Justyna Magdziarz, Amerykanistyka II MA Literatura Amerykaska i Historia Idei Po Roku 1900 Vladimir Nabokov Lolita Date of submission: 21.12.

2013

Repulsive, disgusting, outrageous. These adjectives came to my mind when I read Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov for the first time, at the age of 18. Little did I know then about literature in general, let alone American literature, and therefore, I took the whole novel at face value. Most probably, a common reader, like me five years ago, will fail to see through the misleading surface of the book and thus, hail it quite immoral or even highly inappropriate. Undoubtedly, this is why upon the publication, the book stirred so much controversy and there were so many accusations against Nabokov being a pedophile. On the other hand, a more discerning reader will quickly notice that Lolita is not a mere account of a love affair between an adult and a child. In fact, the controversial subject provides only a frame to what Lolita really is: a literary creation at its best. At the most basic level, the novel deals with the topic of a quasi-incestuous relationship between a 40 year old man and a teenage girl. Although the author spare us detailed description of numerous sex scenes, which are only mentioned, but never explicitly depicted, there is no denying that even hinting at the possible sexual intercourse between a grown-up man and a 12 year old child evokes feelings of revulsion. In my opinion, such a relationship runs counter to the universal moral code shared by the people all over the world and deserves nothing but a public opprobrium. In fact, even the narrator of Lolita admits that his penchant for nymphets amounts to sheer insanity. In the course of the novel, he refers to his relationship with Dolores as the parody of incest and a bestial cohabitation (286). Humbert knows that no matter how much he loves and cares for Lolita, what he does is

simply against nature and could never be accepted by the society. By entering into a sexual relationship with a child, he robs her of her childhood and leaves an indelible mark on her psyche. Instead of protecting her, he fails as a father figure and contributes to her eventual corruption: I was a pentapod monster I was despicable and brutal, and turpid, and everything . And there were times when I knew how you felt, and it was hell to know it (283). Notwithstanding, though Humbert acts like a heartless beast, he is not devoid of compassion and he actually feels self-contempt. He does not fit the conventional notion of a pedophile who, at least according to my perception, lacks higher emotions and is unaware of the harm he does to a child. What strikes me even more is the fact that at the end of the novel, Humbert pleads guilty to committing a crime: [h]ad I come before myself, I would have given Humbert at least thirty-five years for rape (307). Interestingly enough, he does not feel the same about another crime he committed: namely, the murder of Clare Quilty. Indeed, a murder is one of the most serious offences I can think of and though in real life it would be difficult for me to justify such an atrocious deed, I am able to sympathize with Humbert and therefore, as a member of the jury he is referring to so frequently in the course of the novel, I am ready to dismiss this particular charge. It is really interesting that, as I have already mentioned, despite being a pervert, Humbert evokes sympathy in readers. Although I felt repelled by his obsession with young girls and I generally disapproved of his actions, I really liked him as a character. He actually longs for being liked by his readers as at numerous occasions, he appeals to them and craves for their understanding: Please, reader: no matter your exasperation with the tenderhearted, morbidly sensitive, infinitely circumspect hero of my book, do not skip these essential pages! Imagine me; I shall not exist if you do not imagine me; try to discern the doe in me, trembling in the forest of my own iniquity; lets even smile a little.
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After all, there is no harm in smiling. For instance , I had no place to rest my head, and a fit of heartburn was added to my discomfort. (129) Actually, one of the final scenes in which Humbert eventually finds Lolita, who refuses to go away with him, is genuinely touching. I felt really sorry for Humbert knowing how much he loved Lolita although compassion is evidently the last thing one should feel for a villain. In fact, one of the factors that render Humbert likeable is Dolores herself. A child harassed by a grown-up man should automatically evoke feelings of sympathy, but it is not the case when it comes to Lolita. At some point of the novel, I found myself thinking: this girl is really asking for trouble. Indeed, had it not been for her immodesty and impudence, Humbert would have probably content himself with his dirty thoughts. Dolores is an epitomization of all the evil; she is a classic example of a femme fatale or what today is called a bad girl. She knows that she attracts men and she keeps provoking them: little Lo was aware of that glow of hers, and I would often catch her coulant un regard in the direction of some amiable male, some grease monkey, with a sinewy golden-brown forearm and watch-braceleted wrist (157). As Humbert informs his readers, it was actually Lolita who seduced him and made him go to bed with her for the first time. What is more, she had already had some sexual experience by then: not a trace of modesty did I perceive in this beautiful hardly formed young girl whom modern co-education, juvenile mores, the campfire racket and so forth had utterly and hopelessly depraved (133). No wonder that at the age of seventeen, Lolita, though still a child herself, is already pregnant. Besides, although at numerous occasions she emphasizes and demonstrates her unwillingness to cohabit with Humbert, she can be easily won over by money. Actually, over the course of time, she becomes increasingly rapacious, demanding from Humbert more and more expensive gifts in return for her sexual services. She is a sort of a prostitute, a cold and calculating one, which makes it hard to feel any empathy toward her.

That Dolores is indeed a catalyst for the whole predicament described in the book might be seen in the episode from Chapter 13, Part 1. I believe that it is actually the most crucial episode of the novel as it serves as a spur to a further physical contact between Humbert and Lolita. Once again, the narrator himself emphasizes the importance of the event by addressing the readers explicitly: I want my learned readers to participate in the scene I am about to replay; I want them to examine its every detail and see for themselves how careful, how chaste, the whole wine-sweet event is if viewed with what my lawyer has called, in a private talk we had, impartial sympathy (56-57). The chapter starts with a dispute between Dolores and her mother which results in Dolores refusing to go to church with Charlotte. This refusal may foreshadow the sinful and immoral character of the event which is about to follow. Dolores herself is depicted as an embodiment of sin; she has her lips painted red, a color which symbolizes seduction and sexuality, and she is holding a red apple, which is an obvious reference to the Bible and the story of Adam and Eve (the Temptation and Fall of man). Indeed, what Humbert does in this chapter is a retelling of the well-known biblical story. Once more, Dolores role as a victim is accentuated as she accidentally on purpose seduces poor Humbert and brings about his eventual downfall. The episode in question starts as a childish game with Humbert taking away the apple Lolita is playing with. Despite the apparent innocence, the text is permeated with sensuality and a sense of sexual tension that exists between the two: [s]he grasped it [the apple] and bit into it, and my heart was like snow under thin crimson skin (57). Humbert, who was longing for some physical contact with Lolita for so long, cannot contain his excitement when at some point, the girl extends her legs across his lap. Tormented by his sexual arousal and unable to conquer his desire, he decides to take advantage of the situation provoked by Dolores herself. What follows is a description of the masturbation process which, by being extremely flowery in terms of style, is no longer trivial and repulsive, but actually solemn and, in a way, beautiful:

Under my glancing fingertips I felt the minute hairs bristle ever so slightly along her shins. I lost myself in the pungent but healthy heat which like summer haze hung about little Haze. Let her stay, let her stay As she strained to chuck the core of her abolished apple into the fender, her young weight, her shameless innocent shanks and round bottom, shifted in my tense, tortured, surreptitiously labouring lap; and all of a sudden a mysterious change came over my senses. I entered a plane of being where nothing mattered, save the infusion of joy brewed within my body. (59) Even the greatest poet would not be ashamed of such a description. Still, it is weird that although the whole incident is nothing but a sexual abuse, after all Lolita was not even aware of what is really happening, the way it is depicted makes the readers entranced with what they are reading. Without a shadow of a doubt, the language plays an extremely important role in the novel and I must admit that I was spell-bound by the way Humbert narrates his story. At the same time, this extraordinary language poses a great conundrum for the readers. While it is true that Humbert does not resemble a villain, whereas Dolores can hardly be called a victim, one must take into consideration the fact that Lolita is a first-person narrative which means that the account of the story we are provided with is intensely subjective. That his story might be exaggerated and embellished is stressed out by Humbert at the very beginning of the novel: [y]ou can always count on a murderer for a fancy prose style (9). Humbert is in fact one of the most unreliable narrators ever. Not only is he affected by and entangled in the events he is describing, but also he is not fully sane. If the novel had been told by a third-person, omniscient narrator, it would be totally different as both the thoughts of Humbert and Lolita would receive equal attention. With Humbert as a narrator, we can only assume that deep inside, Dolores is unhappy (there are in fact some subtle references to her crying in the night
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and feeling lonely). Another thing is that Humbert very often comments on his own style, e.g.: [w]e came to know nous connmes, to use Flaubertian intonation the stone cottages under enormous Chateaubriandesque trees . Nous connmes (this is royal fun) the wouldbe enticements of their repetitious names (143-144). Such metafictional remarks should alert us and give some food for thought: is it still a mere story of a love affair between an adult and a child? As far as I am concerned, there is actually more to it than meets the eye. In his afterword to Lolita, Nabokov wrote: [f]or me a work of fiction exists only in so far as it affords me what I shall bluntly call aesthetic bliss, that is a sense of being somehow, somewhere, connected with other states of being where art (curiosity, tenderness, kindness, ecstasy) is the norm (313). This quotation leaves no doubt as to what Lolita really is; it is neither a lewd book nor a didactic novel. Numerous references to reality may deceive nave readers, or rather mis-readers, who perceive Lolita as a book based on actual events, whose only aim is to transgress taboos. In fact, it is a literary game, with a carefully crafted plot, which rules out the very existence of McFate, an allegedly driving force so often mentioned by Humbert. The novel is abundant in literary devices, which strengthen the aesthetic value of the text, such as doubles (e.g. Humbert and Quilty, his doppelganger), foreshadowing (numerous statements made by Humbert which foreshadow his eventual crime), word plays (e.g. [g]uilty of killing Quilty (32)), and multiple intertextual references, the most obvious one being the name of Annabel Leigh, Humberts first love. Her name is a reference to a character from Edgar Allan Poes poem entitled Annabel Lee. It is believed that the protagonist of the poem is modelled on Poes young wife Virginia who, similarly to Annabel from Lolita, died prematurely. In my opinion, it is not the controversial subject of Lolita that renders it remarkable and innovative, but all these literary devices employed so perfectly and cleverly by Nabokov in his novel.

To recapitulate, I must admit that Lolita is one of the most interesting books I have ever read, primarily thanks to its language and a unique approach to the topic of pedophilia. Although it was the first book by Nabokov I have ever read, it will certainly not be the last one. But for the exceptional narration, the novel would be a mere confession of a sex pervert, bordering on obscenity. Nevertheless, a plethora of literary devices and an extremely subjective narration cover up the otherwise abhorrent character of the main protagonist and his story, leaving us with a stunning work of fiction.

References Nabokov, Vladimir. Lolita. New York: Penguin, 1980. Print.