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Analysis Of The Novel ' Lolita ' And ' The Sound Tells A Story '

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Reader! Novel and Film’s Sound Tells a Story

We can go through Vladimir Nabokov’s novel Lolita and find a plethora of passages with beautiful, descriptive, and meaningful writing. Nabokov’s 309 pages of art gives the world of literature something worth discussing, analyzing, loving, and adapting. The art of Lolita has been adapted into film by director Adrian Lyne with his filmed titled “Lolita”, released in 1997. In Lyne’s adaptation of Lolita we specifically see an important passage come to life; the passage shows us Humbert’s realization of Lolita’s “absence of her voice” (Nabokov 308). The importance reveals itself through the words Nabokov writes in his novel. In the film adaptation of the novel, we also find importance through cinematic elements like narration, cinematography, sound, editing, and Mise-en-scene. With both the passage and adaptation, we can study the meaning of the character Humbert and his love for Lolita.

The first word of the passage gives us an example of Nabokov’s ways of writing Lolita; the first word appears to be “Reader!” (308). Nabokov addresses the reader to get the attention of us. Usage of addressing becomes obvious throughout the novel. Changing the direction of who he tells the story helps me better understand Nabokov’s difficult and dense writing. These addresses, which change from us and the jury of the court, give me the opportunity to pay more special attention to what the passage says and what Nabokov hides in these words.

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