Does Nabokov’s ‘Lolita’ have any canonical value?

The book Lolita is a highly controversial novel written by Vladimir Nabokov. Lolita tells the story of a man, Humbert Humbert, and his utter infatuation with a young “nymphet” named Lolita. The book and subsequent film adaptations, specifically Stanley Kubrick’s 1962 adaptation and Adrian Lyne’s 1997 adaptation aim to create a feeling of sympathy for the protagonist, Humbert Humbert. Through the use of first person narration, Humbert Humbert is able to manipulate readers with simple inaccuracies, making him an unreliable narrator.

This results in the narrative perspective of the novel demonstrating how Humbert attempts to conceal his true nature through, in his own mind, clever ‘adjustments’ to how the story is presented and references to historical figures who shared the same desires as him- ‘Oh Lolita, you are my girl, as Vee was Poe’s and Bea Dante’s’ (Nabokov 1955), yet often reverts to a disposition in which he laments about his monstrous desires. Not only this, but the comparison to famous literary greats suggests that Humbert considers himself to be of their status and thus possesses an idolized version of himself, a self which can easily transform language into ploys to conceal his true nature.

The men who show their obsessions in Fear and Lolita do so in a more aggressive manner. Humbert, who has always had in interest in young girls, is instantly taken with Dolores, the 12 year old daughter of his landlady - “It was love at first sight, at last sight, at ever and ever sight.” She is the whole reason for his decision to stay at the house, as he is initially put off by her mother, the domineering Charlotte. Humbert takes extreme measures by marrying Charlotte for the sole purpose of staying close to Dolores. After Charlotte’s death, Humbert takes Dolores on the road for an indefinite road trip. He is so attached to her that he becomes easily panicked when he is faced with the possibility of her leaving him. This causes him to be incredibly possessive over her, limiting her interaction with friends her own age to prevent

So far, so good. Having had intercourse with Lolita earlier that morning Humbert, not surprisingly, sees her as his victim, sees both her childlike innocence and the signs of his own brutal assault on that innocence. But at the end of the passage, Humbert's understanding of Lolita and her "lost innocence" changes radically as he proclaims her to

Furthermore, as Lolita can be considered an open text and this paper is concerned with bringing female perspectives to the forefront of the novel, it is reasonable to apply traditional feminist theory to the text to examine Humbert’s marginalisation of women. In particular, this reading will be formulated through applying the work of second-wave feminist Kate Millett, which focuses on exposing the reprehensibility of patriarchal oppression. To begin, Nabokov consistently constructs Humbert to display misogynistic views. To illustrate this, in the scene where Humbert recalls his sexual excitement when Dolores laid across his lap, he fantasizes about being ‘a radiant and robust Turk…enjoying the youngest and frailest of his slaves.’ Due to the reader’s knowledge of Humbert’s affinity for ‘nymphets,’ whom he defines as girls between the age of nine and fourteen, it can be deduced that these ‘slaves’ are female. The word ‘frail’ holds connotations of debility, fragility and vulnerability. Through these negative associations, Nabokov has positioned readers to understand that Humbert views women as inferior to men. This holds relevance to Millett’s theory of female inferiority, through which she explains that ‘the female’s inferior status’ is ‘ascribed to her physical weakness or intellectual inferiority.’ Millett published her work in 1969 during the second wave feminist movement, whereby women demanded equality and challenged patriarchal ideologies regarding sexuality,

The two passages, written by Humbert Humbert, describes two of his ‘nymphet’ loves. In the passage, both Annabelle and Lolita gets introduced. Read the passages carefully. Then, write an essay that compares H.H.’s perspective of the two characters to show his feelings on both of them.

Eric Goldman argues that while Humbert attempt to make Lolita into a sexual deviant that corrupted him, Nabokov instead, suggest that she is a normal female that is experimenting with her sexuality. He starts with explaining Humbert attempting to make Lolita in a sexual deviant, then he states that after its publication “many of the critics Humbert Humbert’s misogynistic interpretation of Lolita” (Goldman 87). Goldman believe that Lolita “sexual development is warped by a maniacal, myth-making pedophile” (88). Humbert makes Lolita into a deviant to justify his behavior towards her.

It not only threatens, but also breaks through. Betrayed by love once in her life, she nevertheless seeks it in the effort to fill the lonely void; thus, her promiscuity. But to adhere to her tradition and her sense of herself as a lady, she cannot face this sensual part of herself. She associates it with the animalism of Stanley's lovemaking and terms it “brutal desire”. She feels guilt and a sense of sin when she does surrender to it, and yet she does, out of intense loneliness. By viewing sensuality as brutal desire she is able to disassociate it from what she feels is her true self, but only at the price of an intense inner conflict. Since she cannot integrate these conflicting elements of desire and gentility, she tries to reject the one, desire, and live solely by the other. Desperately seeking a haven she looks increasingly to fantasy. Taking refuge in tinsel, fine clothes, and rhinestones, and the illusion that a beau is available whenever she wants him, she seeks tenderness and beauty in a world of her own making.

Love and obsession are often misinterpreted to be the same thing, yet one can cause people to flourish, while another destroys the people involved. Humbert Humbert becomes obsessed with the childlike innocence in young girls and pursues a 12 year old girl, Lolita. Humbert and Lolita develop a sexual relationship that inevitably takes away her innocence more each time that they are together. Vladimir Nabokov uses irony and diction in Lolita to show how Humbert is obsessed with Lolita’s childlike innocence, and how his obsession leads to the destruction of the childhood that he is so desperately trying to obtain.

Then there is Lolita, nymphet Lolita with whom Humbert is so madly infatuated. His “love” of Dolores Haze is nothing more than a sick obsession that grows out of control, crossing boundaries that did not even exist prior to the pedophilic relationship. Immediately, it is evident that Lolita is nothing more than a more serious version of his past wives, as “little Lo” is the closet to a nymphet Humbert has been since Annabel. His lust and love for Lolita is nothing more than a mere recreation of his one true love. Though Humbert’s actions may be perceived as an obsession with Lolita herself, it is instead a façade; Humbert still degrades ad objectifies Lolita liekt he rest of the woman he has encountered.

She does not say the address and Humbert goes to search for her. He takes the gun with him to kill the kidnaper. When Humbert sees Lolita after three years he notices how she is grown up and no longer she is a nymphet. He realizes that he still loves her so much. Lolita says is not her husband who abducted her but Clare Quilty. She says that she knew him since she was a child and he had been a friend with her mother. Lolita tells Humbert what happened after they got out of the hospital. Quality wants Lolita to be in his pornographic films, but Lolita refused and Quality kicked her out. I think Quality like Humbert, he is the shadow of Humbert. They have the same thought about nymphet. Everywhere Humbert goes Quality was there. Clare Quality was the stranger who ask Humbert at the Enchanted Hunters hotel. “where the devil did you get her?” (Nabokov 127). Humbert says that Lolita is his daughter, Quality says “you lie she is not” (Nabokov 127). It is obvious that Quality follow them from the beginning. So, Humbert finds it necessary to kill him. He took his love from him and made him suffer. Even Humbert knows that Lolita loves Quality. “He was the only man she had ever been crazy about … she meant something different. And I had never

However, The audience will find out that Lolita shares many similarities compared to Humbert’s many associates. Humbert speaks about the events regarding The Enchanted Hunter in that, "My life was handled by little Lo in an energetic, matter-of-fact manner as if it were an insensate gadget unconnected with me" (Nabokov, 133). Humbert refers to Lolita as if she is a child playing with a toy. Humbert failed to see that Lolita has now learned how pleasure men sexually and found it to be somewhat acceptable in some form. As his new stepdaughter, she wants to make her stepfather happy in anyway possible. Lolita being a minor, would believe that she will receive love and attention any daughter would get from a father. However, Lolita fails to recognize

In the world of Lolita, Humbert is writing this memoir for the jury of his trial, and by using his “fancy prose style” to cover up the disconcerting details of his relationship with Lolita, he attempts to convince the jury the “purity” of his relationship with Lolita. Whenever Humbert involves pedophilia or Lolita, his matter-of-fact tone shifts into rich, indulgent language, which amplifies the aesthetic appeal of Humbert’s nymphets as the jury reads along. For instance, in the scene where Humbert becomes aroused by Lolita spreading herself over Humbert, his recountance of the incidence is so complex and enthralling, in hopes that the jury can feel empathy for his lust for Lolita. He paints Lolita as: “She wore that day a pretty print dress that I had seen on her once before, ample in the skirt, tight in the bodice, short sleeved, [...] and was holding in her hollowed hands a beautiful, banal, Eden-red apple” (Nabokov 57). The poetic elements in Humbert’s description, such as alliteration (pretty print, short sleeved, hollowed hands), parallelism (ample in the skirt, tight in the bodice) manipulates Lolita’s otherwise indecent description into a piece of art, exceeding beyond the moral values that prohibit other people, such as the jury, from enjoying the allure of nymphets.

Ian McEwan utilises allusion of Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita to depict the relationship between Paul Marshall and Lola Quincey. The reader is aware of this allusion through the naming of Lola Quincey, similar to the protagonist of Lolita. This allusion foreshadows the rape of Lola, Paul is not convicted when Briony claims that she “saw him [Robbie],” with her own two eyes. McEwan uses this allusion to portray how Briony’s imagination convinces her that Paul Marshall is innocent while Robbie Turner is the criminal.

Vladimir Nabokov, one of the 20th century’s greatest writers, is a highly aesthetic writer. Most of his work shows an amazing interest in and talent for language. He deceptively uses language in Lolita to mask and make the forbidden divine. Contextually, Lolita may be viewed as a novel about explicit sexual desire. However, it is the illicit desire of a stepfather for his 12-year old stepdaughter. The novel’s subject inevitably conjures up expectations of pornography, but there in not a single obscene term in Lolita. Nabokov portrays erotic scenes and sensual images with a poetic sensibility that belies the underlying meaning of the words. The beautiful manipulation of language coerces one to understand Humbert’s interdict act of