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Vladimir Nabokov: Lolita
- Thread starter Love4OneAnother
- Start date
pontalba
Well-Known Member
Peder
Well Now...........
Its entirely possible, but later on while HH was shooting up the place and incidently Q, Q shouted out that he was impotent. True or false? Perhaps he was a voyeur. We can fairly safely assume that in Q's circle there was a great deal of drinking and some form of drugs perhaps. That can have a certain 'deadening' effect.
Oh btw, the poster in Lolita's room did have Q smoking Drone (brand name?) cigarettes.........so that was the first reference. It was mentioned later down the line that was the brand that Q smoked. The same poster that she'd scrawled HH on?
Well Now...........
Its entirely possible, but later on while HH was shooting up the place and incidently Q, Q shouted out that he was impotent. True or false? Perhaps he was a voyeur. We can fairly safely assume that in Q's circle there was a great deal of drinking and some form of drugs perhaps. That can have a certain 'deadening' effect.
Oh btw, the poster in Lolita's room did have Q smoking Drone (brand name?) cigarettes.........so that was the first reference. It was mentioned later down the line that was the brand that Q smoked. The same poster that she'd scrawled HH on?
SFG75
Well-Known Member
Yes, her devilish nature wasn't a secret to her friends!. That line among others lets you know that she is hardly the innocent nymphet H.H. pretends her to be. Who can forget her romp with that dullard Charlie? She confesses that to H.H., but it's clear that after that point, she is more than *worldy* You also get the feeling that when she is hospitalized by H.H., that the nurses are in on the conspiracy to get her away from H.H. They constantly accost him whenever they see him and they are work very hard to make certain that he isn't around after visiting hours. He in particular mentions a black haired nurse that he found to be most disagreeable.
Peder
Well-Known Member
pontalba said:
Well now, indeed, Pontalba, ahem,
Let me start with the less 'complicated' part of the answer.
Yes Q was smoking a Drome in that ad, short for Dromedary, Nabokov's pun for the Camel brand name. And Drome always cracks me up, thinking of that.
But, no, she scrawled HH's initials on the other real-life. actual ad, with the man in the bathrobe and the Irish eyes (are smiling?), which Nabokov doesn't say, but which I am virtually certain, was an ad for a Viyella fabric bathrobe. (From the picture of the ad in Appel's notes) Had one of those myself, from my LW a long time ago. So. there were the two pictures of the two men, one above the other, in Lo's bedroom early on as you say. And as we say "Had we but known then..."
On the other topic I am far from an expert. But I like your analysis, and especially of HH's (lack of) marksmanship.
In any event, I was only counting time by the clock.Humbert took a long walk down to the town in the valley, and back, as I recall. It would seem reasonable that he was gone maybe half an hour for any reasonable length walk. But he was certainly gone at least 10 minutes! Soooooo, doing a quick mental camculation, . . . . . I asked.
This is turning into a very modern discussion of the book. Nabokov should have calculated his times a little more closely, to allow less wiggle room.
Especially with a girl like little Lo. Peder
StillILearn
New Member
I read that part today too. They have their first sexual encounter (three times, according to HH), he later tells her that she can't call her mother because her mother is dead, and then he buys her some sanitary napkins. Meanwhile, he is feeling sorry for himself because this all probably means no more sex for him that day.
Peder
Well-Known Member
Revisionism run amok!
Early on, in other discussions, I used to be the one who preferred to think of Lolita as the innocent nymphet. But I have to say that, in these further rereadings in this forum, the evidence is mounting that makes that position very hard to maintain.
In addition, it is now clearer than ever to me that the nurses were forming a protective shield around her, again as you say. Including preventing Humbert from reading that letter on her tray. So yes the 'fix' was definitely in!
Coupled with pontalba's mitigating facts about Humbert's hospitalizations that she found, I also have to start thinking about him somewhat differently, with a somewhat more complicated personality than I originally thought.
So this whole discussion is giving me a rather different picture of the book and all its characters than I came in with.
I think that's great!
And I am glad you reminded me of the discussion,
Mne tnx
Peder
SFGSFG75 said:
Early on, in other discussions, I used to be the one who preferred to think of Lolita as the innocent nymphet. But I have to say that, in these further rereadings in this forum, the evidence is mounting that makes that position very hard to maintain.
In addition, it is now clearer than ever to me that the nurses were forming a protective shield around her, again as you say. Including preventing Humbert from reading that letter on her tray. So yes the 'fix' was definitely in!
Coupled with pontalba's mitigating facts about Humbert's hospitalizations that she found, I also have to start thinking about him somewhat differently, with a somewhat more complicated personality than I originally thought.
So this whole discussion is giving me a rather different picture of the book and all its characters than I came in with.
I think that's great!
And I am glad you reminded me of the discussion,
Mne tnx
Peder
SFG75
Well-Known Member
Let me just say that I have learned a lot from this great discussion. I'm thrilled that you've come back Peder, as well as having Pontalba here. It has certainly been a treat to be involved in this thread, as well as to sit and read the interaction between you two and compare notes.
Pontalba mentioned a part where Quilty mentions his impotency to H.H. my first thought is this-why? Did he think that if he did not rape Lo as H.H. did that he would go easy on him? And if that is the case(i.e.-his impotency) then why did he offer H.H. sex slaves and his house? If Quilty truly was just saving Lo from that evil pedophile of a man and had such noble intentions, then why doesn't his life in the mansion reflect it? Was he a man of the cloth? What indication exists that he is anything but a carbon-copy of H.H.?
Speaking of the cloth, did you guys read of the part where N has H.H. mention that he was indebted to a priest of the Catholic faith for listening to him? All that H.H. says is that the priest heard him out but in the end, nothing he could do would bring back Lo's childhood. Page 283 carries a poignant, yet pithy verse
--
The moral sense in mortals is the duty
We have to pay on mortal sense of beauty
--
Pontalba mentioned a part where Quilty mentions his impotency to H.H. my first thought is this-why? Did he think that if he did not rape Lo as H.H. did that he would go easy on him? And if that is the case(i.e.-his impotency) then why did he offer H.H. sex slaves and his house? If Quilty truly was just saving Lo from that evil pedophile of a man and had such noble intentions, then why doesn't his life in the mansion reflect it? Was he a man of the cloth? What indication exists that he is anything but a carbon-copy of H.H.?
Speaking of the cloth, did you guys read of the part where N has H.H. mention that he was indebted to a priest of the Catholic faith for listening to him? All that H.H. says is that the priest heard him out but in the end, nothing he could do would bring back Lo's childhood. Page 283 carries a poignant, yet pithy verse
--
The moral sense in mortals is the duty
We have to pay on mortal sense of beauty
--
StillILearn
New Member
More thoughts: I can't believe how well this book has aged. Although there are so many allusions to specific things that happened back in the forties and fifties, it could as well have been written yesterday. Also, I'm astonished at how much detail and information Nabokov managed to squeeze into just about three hundred pages. One doesn't dare to drift off for even an instant.
And, I'm so very grateful to have all of you to obsess with about this book!
Interestingly (as I've mentioned), I'm spending a a fair amount of time with my twelve year old granddaughter right now, and I can't help but try see how she or her friends might compare to Humbert Humbert's Lo. Simply, I really don't see a comparison -- well, other than the way in which he catches the apparent worldliness and the actual naivete of this age group. I truly believe that most of the twelve year old girls I know are just not Lolita material. These girls might break a window with a rock and flag down a police car. They'd probably find a way to dial 911. But they would be incapable of spending a year on the road playing cat and mouse with a man like this. They'd be destroyed.
This doesn't destroy the story for me! I will suspend my disbelief and go along with the genius of Nabokov. I'd hate to miss the ride!
And, I'm so very grateful to have all of you to obsess with about this book!
Interestingly (as I've mentioned), I'm spending a a fair amount of time with my twelve year old granddaughter right now, and I can't help but try see how she or her friends might compare to Humbert Humbert's Lo. Simply, I really don't see a comparison -- well, other than the way in which he catches the apparent worldliness and the actual naivete of this age group. I truly believe that most of the twelve year old girls I know are just not Lolita material. These girls might break a window with a rock and flag down a police car. They'd probably find a way to dial 911. But they would be incapable of spending a year on the road playing cat and mouse with a man like this. They'd be destroyed.
This doesn't destroy the story for me! I will suspend my disbelief and go along with the genius of Nabokov. I'd hate to miss the ride!
pontalba
Well-Known Member
SFG I think Quilty was simply throwing anything at HH that he could think of that he hoped might possibly work and stave HH off. Of course it wouldn't make any difference if Q was impotent or not, as I am certain he had other, umm, tricks up his sleeve. The exchange that really went over my head the first reading was at The Enchanted Hunters, first stop on HH's hit parade at the top of p.127 Q's little exchange with HH is about the most ironic, sad, funny exchange in the whole thing (in retrospect).
First of all however Lo spotted Quilty on p.121, and drew HH's attention to him.
Peder! Dromes equal Camels!! I didn't get that connection!! Good-o! Glad you have nicked onto Lolita's true nature. I did not like her from the beginning, but not liking someone doesn't mean they are good or bad, they just are not ones cup of tea. She was manipulative by nature, but HH put her into a corner where she was forced to hone those instincts to a much finer point. Some girls would have simply cracked. She survived. Which is an admirable quality.
Which really makes her death so outrageously wasteful!!!!!!!
First of all however Lo spotted Quilty on p.121, and drew HH's attention to him.
Peder! Dromes equal Camels!! I didn't get that connection!! Good-o!
Glad you have nicked onto Lolita's true nature. I did not like her from the beginning, but not liking someone doesn't mean they are good or bad, they just are not ones cup of tea. She was manipulative by nature, but HH put her into a corner where she was forced to hone those instincts to a much finer point. Some girls would have simply cracked. She survived. Which is an admirable quality.Which really makes her death so outrageously wasteful!!!!!!!
pontalba
Well-Known Member
Plus, I cannot express how much I am enjoying all of the feed back from all of you guys! You've made me look at deeper aspects of the story than I did before. The first time, I was so outraged at the advantage taken of Lolita by Humbert, I was blinded to many of the layers than good ole VN wove.
You've made me look at deeper aspects of the story than I did before. The first time, I was so outraged at the advantage taken of Lolita by Humbert, I was blinded to many of the layers than good ole VN wove.
pontalba
Well-Known Member
StillILearn said:
One thing that has not been addressed so far is VN's assertion of the existance of 'nymphets'. If you read the second to last paragraph on p/16, you will find HH's ideas on the subject. Follow onto the next page and this is enlarged upon. Now note on p.17 near the middle that he says "A normal man given a group photograph of school girls or Girl Scouts and asked to point out the comeliest one will not necessarily choose the nymphet among them. You have to be an artist and a madman a creature of infinite melancholy......" Now I have to say that some young girls do, quite innocently, perhaps give that impression, but some not so innocently. Maybe they have seen the power they can wield, without understanding what fire they are playing with. I think that is how Lolita started out with HH. She was imitating movies she'd seen of 'romances'. Or even something she had seen of her mothers relationships.
SFG75
Well-Known Member
pontalba said:Plus, I cannot express how much I am enjoying all of the feed back from all of you guys!
Oh tell me about it!. When I first joined TBF, I would notice the book title next to a given member's "currently reading" header and would wonder what in the world the given member saw in the book.
O.k., so it's a story about an older man and a younger girl...blah..blah..blah. Not until recently have I seen the intricate web of story telling that Nabokov weaves, the beauty of the language as Peder pointed out previously, not to mention the joy of figuring out the whole-- "What happened when" aspect of the book.
Peder
Well-Known Member
SFG
I haven't gotten as far as that final meeting between HH and Q, and I see you have much more fresh detail than I recall, but Quilty is a guy I don't (yet) think I'll much be revising my opinion about.
In fact, I will rely on Lolita's revulsion at the things he asked her to do, for my opinion that he was pure and simple a vulgar obscene exploitative humanly degrading and brutal pornographer. His demands were so physically disgusting to her that she didn't even want to talk about them after she got away from him.
I never got the impression that Lolita was revolted or disgusted by Humbert's relations with her, even though we are. His descriptions and complaints are more that she ignored him, as I remember it. While he was having his pleasure, she was chewing gum and reading a magazine, totally oblivious to any sexuality going on. In fact, she would occasionally chase him away and seemingly he would comply, instead of simply overpowering her and forcing his way. Their relation seems more to have been one of negotiated fees, rather than physical domination and subjugation, strange as that may sound to say.
I think her complaint with Humbert was mainly that he was confining her and preventing her from having and enjoying a life with other people and children her own age, doing all the things that any child of her age would be doing (including, no doubt, even having sex of her own choosing). Humbert describes her happiness at being able to teach another child how to jump rope, for example. And then OTOH there is a pathetic scene where he drags her away from a conversation she is enjoying with another child, so that he can have sex with her. That is just so horrible to me, but nevertheless her reaction to Quilty seems so much worse.
So while Humbert is nothing at all to write home about, it seems to me that Quilty is infinitely worse, if we are going to compare shades of black and evil. I don't know how else to put it.
Peder
I haven't gotten as far as that final meeting between HH and Q, and I see you have much more fresh detail than I recall, but Quilty is a guy I don't (yet) think I'll much be revising my opinion about.
In fact, I will rely on Lolita's revulsion at the things he asked her to do, for my opinion that he was pure and simple a vulgar obscene exploitative humanly degrading and brutal pornographer. His demands were so physically disgusting to her that she didn't even want to talk about them after she got away from him.
I never got the impression that Lolita was revolted or disgusted by Humbert's relations with her, even though we are. His descriptions and complaints are more that she ignored him, as I remember it. While he was having his pleasure, she was chewing gum and reading a magazine, totally oblivious to any sexuality going on. In fact, she would occasionally chase him away and seemingly he would comply, instead of simply overpowering her and forcing his way. Their relation seems more to have been one of negotiated fees, rather than physical domination and subjugation, strange as that may sound to say.
I think her complaint with Humbert was mainly that he was confining her and preventing her from having and enjoying a life with other people and children her own age, doing all the things that any child of her age would be doing (including, no doubt, even having sex of her own choosing). Humbert describes her happiness at being able to teach another child how to jump rope, for example. And then OTOH there is a pathetic scene where he drags her away from a conversation she is enjoying with another child, so that he can have sex with her. That is just so horrible to me, but nevertheless her reaction to Quilty seems so much worse.
So while Humbert is nothing at all to write home about, it seems to me that Quilty is infinitely worse, if we are going to compare shades of black and evil. I don't know how else to put it.
Peder
Peder
Well-Known Member
Good thought pontalba!pontalba said:
Not to mention the computerized signs along the highways where news flashes of abducted children can instantly appear statewide, with personal descriptions, automobile descriptions, license plate numbers or whatever. And computerized police cars that can electronically check centralized databases instantly. Wow!
Humbert's blue Melmoth wouldn't have had a chance! (One would hope.)
And now that you mention it, computerized technology is one thing that Nabokov just couldn't have imagined. And that void in his book dates it so completely!
People will one day, if not already, wonder how such a story could even be possible, the omission will be so glaring!
In the book it is only the roadside telephone which saves her. (Telephone? What's that? Didn't she have a cell phone?! Every six year old has one! Implanted into their shoulder, for pete's sake! And permanently connected to their ear. And always on, for anything they might say.)
What a thought you raise pontalba!
Egad! The book is turning into a quaint museum piece.
Boggles the mind,
Peder
StillILearn
New Member
pontalba said:
We need to remember that everything we know about Lolita has been filtered through HH's perverted eyes. Remember when the police stopped them and Lolita acted so terrified? HH had already terrorized her. And even he admits that she cried every single night after she thought he had gone to sleep. He also tells us that he'd promise to let her spend time with friends (or pay her) in exchange for sexual acts, then he'd take the money or the promises back. He's the one who tells us that she found no pleasure in having sex with him. He tells us that he feared that she was trying to save up 'as much as fifty dollars' in order to run away from him and that he searched for and stole her pathetic savings while she was at school. Humbert Humbert is the one who tells us that she had absolutely no one else to turn to. To Lolita even Quilty looked like a savior -- at first.
pontalba
Well-Known Member
Peder said:
You know it can be looked at either way---VN focuses so deeply on the emotional/psycological aspects that the surroundings are in a way only background, or 'white noise'. Lolita's personality played into his obsession, or played it so well, that in spite of the very true and heartrending aspects that you, StillILearn speak of in your excellent post there was something in Lolita that stayed. Yes, she could have jumped out of the car, she could have told the counselors at Beardsley, she could have escaped in any number of ways. But she didn't. I do not in any way mean to imply that she enjoyed the attentions of HH. No Way. However, there must have been some aspects of the 'journey' that she did enjoy. I know HH held the orphanage over her head, but surely she could have seen while at Beardsley that was not a viable option. She was not stupid. She thought she could outwit him, and in the end she did, but to her own detriment. There were more productive ways for her to have outwitted him.
I'm rambling, its time for me to fix my morning tea............
Peder
Well-Known Member
For the moment I am in total confusion, which is going to last until tomorrow. I have read through Humbert's parting with Lo, which is about as I remembered it (tear-jerking and all), But, when Humbert leaves and starts out after his nemesis, not yet even named for the reader, other than as Cue, he also begins a long interior monologue on p 281 with the words:
"I reviewed my case. Previous attempts seemed out of focus by comparison"
Maybe I'm just too foggy-brained, but all his words left me more out of focus by comparison. Tomorrow I will have to start a re-read within a re-read to try to penetrate the haze (no pun) of his ramblings. He does end on p 287, however, (if that is the end) saying:
"It had become gradually clear to my conventional Lolita during our singular and bestial cohabitation that even the most miserable of family lives was better than the parody of incest which, in the long run, was the best I could offer the waif."
So that sounds like a comment on why she chose to stay with Richard Shiller, in a 'miserable' family life from H's perspective, and not come back to him, Humbert. And also a comment why she wanted out, before that, during their 'bestial cohabitation.' But with what miserable family life in mind as the alternative, then? She hadn't yet met Richard Shiller. I'm confused. That's one of Nabokov's sentences that I just can't parse to a clear meaning.
Here, at the end, when I thought things would be clarifying, I find them getting muddier. I think I need a long night's sleep to get my wits back about me.
--
His parting from her seemed relatively straightforward, however, even if excruciatingly tender. He was hoping against hope to get her back. And she realized "all at once," for the very first time, that he "had known and adored every pore and follicle of her pubescent body." And, realizing that, it took her but a moment while she "reflected, pondered upon, and dismissed" their "poor romance." Swish, that fast did the blade of the guillotine fall on Humbert's fondest memories, which to her were "like a dull party, like a rainy picnic to which only the dullest bores had come, like a humdrum exercise, like a bit of dry mud caking on her childhood."
He had seen his doom pronounced, but in the middle of her asking him not to be dense, and saying that the past was the past, he also heard her say, too late, that at least "I had been a good father, she guessed."
Which is a much better comment than Quilty (still unnamed) gets. Describing their final break, she says:
"I said no, I am not going to [souffler] your beastly boys, because I want only you. Well, he kicked me out."
"He was the only man she had ever been crazy about" and he undoubtedly knew it. But when she wouldn't peform sex acts with strangers -- for him, for his pleasure, for the camera -- he kicked her out. Some guy!
One finally realizes that this is a novel in which not a single character survives, or even finally achieves happiness before they die. Such a waste of so many human lives did their destinies produce.
Peder
"I reviewed my case. Previous attempts seemed out of focus by comparison"
Maybe I'm just too foggy-brained, but all his words left me more out of focus by comparison. Tomorrow I will have to start a re-read within a re-read to try to penetrate the haze (no pun) of his ramblings. He does end on p 287, however, (if that is the end) saying:
"It had become gradually clear to my conventional Lolita during our singular and bestial cohabitation that even the most miserable of family lives was better than the parody of incest which, in the long run, was the best I could offer the waif."
So that sounds like a comment on why she chose to stay with Richard Shiller, in a 'miserable' family life from H's perspective, and not come back to him, Humbert. And also a comment why she wanted out, before that, during their 'bestial cohabitation.' But with what miserable family life in mind as the alternative, then? She hadn't yet met Richard Shiller. I'm confused. That's one of Nabokov's sentences that I just can't parse to a clear meaning.
Here, at the end, when I thought things would be clarifying, I find them getting muddier. I think I need a long night's sleep to get my wits back about me.
--
His parting from her seemed relatively straightforward, however, even if excruciatingly tender. He was hoping against hope to get her back. And she realized "all at once," for the very first time, that he "had known and adored every pore and follicle of her pubescent body." And, realizing that, it took her but a moment while she "reflected, pondered upon, and dismissed" their "poor romance." Swish, that fast did the blade of the guillotine fall on Humbert's fondest memories, which to her were "like a dull party, like a rainy picnic to which only the dullest bores had come, like a humdrum exercise, like a bit of dry mud caking on her childhood."
He had seen his doom pronounced, but in the middle of her asking him not to be dense, and saying that the past was the past, he also heard her say, too late, that at least "I had been a good father, she guessed."
Which is a much better comment than Quilty (still unnamed) gets. Describing their final break, she says:
"I said no, I am not going to [souffler] your beastly boys, because I want only you. Well, he kicked me out."
"He was the only man she had ever been crazy about" and he undoubtedly knew it. But when she wouldn't peform sex acts with strangers -- for him, for his pleasure, for the camera -- he kicked her out. Some guy!
One finally realizes that this is a novel in which not a single character survives, or even finally achieves happiness before they die. Such a waste of so many human lives did their destinies produce.
Peder
pontalba
Well-Known Member
Peder
'Tis rather depressing when you realize that nobody got out alive....... But otoh, HH really did the world a favor by getting rid of a slime ball like Quilty. What really slays me is that Lolita in the end after all the shouting was over actually preferred Quilty!! Ye Gods!
But as to your thoughts on this:
""It had become gradually clear to my conventional Lolita during our singular and bestial cohabitation that even the most miserable of family lives was better than the parody of incest which, in the long run, was the best I could offer the waif."
I don't think it referred to her marriage at all. I would have to suppose she meant literally that any miserable, crummy 'family life' was better than what she had with HH. Well, I could argue with that, as there are/were things that would even more terrible, but she wasn't far wrong.
'Tis rather depressing when you realize that nobody got out alive.......
But otoh, HH really did the world a favor by getting rid of a slime ball like Quilty. What really slays me is that Lolita in the end after all the shouting was over actually preferred Quilty!! Ye Gods! But as to your thoughts on this:
""It had become gradually clear to my conventional Lolita during our singular and bestial cohabitation that even the most miserable of family lives was better than the parody of incest which, in the long run, was the best I could offer the waif."
I don't think it referred to her marriage at all. I would have to suppose she meant literally that any miserable, crummy 'family life' was better than what she had with HH. Well, I could argue with that, as there are/were things that would even more terrible, but she wasn't far wrong.