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Vladimir Nabokov: Lolita

Peder

On p.3, of the foreword, John Ray, Jr. writes that "Humbert Humbert, their author, has died in legal captivity, of coronary thrombosis, on November 16, 1952, a few days before his trial was scheduled to start." On the next page he referrs to the manuscript as a "memoir". Now the very defination of Memoir is :a historical account or biography written from personal knowledge or special sources. /or/ :an autobiogrphy or a written account of one's memory of certain events or people.

Now, on p.40 Chap.11 HH speaks of a pocket diary from 1947 that was destroyed five years ago, but reproduced by him from photographic memory. Remember the book Charlotte found?

Five years ago. 1947--1952.

So coupled with your observation on the 56 days ago he began writing.................thats it.
 
Pontalba

I thought you might mention that diary. :eek:

But, I never said it would be easy.:rolleyes:

So, back to the drawing board. :(

And Lolita == bruised peach? Definitely! :)

Peder
 
:D
Peder
p.71..."That journal of mine is no more; but I have considered it my artistic duty to preserve its intonations no matter how false and brutal they may seem to me now. Fortunately, my story has reached a point where I can cease insulting poor Charlotte for the sake of retrospective verisimilitude."

So, perhaps......both?

More Later.
 
pontalba said:
:D
Peder
p.71..."That journal of mine is no more; but I have considered it my artistic duty to preserve its intonations no matter how false and brutal they may seem to me now. Fortunately, my story has reached a point where I can cease insulting poor Charlotte for the sake of retrospective verisimilitude."

So, perhaps......both?

More Later.
Click to expand...

Yes pontalba, both can be mixed in. Exactly as you prove! :)
That's how you convinced me they would be difficult to sort out. :(

But in looking, I found a great single line. Which I of course can't find now again. But they are driving along in the car when they run over a squirrel.
Lolita says "Too bad." Or something equally brief and apparently uncaring.
Now, after all this reading, it has to be a wry comment by Lolita about her own situation. Humbert runs over Lolita, "Too bad."

Peder gets some sleep,
Too tired!
CU tmw
Peder
 
Peder
Last night I looked for your squashed squirrel, but couldn't find it. At that point, I was too tired to look further. But perhaps Lolita did in fact take that attitude.

btw, my Nabokov order came yesterday evening.....:D
 
pontalba said:
Peder
Last night I looked for your squashed squirrel, but couldn't find it. At that point, I was too tired to look further. But perhaps Lolita did in fact take that attitude.

btw, my Nabokov order came yesterday evening.....:D
Click to expand...

Pontalba,
I've started at the front again, (still) looking for traces of remorse in the parts of the book that are clearly 'memoir' rather than 'diary' according to the clear distinction that you point out. And clearly enough the book has much the tone of a memoir about it, but I haven't found the 'remorseful' phrases that I have been looking to find (yet, to p.52). However, in the runup to the couch scene, I found myself laughing at some of VN's wonderful sentences.

Big Haze in a mocking motherly tone, when Humbert mentioned a mustache he was thinking of growing: "Better don't if somebody is not to go absolutely dotty."

Continuing, after Lo storms away from the tablw: "Would it bore you very much," quoth Haze, "to come with us tomorrow for a swim in Our Glass Lake if Lo apologizes for her manners?" (HAH!)

Humbert, when he is tryibg to sense whether Lo is in the house: "Is she still brushing her teeth (the only sanitary act she performs with real zest)?

Big Haze saying, when Little Lo jumps into the car for their shopping trip: "It is intolerable that a child should be so ill-mannered. And so persevering. When she knows she is unwanted. And needs a bath."

Poor kid! Everyone picking on her!

And at the couch scene, it is clearer than ever that she is the instigator and clearly in the mood and available for play.

But I'm sure I'll find the squirrel in the road someplace, although maybe this time the car will miss him and he'll be gone, along with the quote. :)

And btw to you too, my Nabokov order arrived this morning :p :) :)

CU later,
Peder
 
In all their time together, did Lo and HH ever celebrate a holiday or a birthday? I don't remember mention of any of these things.
 
StillILearn
You know, I don't remember any at all. Hmmm. There was one mention of Lo's birthday coming up soon.......January 1, 1947.....but thats all that comes to mind.
Tis a puzzlement.....
 
I wonder if I am the only one that doesn't know how Lolita was able to write to HH. I've just gone over that section again, and maybe I am just not seeing it, but I don't know how she got his address. He received a letter from the lawyer he'd used in Ramsdale, one John Farlow regarding his quitting of the country and inquiring of Dolly's whereabouts at the same time he received Lo's letter. :confused:
 
StillILearn said:
In all their time together, did Lo and HH ever celebrate a holiday or a birthday? I don't remember mention of any of these things.
Click to expand...
StillILearn,
Not that I remember either. The dates are mentioned, but in connection with other events. It took me a very determined search once, for Lo's birthday, to discover on p81 that:

"On Lo's twelfth, January 1, 1947 Charlotte Haze, nee Becker, had underlined the following epithets ....." in filling out an annual checklist about her daughter's development.

Christmas Day 1952 is also mentioned early on
, p4, when she and her child died in childbirth,
but otherwise I only found fleeting references to her age, and no birthday parties.

And then as if to answer your question, the book fell open to p198, [the spirit of VN himself at work here :)] where there was one almost-Christmas party but for a different purpose.

On p 198 she catches a bad chill "around Christmas" and "as soon as she was well again, I threw a Party with Boys" which didn't go well. On the next page "January was humid and warm ...For her birthday I bought her a bicycle... and added to this A History of Modern American Painting."

And there may be a few more equally vague references.

But funny you should ask, because earlier I was thinking of posting how she had just spent her Christmas day. She was sitting on the floor alongside the tree, with two new subscription issues to Gulp! and Gasp! magazines alongside her, while she squealed over her first lipstick and held up the new fancy things she had bought with her own money at "Twelve 'n Undies." Charlotte was telling her "Dolores Haze, for the third time, ne montrez pas vos zhambes." And Humbert, who, seemed like he was having a heart attack, excused himself, although it wasn't clear whether it was from the bad French or the frilly new thongs. :rolleyes:

Hope your Holiday went as well. :)
Peder
 
Yes, I am here.....

Peder
Um, given HH's proclivities, I think we know the answer to that lil ole question. But then of course, anything is possible....not probable, but possible, just. :D (I mean of course, the thong vs. lousy french options)

Now, what about an answer to my question? Did I miss something as glaring as the giving out of HH's address?? :confused: :eek:
 
pontalba said:
PederNow, what about an answer to my question? Did I miss something as glaring as the giving out of HH's address?? :confused: :eek:
Click to expand...
Um, no, Pontalba,
I don't think you missed anything. I recall being a little puzzled when I read it also. But who knows what mysteries lurk in the heart of VN's writing? The Shadow knows .....Oops! wrong thread!
Or maybe my book might again fall open to an informative page. :D

Or, seriously, just possibly the answer might suddenly appear elsewhere, as it did when I found out what those two Frenchmen shouted out when they came across young Humbert and Annabelle(?) on the beach.

"Allez-y! Allez-y!" ('Onward, onward' in my fractured French spelling and vocabulary? Anyone?)

I also remember being puzzled how Lolita could ask him to write to her after she had just said she couldn't give him her address.(!) At first I thought "Typical Lo!" but then there was an answer, even if Humbert actually did decide to track her down instead,

So despair not,
Nor lose faith in thy eyesight,
It may surface.
(He says not very hopefully :D)
Or maybe it was one of those forwarding addresses he left 'way back?
Puzzled as you are :)
Peder
 
Thank you for this, Peder. Makes me want to reread the book again!

But funny you should ask, because earlier I was thinking of posting how she had just spent her Christmas day. She was sitting on the floor alongside the tree, with two new subscription issues to Gulp! and Gasp! magazines alongside her, while she squealed over her first lipstick and held up the new fancy things she had bought with her own money at "Twelve 'n Undies." Charlotte was telling her "Dolores Haze, for the third time, ne montrez pas vos zhambes." And Humbert, who, seemed like he was having a heart attack, excused himself, although it wasn't clear whether it was from the bad French or the frilly new thongs.
Click to expand...
:D

In reference to her birthdays, I just remember him worrying that she might have grown an inch or two or maybe gained some weight. HH may have had the first documented case of Munchausen's Anorexia by Proxy.
 
peder to the rescue! :) Peder Man has kept pontalba from losing her fragile grip on reality.....:D :p I kept going over and over that section, thinking surely I'd missed it. You may be right, it could be simply a vague mention (VN's speciality!) somewhere back there.
 
pontalba said:
... a vague mention (VN's speciality!) somewhere back there.
Click to expand...
Pontalba,
Specialty indeed! ROTFLOL :D And you got that location right also! :D
Just to get your rmind onto other things, have you found where he lost the eyeglasses that were found, or mentioned, on the beach later in the book? Just helping, just helping! :rolleyes:

StillILearn,
Anorexia by Proxy! Good one! More ROTFLOL :D From the way she downed gooey fountain concoctions (at least one mentioned) it sounds like weight hasn't crossed her mind yet, at all! Oh, the years of youth! Nor, come to think of it, is there any mention of her watching any other part of her body. :rolleyes: Ya' think she is even as old as Humbert claims? :eek: Or are nymphets always, er, ahem, ..... sleek? :eek:

I have been sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeppppppppppppping like there is no tomorrow. /yawn. Pardon me/
Think I have to go walkaround,
CU later
Peder
 
pontalba said:
mutter, mutter, curse, curse.............sunglasses indeed. lost.....found.....bah!
Click to expand...
Pontalba
Didn't mean to drive you to distraction. /biting fingernails :(/ Since I raised the question I should at least answer half of it to provide the first hint, namely where they are referred to as found. Then with four eyes looking we might be able to find where they were lost. But that would be a Nabokovian coup wouldn't it? Finding something that was never lost? Aaaarrrrgggghhhh!
So here I go looking,
I'll shout if I find anything, :)
Peder
 
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