Vladimir Nabokov: Lolita

[pontalba]

Oh StillILearn of the ever mutating avatar!
said:

one might say that OJ loved Nicole with all his heart and soul. In fact, I'm quite certain that he must have.

Huh?? IMO not the same difference.

But then I can still see OJ running like a gazelle down the football field tearing up the opposition. As I said before, I tend to believe the best of people. My mother used to say, expect the worst, and maybe you'll be pleasently surprised. I must be a fool, because I expect the best and see the best in people.

 

[Peder]

Maybe I read it in Reading Lolita in Tehran? I certainly hope I didn't make it up. Or, worse yet, dream it!

StillILearn,
Don't recall it from RLiT, but that was a long time ago.
Dream it? Entirely possible Works for me!
I'll call the Baker Street Irregulars (odd there isn't a similar organization for VN)
Peder

 

[SFG75]

Forgive me for resurrecting an old post that is now five thread pages old, but with a computer virus knocking me out for a week, I have a lot of ground to cover. Let me begin by saying......

Okay, okay, so I feel just the tiniest litle bit sorry for him now. And since he's dead, I guess I can stop shrieking, "Lynch him!"

Yes, as the adult he had a sense of ethics and knowingly chose to violate it, not only that, but to do so repeatedly.

HH was a fourteen year-old in a grown man's body.

Really?.....was he really? Don't women try and look younger all the time? Facial creams, hair coloring, not to mention nips/tucks/lord knows what else to achieve the youthful look? And yes, I'm certain Lo looked her age, but are there not adults who get questioned by bouncers outside of bars and they are 35 or so? We have social friends who certainly fall into this category. Is it really H.H.'s maturity or is it Lo somehow fitting a schema of what H.H.(or other men) are attracted to? In other words, did Lo possess some quality that was young, yet alluring to males around her? I'm not so certain that he was mentally 14 years old, but defintely his moral development was lacking-inspite of his great education.

 

[SFG75]

Now as to Lo herself. She is as I originally thought a controlling/manipulative little brat. Howsomever... put into that situation...she did good! And to change my original opinion, I think that she would have matured into a well-adjusted, excellent mother. After all, she knew what to look for didn't she?

Hmmmmmmm, stable environment and loving parents=a less flirty girl who won't straddle male guests on the sofa. I don't know, but something about her actions a million pages ago leads me to conclude that she was very *assertive* and that perhaps it's more "nature" than "nurture" when it comes to her development and overall temperment. Undoubtedly, Big Haze did a horrendous job and fell completely flat on her face trying to discipline her, but I'm not certain that a stable enviornment would've had her less "needy"

 

[Peder]

Did Lo possess some quality that was young, yet alluring to males around her? I'm not so certain that he was mentally 14 years old, but defintely his moral development was lacking-inspite of his great education.

SFG,
Glad to see that you have vanquished your virus, or that at least it has given you permission to post.
I hate to say that your question is probably going to sound like the she-was-asking-for-it defense used by males for raping women of any age who dress or act in the least provocatively.
However I wil HASTEN TO ADD that among child molesters, from what little I have read, you question is exactly to the point. That little I have read suggests there is a "dagerous age" for a young girl, an age where she is still young in their eyes, but just old enough to have the suggestion of womanhood about her. Namely that she is a (very) young woman. In that context I think there is the chance that was exactly what Humbert may have seen in her, and called it by the graceful term 'nymphet.'
Now let the shrieks begin,
Peder

 

[SFG75]

The more I think about her, the more I see different Lo's. Of course, I am also getting further from my last detailed read of Lolita, so my memory may be collapsing a considerable initial variety down to just a few remaining ideas. But I see Lo in three phases, or four.

First, she is the teenager in kids clothing -- a seventh grader as I just found out -- who fights with her mother and flirts with Humbert.

Second, she is the kid who begins to indulge her sexual curiosity at camp and later with Humbert at the Enchanted Hunters.

Third, she is the captive putting up with the demands of life in captivity and trying to escape.

Fourth, she is married.

Oh Peder, you have successfully reconciled a big problem that I've had in regards to Lo. Yes, Humbert is a creep and a pedophile. Yes, Quilty is in the same category, undeniably. Yet, I have this nagging though that she isn't so innocent herself. She's young, bats eye-lashes, and gets off the "hook" in terms of responsibility for her actions. Justt when this nagging thought keeps going, you post and.......bah!, you explained it perfectly as she goes from innocence, to naive *love* and molestation, to her ultimate downfall and imprisonment. Stages, it's all just stages.

 

[Peder]

Oh Peder, you have successfully reconciled a big problem that I've had in regards to Lo. Yes, Humbert is a creep and a pedophile. Yes, Quilty is in the same category, undeniably. Yet, I have this nagging though that she isn't so innocent herself. She's young, bats eye-lashes, and gets off the "hook" in terms of responsibility for her actions. Justt when this nagging thought keeps going, you post and.......bah!, you explained it perfectly as she goes from innocence, to naive *love* and molestation, to her ultimate downfall and imprisonment. Stages, it's all just stages.

Well SFG,
At least it makes a nice story, and one that I can believe. But the devil is in the details, as they say, and there are just so many details in Lolita that it is definitely going to take a reread to nail it down all around the edges and see that it fits as well as it sounds. (Some of her 'childish' flirting was really quite aggressive, in the couch scene for example.) But for myself, I definitely prefer very simple explanations, and that is about as simple as I can get it. So I am very glad it sounds right to you too. It's that teen-age period that's the killer! And where she met her doom.
Peder

 

[SFG75]

Yet another interesting morsel to chew over.

"Knowing" Lolita:Sexual deviance and normality in Nabokov's Lolita
Link

Interesting perspective, though I do need more time to sit down and digest it. Enjoy the evening Peder!.

 

[Peder]

Yet another interesting morsel to chew over.

"Knowing" Lolita:Sexual deviance and normality in Nabokov's Lolita
Link

Interesting perspective, though I do need more time to sit down and digest it. Enjoy the evening Peder!.

SFG,
Whoa, that's a long article! But from the first paragraphs, and the footnotes at the end (end notes?) it looks like the author has a very tightly argued thesis and one that will definitely be fascinating to read. It sounds somewhat like the two views of Lolita that have been heard in this discussion, and I didn't realize that VN had presented an alternative to Humbert's views in the novel. As another layer to be unraveled? I am going to be reading every word of that, for sure! And marking my copy of Lolita accordingly.
Many thanks for the link,
How do you find these things?
Peder

 

[pontalba]

SFG!
Nice to see you back, glad the virus is GWTW. That article you linked is just too, too, too wonderful! I have not finished it yet, by any means, and I know that it will take several readings, but wow!

We have not yet begun to Layer.....

I echo Peder...how and where do you find these things???

 

[SFG75]

In regards to the article-the garden of eden imagery through the use of Big Haze's garden and the various apples appearing throughout the front of the book is enough to make you want to hit your forehead with one of your hands. The sofa scene, the one with an alluring Big Haze uncoiling herself from the garden...how could I have missed it? Interesting to note that early reviews of the book agreed with Humbert's interpretation of her sexuality as being deviant.

How do I find it?, I do a google search and then connect "psychology" with "Lolita" or "Humbert"

 

[Peder]

In regards to the article-the garden of eden imagery through the use of Big Haze's garden and the various apples appearing throughout the front of the book is enough to make you want to hit your forehead with one of your hands. The sofa scene, the one with an alluring Big Haze uncoiling herself from the garden...how could I have missed it? Interesting to note that early reviews of the book agreed with Humbert's interpretation of her sexuality as being deviant.

How do I find it?, I do a google search and then connect "psychology" with "Lolita" or "Humbert"

SFG,
Oh, your first paragraph hints at the wonderful joys ahead!
But, more important thanks for your secret in searching. My searches have always turned up such ordinary things. OK, but ordinary.
Thank you,
Peder

 

[pontalba]

Hmmmmmmm, stable environment and loving parents=a less flirty girl who won't straddle male guests on the sofa. I don't know, but something about her actions a million pages ago leads me to conclude that she was very *assertive* and that perhaps it's more "nature" than "nurture" when it comes to her development and overall temperment. Undoubtedly, Big Haze did a horrendous job and fell completely flat on her face trying to discipline her, but I'm not certain that a stable enviornment would've had her less "needy"

Well, unless we could do a quick parallel universe scenario, we can't tell for sure. But I do think Lo would have been less needy and searching if she had had a stable enviorment to temper whatever nature she did have. Obviously she was very interested in sexual experimentation, but loving parents that were successful disciplinarians would/could/probably have made all the difference for her. I think by nature, Lo was someone that wanted to please, and given the helpful parameters of said parents, or parent, she'd have been ok in life.

Of course HH was the spanner in the works.

We could argue all day and night about nature vs nuture, but IMHO, they work together.

 

[Peder]

And oh man!
The early reviews agreeing with Humbert's view that her sexuality was deviant?
Do I hear someone saying 'It's a man's world, even when it is perverted?'
Wowee, wowee!
Boggles the mind!
Peder

 

[pontalba]

The bit about Humbert attempting to show how "normal" pedophilia was in Ancient Rome and Oriental cultures to excuse himself for his behavior was so twisted and typically "you made me do it'......or "everyone else does it.....

And yet when he went on in the book about it, he made it all sound perfectly normal. IOW, whats the matter with you that you don't believe me? Oy. Or we could even equate it to a rapist saying, well, look at how she's dressed! She asked for it. aaarrrggghhhhh............

Good is bad, and bad is good......

 

[SFG75]

And oh man!
The early reviews agreeing with Humbert's view that her sexuality was deviant?
Do I hear someone saying 'It's a man's world, even when it is perverted?'
Wowee, wowee!
Boggles the mind!
Peder

The early reviews section was very interesting. I've had some problems breaking out of the "lens" of H.H.'s perspective to some degree. The Lolita as a petite femme fatale was really something else. The subversive nature of the book was also missed by feminist critics according to the author. Nabokov's fooled legions number quite a few, glad to know I wasn't the first.

 

[StillILearn]

The early reviews section was very interesting. I've had some problems breaking out of the "lens" of H.H.'s perspective to some degree. The Lolita as a petite femme fatale was really something else. The subversive nature of the book was also missed by feminist critics according to the author. Nabokov's fooled legions number quite a few, glad to know I wasn't the first.

I just know I'm not gonna actually read that whole thang. I'm hoping and trusting that one of you Nabokovian scholars will fill me in on the bottom line gist of it all. Please? (My eyes just kinda glazed over when I did try to read it -- twice -- I promise!)

Is it saying that these Lolita-style nymphets actually do exist in America today?

 

[Peder]

Is it saying that these Lolita-style nymphets actually do exist in America today?

StillILearn
That is not exactly the way I would put it, based only on reading only the openiing paragraphs.

It looks to me as if the author is headed in the direction of claiming, with Kinsey, that development of sexuality in females is a normal thing and that it happens at the ages at which it happens. The author contrasts that view of the 'normalcy' of sexual curiosity and development to Humbert's suggestion that Lo was morally 'deviant' and abnormal in her interest in sex. (The same distinction is presumably true of males also, the subject of the first Kinsey report, but that is not the topic the author is discussing.)

So I wouldn't say that nymphets are all around us, especially not as sexually aggressive females of the sort that Humbert claimed Lolita was, i.e. the couch scene and the Enchanted Hunters. But sexually developing girls are certainly all around us. The question left unanswered in the opening paragraphs, as far as I can see, is whether the degree of sexual awakening and exploration seen in Lolita is prevalent among girls her age. If it were, then there would certainly be the (Kinsey) argument for its normalcy. Even if it were rare for such early interst, the author would argue, I would think, that it was still a normal interest of a growing girl, even if precocious, rather than symbolic of the development of a depraved child, such as whom Humbert claimed seduced him. Humbert's view of Lolita's sexuality, and the notion of singling her out as a nymphet is self serving and such as to shift the blame for his behavior onto her, whereas his behavior is properly to be viewed as the result of his own depravity in any and all cases.

Whether there might be sexually seductive and aggressive girls of Lolita's age who might be called nymphets is not something that I think the author is suggesting at all. So in that sense the answer to your question seems to be 'no.' (And BTW, I have never seen one.)

HOWEVER, that is only my reading of what I see in the opening paragraphs. I am eagerly looking forward to reading the entire article because it may develop differently, or I may simply be misunderstanding the author's opening, but in either case it is going to be interesting, and necessary, to see what he says in further detail before discussing the article in any serious way. Our own discussion of our own views, such as we have been having, need not wait until then, of course.

Peder

 

[SFG75]

Bravo Peder!, good points indeed. I was struck by the indication that Lolita was a rather subversive book, turning H.H. and contemporary's society's view of female sexuality. It also makes light of the scientific study of sexual development through the scene of H.H. haggling with the school official about Lo being in the play at school. She quotes figures and that kind of thing, just as someone would methodically do so in real life. Feminists miss Nabokov's subversivie nature and transpose H.H.'s desires as really being VN's!. The point?, Lo was perfectly developing her own individuality and impulses, H.H. who wrecked it, viewed it as a wicked, eventhough it was he himself who derailed her.

 

[Breaca]

I may be viewing this in a rather simplistic fashion, but I cannot deter the thought running through my head that the picture we have of Lo is through the eyes of HH only. As I sit and ponder over VNs novel, I cannot help but wonder how a 'normal' man would see little Haze - would she still be Lolita or Delores (your average 12 year old).