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Vladimir Nabokov: Lolita

Peder said:
But ya better do it here, because I see that people are still outright snotty about Nabokov out in the the further realms of this bookly and readerly enclave.
SHEESH! :mad:
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Often times a general insecurity of self will cause people to be snotty about any subject with which they......well you know what I mean. ;) :mad:
 
pontalba said:
Often times a general insecurity of self will cause people to be snotty about any subject with which they......well you know what I mean. ;) :mad:
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Ah. There they are. Those look like rare and delicate subgenuses of nymphaliinae from where I stand. They could be pupating into lepidopterian chrysalids. No loud noises, please; we don't want to scare them away. Anybody got any Bach flower water?
 
StillILearn said:
Ah. There they are. Those look like rare and delicate subgenuses of nymphaliinae from where I stand. They could be pupating into lepidopterian chrysalids. No loud noises, please; we don't want to scare them away. Anybody got any Bach flower water?
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Sorry no Bach flower water, but what about some nice Butterfly Wine?
125g9s3.jpg
 
pontalba said:
Sorry no Bach flower water, but what about some nice Butterfly Wine?
125g9s3.jpg
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Pontalba,
Just a sip of what I need to re-equilibrate my attitude. I love it. :)
And please don't take your pictures anyplace else.
You and they are always welcome here.
Peder
 
Pontalba,
Just a sip of what I need to re-equilibrate my attitude. I love it.
And please don't take your pictures anyplace else.
You and they are always welcome here.
Peder
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Not in this lifetime.....:D
 
I think I've got a case of dandelion whine.

I suspect I'll just maunder back on over to the Enchanted Garden for the Timid. I believe I may have seen a nice little patch of shade there.

Is there any cure for dandelion whine, do you think? :eek:
 
StillILearn said:
I think I've got a case of dandelion whine.

I suspect I'll just maunder back on over to the Enchanted Garden for the Timid. I believe I may have seen a nice little patch of shade there.

Is there any cure for dandelion whine, do you think? :eek:
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I see no timidity in that thar Garden, I do see lots of excellent posts and ideas though.
Jes 'cause I ain't a postin', don't mean I ain't a lookin'............:D :p
 
beer good said:
I've now cracked Lolita's spine and started reading. Watch for further developments.
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I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts as you go along, beer good -- I think this one grabs you right from the start. Have you seen either of the movies yet?
 
StillILearn said:
I think this one grabs you right from the start. Have you seen either of the movies yet?
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It does, and I'm already starting to feel the whole "unreliable narrator" bit. I mean, I WANT to hate this guy, both for his leanings and his poeticizing of it... yet at the same time... well, only 20-odd pages into it yet, so I'm not sure. I have a feeling I'm going to love it but not like it, if that makes any sense. (Haven't seen any of the movies except for about 20 minutes of the middle of Kubrick's.)
 
OK, about 100 pages in, a couple of thoughts. Not sure if this thread is spoiler-free, so black boxes looming ahead.
Man, Humbert Humbert is a creep.
Man, Humbert Humbert is tragic.
Couple scenes that stick: Humbert going into great detail about many things and then mentioning in passing that he spent a year in an insane asylum. Humbert holding Lolita in his lap, cumming in his pants and making a remark something along the lines that he didn't even hold her down, which to me implies that that's exactly what he did. Humbert calmly pondering the advantages of knocking Lolita's mother up so he can have the girl all to himself and a bottle of sleeping pills.

Still not sure about the language. It comes off a little too much as someone with English as his second language using a dictionary to make his prose come alive. And I'm not sure whether to blame this on Humbert, Nabokov, or both. It's beautiful and occasionally hilarious, just a bit over-written.

Oh well. Like it a lot so far, though it's yet to make my masterpiece detector spike into the red zone.
 
I agree BG-HH IS a creep. The scene you mention is a prime example too, not just for the act itself, but for his justification for it.
 
About 170 pages:
"I am not the rapist, I am the therapist." Oh Humbert, you poetical bastard. And now he's whining about Lolita being "stupid" - well, you wanted a 12-year-old, that pretty much excludes dating Einstein.

I find myself wondering exactly how much Humbert is lying, and to whom. Whether he himself believes what he writes. He mythologizes his Lo/Dolly/Lolita/nymph/whatever, keeps drawing on antique customs and modern wordplay to justify what he's doing - but is he doing it for his or for his readers' benefit? Fascinating.
 
I wonder too, who HH was trying to fool. Himself, the reader, or the mysterious "jury" he addresses from the beginning. Of course, the reader is part of that jury, but I wonder if HH was trying to pull one over on the ultimate judge, God himself. Whether the reader believes in an supreme being, I think HH does and is hoping to buy sympathy in the final crunch.
 
ABC, that's great. I never thought about it in exactly those terms before but HH is constantly pleading for sympathy, both explicitly and implicitly. It doesn't ultimately work on the reader (at least not this one!), and he obviously doesn't really care what Lolita thinks, so I agree with you that he's trying to score some sympathy points with God.... although, whether or not he truly repents is a separate, but important question. I tend to think not, but I am more than willing to hear counter-arguments :)
 
I think you may be right on the money, both of you. HH is brilliant and deranged; penitent and incorrigible.

And sly.

Sly, sly, sly. As is his creator (that's creator with a small 'c'.) Don't take your eye off either of them.

;)
 
Ahhhhh... My copy finally arrived today. As soon as I finish The Girl in a Swing (which by the way is excellent) I will be submitting myself to Lolita's charms. Can't wait to see what all the fuss is and to join in this discussuion.
 
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