"Lolita"

“Lolita”

Written by Vladimir Nabokov

Review written by Diana Iozzia

            “Lolita” is regarded as one of the most famous and most taboo classic books in American culture. Originally written by Russian novelist Vladimir Nabokov, “Lolita” was beloved and infamously known as a popular thriller about a man who falls in love with his step-daughter. Dolores Haze, Lola, Lo, Dolly, and good old Lolita is the title character. She’s twelve years old, loud, obnoxious, and irritating. Mr. Humbert Humbert, our narrator, is smooth, charismatic, charming, funny, and a pedophile, of course. He’s eerily a sympathetic character, to begin with. After his childhood friend and lover dies at a young age, it clearly causes him to grow up stunted, only attracted to girls of that age.

            This is going to be a long, ranting, and angry review. Be prepared. Make yourself a line of shots and take one every time I say “unnecessary”, “irritating”, “annoying”, or “boring”.

            This book was interesting and a worthwhile read, but I did not particularly like it. Rest assured, it was not because of sexual content or pedophilia. In reading this book, you accidentally look past all that somehow. It’s clear and in your face and uncomfortable, but that isn’t the reason I didn’t like this book. Lolita is a very descriptive book and narrated by a (slightly) boring unreliable narrator. I personally love thrillers and chillers and unreliable narrators, but I think Humbert is a very boring man. The first third of the book was great, because it sets up this eerie and uncomfortable love and lust Humbert has for Lo. We also have a great plot twist involving Lo’s mother, Charlotte.

            In the second act, Lo goes away to a girls’ summer camp and comes back annoying, rude, and even more childish than you’d think a twelve-year-old would be. Humbert whisks her away on a cross country road trip. There are honestly pages upon pages of sights that they saw. Just lists of places they went to, thinks they did, soda pops, they drank. It’s mind-numbingly disinteresting. I had to skim so much of the second act. Humbert rapes Lolita in the second act, and she is consensual, but mocks him endlessly afterwards and pretends to threaten him that she will go to the police.

            The last act is dedicated to finding Lolita after she is kidnapped(?) and taken away(?). He searches for her, but finally receives a letter that she is pregnant and happily married to a man who seems very nice, but we have to realize that at this age, Lo is 15, so this is still probably statutory rape. However, what is the marriage age anyway? This is sort of a grey area, so I guess I shouldn’t think too much on the legal accuracies. Then, the last act has Humbert searching for Clare Quilty. This is a great revenge sequence that helps redeem the boring second act.

            I think I want to give this book a three stars out of five review, because although the second act and some of the other two acts put me to sleep out of boredom, there were still some redeemable scenes and moments. As with every review, I look at the pages I’ve tagged with Post-It Notes and point out any thoughts or things worth mentioning. I’ve tagged so many pages and thoughts, so I’m typing them out in a numbered list in the order of the pages of the book:

1. The narration is interesting at first, because Humbert is funny. It’s also interesting to learn a little about his back story.

2. There are many instances that the dialogue or descriptions are cheesy, annoying, or cringeworthy. I will list here those bits: Humbert’s sexual encounter with his first love Annabel, “apply voracious lips to her young matrix”, one character that had misnamed Lo and Humbert in about 6 different ways,  

3. Before Humbert becomes sexually fascinated with Lo, there are some beautiful and kind descriptions of how special Lo is. If you had read a romance novel with two consenting adults, this would be a beautiful narrative.

4. I have to mention that Humbert does not often blame himself for his love for Lo, his violence, or his poor decision making in general. When he does blame someone, it is often his “mental illness” which is treated post-imprisonment, his crazy lover, Valeria, Charlotte’s dislike for her daughter, the Devil. He also justifies raping her by saying that he wasn’t even her first lover, that he didn’t “deprive her of her flower”.

5. There are many “additional” things in the text other than just the narrative that are unnecessary and irritating, including: a list of Lo’s classmates, a poem he wrote to Lo,

6. It annoys me how many people allow Humbert’s behavior without complaining. I know this is a plot device, but I can name by counting fingers how many people ignored his creepy and uncomfortable behavior.

7. Humbert speaks constantly through the book in hypotheticals about being evil. “If I was a murder, I would…” “If I wanted to hurt her…”, “I know I’m not a great person, but…” He also eagerly talks about a perfect murder he finds interesting. We get it! You’re a terrible person!

8. Show, don’t tell. Actually, this point speaks for the whole book. With narration, you usually do have the problem that the narrator literally tells every possible detail, but I like a book that still shows without explicitly saying every single time Lo blinks or bites her fingernail.

9. “An accident is going to happen soon”. This line in the first sentence of part one chapter 19. I don’t want that, because now, all I plan to do is skip forward to the accident. The lead up to the accident is interesting, but the shock would have been more effective if HE DIDN’T TELL ME IT WAS GOING TO HAPPEN. I’m all for some fore-shadowing, but this is (curse word) ridiculous. Be warned though, the actual details of the said accident are actually disgusting and made me feel ill, and I normally have a strong stomach for yucky death stuff.

10. YAY, drugging Lo is always a loving father / rapist move.

11. “Not only had Lo no eye for scenery but furiously resented my calling her attention to this or that.” Same, Lo, same. I’d be just as irritated with Hum.

12. There are a few times that Humbert mentions how when girls turn thirteen they become teenagers, so they are no longer considered “nymphets”. He talks about how after they lose that status, they are no longer attractive and exciting to Hum, who is naïve in thinking that he will lose his attraction and love for Lolita after she ‘ages out’. This does show that Lolita is more than just a sexual conquest and crush, because he still loves her years later. I wonder if that makes him more sympathetic, because you feel for him that he does feel love for her.

13. I absolutely love the scene where Lo and Humbert reunite after (3?) years when she is fifteen, pregnant, and married. It’s so sad and heartbreaking, but also twisted, because you know you shouldn’t pity Humbert in his sadness. It’s so nice to see that Lolita has ended up happy with her new life. You feel so happy for her, and so sad for Hum.

14. I don’t like the idea of revenge, but Humbert’s revenge for Clare Quilty is brilliantly executed. The description of the final moments is very interesting and well-written.

            In conclusion, this book had many boring parts where I found myself skipping through and dying for something interesting to happen, but this book was thoroughly worth the read. I think it’s very uncomfortable and strange to occasionally sympathize with a murderous pedophile, but you truly do. The last goodbye Humbert writes to Lolita in the story is so sad, you cannot help but feel sorry for this unfortunately criminally insane man and his sad, pathetic life.