"Lolita" is a fascinating read. The prose is remarkable, although it was challenging to understand what he was describing at times and I had to look up every other word;-) It's a book about abuse and addiction - in chapter 32 he talks about his "monstrous" appetite and how his lifelong dream had "overshot its mark-plunged into a nightmare." Also, he talks about the "shame and despair" he experienced "after having had my fill of her..." It's also heartbreaking that Lolita grew up in a society where it was more important to "not to spell very well, but to smell very well." Know your four D's:" Dramatics, Dance, Debating and Dating." Charlotte, Lolita's mom, is a compelling character who I wish we had more of backstory on. The fact that she saw her own daughter as competition and an obstacle to Humbert - to the point of sending her away to camp so she could have him to herself - is disturbing. Definitely worth a re-read. Thank you for your insightful book reviews, Alana.

I think you explained it perfectly. It is a famous novel because it is written beautifully (I remember underliling many phrases while I was reading it) and it makes you deal with the fact that terrible people are still, well people. They find a way to justify their actions and while you condemn them you can still comprehend them. I remember while reading it the hope that Humbert would stop being a piece of shit and become a better person and almost rooting for him despite the fact that he was a fucking monster. It is not easy to write about such a fucking terrible person and still make people kinda root for them to become better. Parts of me think I am sick because I sometimes related to Humbert and his struggles while I hated him, but I think that’s just because Nabokov is a phenomenal writer.

For another story from the victim’s perspective, my first thought was The Color Purple.

I also read Lolita because it’s iconic and I wanted to see what it was all about. Other than the disturbing subject, I liked the book because of the writing and the psychology. I always say a book should make you think or feel something and as you mentioned he made me feel uncomfortable yet fascinated by the beautiful writing. Loved your review - it makes me want to reread it.

Well, I don't have Instagram so I am happy you post on KZfaq. I just can't do without your book reviews and sense of humor. No pressure 😉😅

One of the things I like about Humbert's characterization is that his sociopathy feels realistic. I feel like I've met this guy before wearing a different skin and working different angles, but basically the same eyes.

Totally agree about Lolita. Such beautiful writing about such an ugly relationship

I haven’t read Lolita or Little Life yet, but I thought My Dark Vanessa was a compelling and deeply disturbing narrative from the victim’s point of view. I appreciated all your thoughts and highly recommend My Dark Vanessa! 💜

I have this book on my bucket list, but it's so far down the list that I'm actually avoiding the book because of the subject matter without admitting it to myself. After hearing your review I've decided to give it a chance and if it turns out to be to offensive to my sensibilities, I'll just DNF it. Thank you for your review, it helped me deal with this legendary book by Nabokov.

I've been reading 'my dark vanessa' and noticed a mention of 'Lolita' in it, got me curious! Thanks for the spoiler free review ✨

Superb review. Thank you. I haven't read Lolita, but I just finished Nabokov’s Bend Sinister, and it's filled with stream of consciousness prose.

I recently read Lolita late 2023. I felt no sympathy for him but I saw what he was trying to do. I did enjoy the writing.

Thanks for the review Alana. I do want to read Lolita and moreso after watching your video because I would like to explore the connection you mention between Lolita and A Little Life

"Oddly fascinated, and disturbed at the same time" ... read McCarthy's _Blood Meridian_ .

I read Lolita about 40+ years ago. I remember it as a compelling look behind the curtain. Well written. Knowing that it was fiction allowed me to keep it (the topic) at arms length I will reread it but want to read Dark Vanessa after

Haven't read it myself, but this was a solid review. I'll probably read it someday. I think I'd have to actually read it to be able to really reflect on the questions you pose at the end (and also I like that you posed these!) It's one of those books where its reputation precedes it so much that it would be easy to discuss the book as it's perceived in society in a way that begins to lose its grounding in the book itself.

Its the most irredeemable subject novel ever. About a pederast who grooms a girl, who dies as a young woman her life ruined. and yet the literary style makes it a perplexingly brilliant novel. I find myself in awe of it. And maybe Nabokov was speaking of the horrors underneath beauty and brilliance and aesthetic rapture. What a novel, it really does just force me to ponder on our attraction to it as a novel, despite the evil of Humbert Humbert, we are immersed in his voice.

A remarkable book in every way. Thank you for your review Alana.

Have you read My Dark Vanessa? It’s from the victim’s perspective and it’s based on the author’s own experience :( there’s a lot to discuss about that book I think you’ll like it

Hey Pandora. "Don't Open That Box!" Opens it immediately... "Don't read that book." Reads it.

I gave up on the book after section one because I just felt that I could be reading something else that didn’t make me so uncomfortable. I agree that the prose was really good, there is a part where the main character sees himself as a spider in a house that is his web, feeling Lolita move around it and I just thought that was such a striking and fascinating metaphor, but the prose couldn’t save it from me feeling annoyed and disgusted. I do think is unfair because a lot of other books talk about the same topic just not as lyrical.

Ah, I do like Lolita. 🙂 People balk at it because they think it's like child porn, but really the focus is on the psychology, not the physicality. And plus the ending reveals that, despite the abuse, it was truly a love story, (of a sort 🥴). And it's also funny as hell too. And of course the writing is god tier stuff. Probably the greatest work, from a purely literary standpoint, of "transgressive fiction". Nabokov boldly went where no one, or very few, had gone before, but the deftness of Lolita's execution is nigh untouchable.

I like this book for creating a powerful sense of both illusion and disillusionment derived from lust, but at the same time, Nabokov's mind-boggling wordplays make me feel so dumb😂

It’s a densely allusive text. Filled with references to Poe (who also wrote stories from the POV of monsters) . Also it’s Humbert trying to obviate his crime with scholarship…putting a wall of strained allusions, metaphors and misdirection between himself and the reader. One of the elements people overlook is that it's a comic novel. A parody of American pop culture, travelogues, various European literary traditions etc. It's actually hilarious. A pitch black comedy. PS I highly recommend Pale Fire

Lolita is art. It is one of greatest novels of the 20th century.

Art and literature are not supposed to be always appropriate, woke, inclusive, diverse, etc. Especially the works of art created decades or centuries ago. Why would you expect that? Following this logic, we should scrap all paintings by Paul Gaugain, to name just one artist. Art is art, it's supposed to create a world and show it to us, we can interpret it, feel it, love it or dislike it. It doesn't have to depict good things only.

I have re-read Lolita a lot and i come to like it, and regard it as one of the best novel that he wrote. I don't blame people who read this novel one time and may 1) hate it, or 2) side with Humbert and admire the Nymphet concept (these two patterns are the typical). But everybody knows that child abuse is not good and it is not anything close to LOVE at all, including the writer himself. It is said that this novel has layers, and if you re-read it gradually you get to see the real Doroles, who their parents died, who only had Humbert to rely, who didn't know anything about sex, and had nowhere to go with the age of twelve or something. What is great is that Nabokov knew what Dolores may feel, but tried to express that throught the unreliable narrator HH. But you can see through it, eventually. Now I love to re-read the novel and I kind of feel what this child Dolores feels or how she numbs her feeling (which is typical for the abused child to do), at the same time what gives hope about this novel is that Dolores (not so much a clever girl) has always stood on her feet and eventually escaped (with the help of Q, a good person in her life) to have her life (sad that she died on her child birth, though). There is a love for this girl from the authour, although given a miserable life in the story. Some that claims this is a love story I would categorise them in the case 2), who are takin into the first layer of the story inside the HH narrative, to praise the nymphet concept. HH caling this girl LOLITA, which is not her real name, says it all, that what he loved is not herself, but the imaginary something that he created. I don't blame these readers. You may have to just keep reading again.

It's one of those 'challenging' titles in terms of subject matter! James Mason channelled Humbert in skin-crawling fashion in the sixties film.

I had such a hard time with this book… I hate the content and I was horrified and yet I was fascinated and wanted to see how it ended. Great review!

I totally understand you about reviews.

As serious a crime as is child abuse IMHO murder is even more serious. Humbert certainly is guilty of Quilty's murder and possibly Humbert is guilty of Haze's murder too. He planned to do it and set his plan in motion, however her death is accidental only to the naive and uninformed. So, you may allow his lyricism to seduce you into believing what he did to Delores is to be judged with extenuating circumstance but that argument falls short in his felonious assault on Delores and his pre-meditated murder of Claire. The novel works very well as a monster story, and after reading it one gives second-thought to sympathizing with Frankenstein's monster, who was brought into this world without his consent and without a soul.

Lolita for me is not only one of my favorite novels, but one of the greatest novels of the English language. Even more impressive considering Nabokov wasn't even a native English speaker. I didn't know what you were going to say about this book, but it seems that it left a deep impression on you, which is good. It means that the book did what it was meant to. What I think makes Lolita so powerful is how Nabokov toys with your expectations and beliefs about the world around you. He plays with our desire to understand why people do things like what Humbert does and he doesn't hold back. He goes as far as to try and gaslight you into sympathizing with someone who most people would want to see go under the jail and see suffer the most scathing punishments imaginable. It's as you say, he goes 'oh, you want to see why? I'll show you.' Not only does he do that, he tricks you into liking him, and even feeling sorry for him, even as the cracks of his facade become more apparent. Lolita is one of those sublime experiences that I don't think I could justify with mere words. It's an experience, to be savored and felt. There were passages of Lolita where I had to sit the book down, in complete awe and wonder over what I just read, before going back to it again. Nabokov's voice is as unique as Blake, Eliot, McCarthy, or Conrad. When you read it, you realize that you'll never read anything quite like it again, at least not in the way Nabokov did it. I'll stop before I just start rambling about why it's a masterpiece. This was a great review, I'm giving your channel a sub!

I've never read it and I also don't know much about Nabokov, so it's difficult for me to comment on his motivations for writing Lolita. Reprehensible characters and behaviours are often very stimulating for an author to work with; it allows them to cross or push at boundaries that would be impossible to do so with more mainstream topics. It doesn't have to necessarily be explicit or graphic. Just the idea of devising a character who is an outcast, dangerous, pathetic and outside the parameters of normal society can really harness an author's work.

I am currently reading Lolita in Russian language, after having seen the movie from 1998. The book is very dense and it is apparently written to be read several times to fully understand every aspects of it. Quite remarkably, the book was originally written in English, although Nabakov was born in St. Petersburg, and then translated back to Russian by the same author. Many things are remarkable about the book and its author.

I'm more scared of A Little Life than Lolita! I read Lolita years ago and yeah it's art. Still feels weird to say "I loved it!" I had A Little Life of my shelf for years and never even opened it!

I just want to say that I actually am a descendant from the Nabokov family, and Vladmir is the cousin of my grandpa, and I think that Lolita might be about pedophilia though literature is not always appropriate and it is a type of book intneded to give an uncomfortable feeling, hiwever literature is all about different feelings and emotions so please don't judge.

I recommend _Pale Fire_ by Nabokov. I am blown away that English is not his native language. IMO, he is a better writer than most English writers. I also recommend Yale Literature Course on YT has 2 videos (2 classes) on Lolita. Fwiw, Nabokov invented the word "nymphet."

Thanks for your honesty, and also, thanks for saying that I don't have to read it. ❤

This was a wonderful review, and almost gives me second thoughts about _Lolita._ I’ll tell you why I am unlikely to read it. I don’t much like Nabokov’s writing. When I was young, I read his “Lectures on Literature” volumes. I believe the first covered the English canon, the second the Russians. I didn’t much enjoy either, and revisited one much later and disliked it. But the real reason, is that I read his translation of Lermontov - parallel read it with another translation - and word-for-word, line-by-line reacted viscerally with abhorrence. Well, that’s a bit of exaggeration, but it was the kind of dislike that brings a physical reaction, and that was just for his prose, not the content. My impression of him is as of a pompous [expletive] - but you have just shoved a wedge into my closed mind to the extent that I could see reconsidering him and giving him a chance. But then the baggage of _Lolita_ inhibits me.

Nabokov certainly never made it easy on himself. I read once that he was trying to emulate a certain romantic style of the 19th century, but to do so required using a sort of pathology to have the effect he wanted. Literature is full of murderers, thieves, etc. , but that doesn't make our hair stand on end in disgust like this does. And the suspicions and his own childhood color it in a different light. He never makes it easy, but always interesting.

brilliant review

Yeah, it's not for me....i am interested in how you are seeing it connect to A Little Life.

'Lolita' is probably the most unflinchingly honest portrayal of a paedophile in literature. Mann's 'Death in Venice' pales in comparison.

Wow, thank you for this great review. Lolita is my favorite book of all time. Yes, I consider it art and I agree that Nabokov trolled the readers in a way that was haunting and magnetic. I have a sorrowful relationship with the book because I read it at a young age and it profoundly traumatised me, yet I forgive Nabokov despite this fact and the fact that he ruined a great chunk of literature for me by showing me how few are the books that hold this kind of literary value.

I had to read it in uni. I understand his writing is incredibly crafted, but it will forever be a nightmare instead of a novel.

⚛😀

I have not read it and I shan't be reading it. 🤓 Great review, though!

I think one interpretation of "why" relies upon the introduction, specifically the unreliable narrator, and why he is writing his side of the story. In this, I am reminded of this quote “Fact is, I never knowed a person from that day to this but who couldn't lie to themselves about their own evil while pointing out the other man's wrong, and I weren't no exception.” ― James McBride, _The Good Lord Bird_ . People lie to themselves, and may even know that they are lying to themselves, in order to justify their actions. As you say, I think Nabokov was toying with the reader's emotions, knowing that he can write a despicable character and yet write so beautiful and lyrical that it is hard to dismiss it out of hand (I liken people who don't read it to the same who wouldn't read that un-Christian book glorifying witches and wizards called _Harry Potter_ and denounce it without having read it, solely based upon what they heard. Sure, you shouldn't have to read it if you don't want, but you shouldn't ban without firsthand knowledge). Art and beauty are in the eye of the beholder. What we call morally wrong is social and a sign of the times. Some are more everlasting than others. For this I point of the idea that cannibalism and slavery were widespread in the past (and slavery continues to this day in East Africa). Ancient Greek did not have the word for incest (fide _Cleopatra: A Life_ by Stacy Schiff - of the 10 or so marriages in post-Alexander royalty, 5 or more were brother/sister marriages). Even in _Lolita_ , Humbert lists underage 'romances' in the past.

Women have been blamed for male lust for centuries. This book actually never found a publisher in the great USA. It was published in France. There is a Spanish director who also travelled to France to make a movie based on Justine by Sarte. I think these books are important for one reason: it makes me really wonder and question what freedom is. Is someone smoking in my face b/c they have the right to smoke freedom, or prison? Is a man abusing a child b/c "he can't help himself" freedom or abuse? Is publishing a book about it shedding light on the matter, or spreading porn? All these questions are in my head when I think of Lolita. But, no, I did not enjoy reading it.

Lolita is the funniest book I’ve ever read. This is Nabakov’s great gift.

The narrator is difficult to pin down. Marry me