Book Review: Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita. "

Digustingly brilliant. Pure perversion. One of the best books in modern literature. These are a few descriptions you'd find for the book by Russian - American novelist Vladimir Nabokov, a book that can never let you lay back in peace, but rather have you cringing at the edge of your seat, worried if you're sinning against the "nymphet" Lolita or Dolores, 12 years, by lending ears to Humbert Humbert, an English professor cum pedophile cum stepfather to the aforesaid. "Humbert is every man who is driven by desire, wanting his Lolita so badly that it never occurs to him to consider her as a human being, or as anything but a dream figment made aflesh. "
Elizabeth Janeway, The New York Times.

Yes. Lolita is not human. Lolita is not Dolores. Lolita is Humbert's desire, his obsession, his vulnerability, his inhumane, passion, his excuses. Lolita is an explanation, I feel, that the protagonist offers not to the reader but ultimately himself, desperately trying to untangle himself of his supreme crime of destroying a childhood and thereby, person.

Humbert, the narrator, overtly uses quite a few tools in the process, including a long dead childhood love he could never possess, his vehement attempts in conveying to the reader his good looks, which he believes was a reason his Lo, fell in love with him just as he did for her. Above all, he believes he was in love.

Lo isn't portrayed as a child, but a rather glossy remnant of the pedophile's memory. But once in a while, the narrator cannot but help look at Dolores as a child wronged. From where he quickly tries to shake it off as her moodswing, a tease, Lolita used, to torture him. His little monster.

If you aren't easily rattled, get yourself a copy, by all means, a goodread.


View all my reviews