I recently read Lolita and was really conflicted as to whether I liked it or not. In one sense it was an uncomfortable read but I found I couldn’t put it down. I see a lot of people saying that they hate it because Humbert is such a monster but surely that’s the point? Nabokov makes it such an uncomfortable read through putting it in first person; we are meant to slightly sympathise with Humbert (because of his unreliable narration) and then feel disgusted with ourselves. Combined with the ‘American Dream’/Academia/Psychological Thriller aesthetic it’s almost as much a mockery of society and its romanticisation of crime as The Secret History. This is even proven by Lolita’s resurgence in popular aesthetics and romanticisation.
by Little_angelxxx
36 Comments
It’s definitely strange reading something disturbing but enjoying the way it’s written, if that makes sense. It feels conflicting. The goal with Lolita is exactly that, Nabokov created a character that hopefully makes everyone who reads it uncomfortable. I originally read Lolita after reading My Dark Vanessa because it was mentioned so much throughout the book and thought it was a good book despite what it depicted.
I can tell if a book that I’m unsure of is “good” or not, if I’m still thinking about it after I read it. I e learned that I don’t have to like a book for it to be impactful.
Welcome my friend. I consider Lolita as a love it/hate it book. In my opinion it’s in a class of it’s own, amazingly well written and interesting but Humbert Humbert is such a vile and unreliable narrator. Kudos to Nabokov. I have since read a couple of his other works and I doff my hat to him, what an original writer.
I am thinking of having my book club read it, even though I think it may drive some of them crazy!
You’re obviously right that the point is that he’s a monster and that the whole thing is deeply critical of society.
On the other hand, something that is less often discussed is that the book is as much about this horrible, monstrous side of life as it is about beauty (and I don’t mean the often mentioned beauty of the language itself here). In this case, Humbert’s monstrosity necessarily contrasts with the beauty of childhood, he’s horrid and ugly and thus only highlights the sublime nature of what he’s ruining.
The common example for this is the tennis scene which Nabokov himself says was one of his favorites but that is rarely seen as the most impactful. For all the disgust we’re meant to feel for Humbert, Dolores is shown enjoying herself for once by just playing, not even to win (which HH can’t understand) but purely to have fun, like children do and should. It’s these glimpses of Dolores being a regular child, along with the almost-regret HH expresses at the very last bit of the novel about taking her out of that world, that shows the beautiful side of the novel. It’s not grimdark and horrid and depressing like so many lesser works that deal with shocking themes are, but it’s also saying: look, this is good, this is wonderful and worth protecting.
Recommending the excellent Lolita Podcast. Really not a podcast in the neverending sense, more like a well researched documentary series.
I think some people just don’t like to read about / from the POV of unlikable characters. Or they don’t like a book when they can’t identify with the characters. But that’s a personal preference and doesn’t say anything about the quality of a book.
I’ve always likened this book to a great piece of art. It’s like if Michelangelo painted a rape. You have to look at the piece as art. And then you can be disturbed by the subject matter. But always remembering they are not the same thing.
Humbert Humbert is an amazing protagonist. He’s fun, he’s wacky, he’s witty, and of course yes, he is a monster.
People are able to read and appreciate *Paradise Lost*, *Grendel*, and heck, the Bible, all of which have protagonists that do evil things but present themselves as the victims. (Actually, it’s been a while on *Grendel*, that one might have genuinely portrayed Grendel as innocent.)
Lolita was way ahead of its time. Humbert is despicable, but he’s “charming” and literate and uses that to manipulate the reader to garner sympathy. The most horrible aspect is that that’s not fictional. To this day there is a tendency to blame the victim (victim blaming) and make excuses for the abuser. Lolita being a seductress is not an uncommon opinion.
It’s one of my faves but I’m always nervous to say that because people think liking a book means agreeing with the main character.
I love this book. I first read it when I was 14. Humbert isn’t a good guy, and that was definitely evident to my teenage brain. And when adult ass men hit on me, I would just think of them all as gross Humbert Humberts
It’s one of the greatest books ever written by one of the greatest writers. Super popular to hate this book right now which tells you it’s worth reading.
I don’t have any literary meaning or explanation here, but I had the same experience with it at first. I started getting bored with it I’d say 3/4s of the way in. I’d gotten past all the main plot points and was part of the way through the beginning of their road trip. It just became a slog.
So while I don’t know if I liked it or not, I certainly couldn’t put it down. I hate read the last quarter just to get it finished. I’m glad I pushed myself through it. Would recommend it to people for sure, maybe not with enthusiasm though.
Idk what number I am to recommend it, but [The Lolita Podcast](https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-lolita-podcast-73899842/) is an absolutely incredible examination of the book, its origins, its reception, its adaptations, and the various cultural phenomena adjacent to the book.
What really icks me is how many reviews out there praise it as a ‘great love story’. Hell, even the back of my copy describes it as one of the greatest love stories of all time. Needless to say the professor is going to recommend a different edition next time she teaches it.
I think the way people judge HH in the book, is the authors take on how he would be judged in real life. He is a p*dophile, but also a charming man. How many times are men forgiven in society? He is a likable person to many, and the book reflects that. He gets away with horrible crimes, becuase of people liking him. No consequences, legal or anything. At the end, many even feel sorry for him. Thats just how the world is. Its gross. I cant read the book without wanting to punch him in the face. Not a second where I find him charming. In real life, many girls will be charmed by some guy, and I wont be.
I loved the book because of Humbert’s narrating. Firstly, Nabokov’s style is simply gorgeous – the way he plays with words is amazing. The book delves deep into the mind of a monster, but this is what makes it interesting. Humbert twists reality constantly by omitting details, painting himself in a heroic light while we are supposed to see through his bullshit. I think, the story wouln’t have been as good if we saw it through Dolores’s perspective because of the psychology of H.H’s mind.
The whole purpose is that it makes one uncomfortanly. Like how could you now feel uncomfortable by a grown man grooming a child, convinced it is true love, while trying to justify his pedophilia.
But yeah, those are my two cents.
When it came out, Lolita was seen as rather naughty. When I got around to reading it I couldn’t find anything remotely salacious about it. It’s uncomfortably funny, but the overriding impression you get from the novel is an unbelievable feeling of sadness, that these people are all doomed and we are watching a slow-motion car crash of people’s lives. Most first-person narrator novels can be quite a struggle because often the character is not interesting enough to maintain our attention throughout an entire book, but Humbert kind of seduces you – he’s witty and amusing even when you know he’s absolutely awful. It’s that moral ambiguity that keeps us coming back to Lolita – Nabokov puts you in the horrible position of sympathising with Humbert over Quilty even when you know that that they are both utterly despicable creatures.
I’m not sure we’re meant to slightly sympathise with Humbert. His voice is very compelling in the sense that you want to keep reading, but not at all in the sense that he’s charming or makes you root for him. He’s more Raskolnikov than Tom Ripley. There’s a visceral yuck factor – just very beautifully written yuck! According to Lolita Podcast, one of the assault scenes was based on Nabokov’s own experience as a child.
We get just enough glimpses of Dolores to make her the sympathetic character, and not just because she’s the victim. Her voice is as different from his as it’s possible to be and it’s very satisfying when it cuts through his pompous narration, and when she outwits him.
Being uncomfortable is the point. You’re not supposed to empathize with him. We should see it through his point of view, but that doesn’t mean you need to empathize with him at all. It’s more of a character study of a narcissist.
If you want a good deep dive into it, check out Jamie Loftus’s podcast on it.
To me, the biggest strength of the book and Nabakovs writing is how unlikeable he makes Humbert.
Its like when an actor plays a terrible person so well that people end up disliking the actor in real life.
So when i see people saying they dont like it because theyre “disgusted by Humbert” i think thats a testament to how well written it is.
What always strikes me about the book is that the author isn’t american, but somehow captures the *spirit* of america perfectly.
Yeah, Nabokov purposely made it clear that Humbert is an evil, unreliable narrator. I’ve seen people say that they want to change the ending of the book because Dolores ‘deserves to live happily ever after’. Honestly those people missed the point. It’s not about giving Dolores a ‘happy ending’, it’s about deep diving into Humbert’s mindset. And if you take into account that the book might have been inspired by Sally Horner, who also didn’t really have a happy ending, giving Dolores a happy ending just doesn’t fit with the overall narrative. I could go on, but I really do enjoy this book, despite the subject matter.
I value books that are an uncomfortable read, it’s one of the few, if not the only medium where we still can experience certain subjects from the evil point of view. I always worry when people talk about Lolita, as this book is obviously ammunition for people who want to restrict reading, and I’m afraid one day it will hit someone who doesn’t read.
It’s actually got a lot of humour in it for such a dark book. I loved it.
It’s a fabulous execution of the craft. It is a gorgeous read.
It’s also a painful one.
Unbelievably wonderful book and one of the most interestingly despicable characters of all time. I’m reading through the top 100 books of all time and Lolita is one of the few that made me laugh— Nabokov is a genius. The book is such a success because the narrator is nuanced, demonstrating his charm in his wry narration but obviously rotten to his core. Liking Lolita does not mean you condone pedophilia, if anything Lolita succeeded in showing readers how depravity exists in the world: because of how they convince themselves and the world around them that they are not depraved.
It sounds like you got the point of the book and found it to be a compelling read that gave you things to think about, which is what you’re supposed to get out of a book like that. If Nabokov was trying to write a book where the protagonist wasn’t a monster, where we were supposed to uncomplicatedly like and be charmed by the writer, that isn’t the book he would have written. Instead, you met the book on its own terms and got something out of it.
It is one of the greatest works of literature from last century.
You were supposed to feel uncomfortable. the main character is an unrepentant pervert
I like it because it was like a Puzzle like a Mystery Book. You know that Humbert is a POS, now you have to reconstruct what actually happened from his unreliable narration. I found that fun.
What’s disturbing is when people call it a love story. I find people’s reactions to it more disturbing that the story itself which is after all a piece of fiction.
The annotated version really makes it clear how much thought, references and craft was put into the book
I honestly thought it was brilliant. Some of the best prose I’ve ever read. Cannot believe English wasn’t his first language.
I am consistently amazed English was Nabokov’s third language. He had already published in Russian and French. He was truly a master of language.
This is one of my favorite books, although most of that is due to Nabokov’s incredible writing.
Still, I’ve always seen this as more of a morality play about obsession. About how it can take over your life, turn you into a monster, drive you to do all kinds of obviously insane and harmful things, and even when you get what you’re after, it’s still hollow and not enough because obsession is it’s own hungry illness that’s separate from what you think you’re attaching it to. Not to erase the true horrors of pedophilia, I just never got the sense that’s what Nabokov was actually writing about. Also never thought we were supposed to sympathize with HH so much as watch what happens when someone is consumed by an obsession and bear witness to the unhappiness and destruction that ultimately follows.
Kubrick ruined public perception of Lolita. People were already very wary of it for the obvious reasons, but Kubrick’s adaptation made it look like the point was “Well, it was wrong and all… But she was SUPER hot and leading him on!”, and I think that accounts for most modern disgust towards the book. They don’t actually understand what the book is trying to say.
The misreadings and bad faith readings of Lolita have contributed so much to the objectification and sexualization of young girls.
The book was never meant to glorify Humbert Humbert, he’s, as you said OP, an unreliable narrator. With some critical reading, it’s so obvious that Dolores is a victim.