Book Review: Lolita

“I knew I had fallen in love with Lolita forever; but I also knew she would not be forever Lolita ”

Never have I ever read a book that has disturbed me so much as ‘Lolita’ by Vladimir Nabokov. In short it is the musings, longings and loathsome fault lines of a paedophile. But we’re not supposed to think of him as a paedophile. No we’re supposed to see him as a protagonist and tragic hero. Excuse me while I burn this book. How it ever made its way to being a ‘classic’ is.. well I have no words.

In light of recent events in the United Kingdom, one does have to look at how this has been portrayed. In my edition of the book there is a quote on the back from the Telegraph ‘There’s no funnier monster than poor, doomed Humbert Humbert’. If anyone has ever read this book then you’ll know, there is nothing ‘poor’ or ‘funny’ about this man. But a monster, he is.

So, here is one reason why we are meant to see him as a tragic hero. The story of Humbert Humbert begins in Europe and his misadventures in Paris, now we see him as someone who pays for sex, notably with a girl who clearly lies about being 18, she is evidently younger. But that’s not the story, we see him as a tragic hero in the fact that he married a horrible brutish (apparently, obviously the narrator would say that as she wasn’t a child) woman. Only for her to run off with a Russian and poor Humbert Humbert can’t even punch him in the end. Too many witnesses apparently. Wimp. 

Humbert Humbert (ridiculous name by the way) makes his way to America by himself to work for a perfumer once owned by his uncle who is now deceased. After a while, the mans in need of a change and heads over to Ramsdale where he meets the titular Lolita. Only her name isn’t Lolita its Dolores. Lolita is just a private nickname that our narrator has given her. His own private joke, a name that is his and his only. An act of possession on the child. 

Now, in spite of this pretty horrific book, there are a few pop culture motifs that were spawned from this book. Now, its not my mission here to decry sub-cultures but the Lolita fashion statements in Japan is now really rather worrying after reading this book. If you are Japanese and you happen to read English: PLEASE DEAR GOD MAKE THE STYLE GO AWAY. The Japanese need to read the book, then they’ll see.

So, we get to a point where Lo’s mother is dead, having been run over by a car. Lo is away at camp. Now seeing as Humbert and Lo’s mother had married that made Lo technically legally his. But he never made a move to adopt her, due to his worries about all of his mental health issues being discovered. He has many. What intensely worries me about reading this book is the lengths Humbert Humbert will go to to control Lo. He at one points gaslights Lo and co-incidentally himself into believing that the sexual relation that they engage in is completely normal. Everyone does it! 

Jealousy is the ultimate downfall of Humbert Humbert, yet what the moral here? He ends up going to prison, yes. But it is for the murder of Quilty, the man who took Lo from the hospital. However, does he feel remorse over his actions? No, in fact over the course of the book he feels nothing but delight and revels in the nostalgic memories of Lo and their time together. Prison doesn’t lock away the monsters and think it’ll teach them a lesson, no. Humbert steadfastly justifies that he was in the right and that he has been wronged by wider society. No lesson has been learnt.

On my home page, you’ll see the section for literature where I say ‘Book reviews that don’t tell you if they’re good or bad but why you should read them’. So, I'm somewhat hung by my own petard. Thus, why should you read this book? Because monsters are real and they live amongst us, they look just like everyone else and the #MeToo movement is very real.