The End of Lolita...

The end came suddenly, the way it does in high-tension filled movies. Humbert Humbert finally meets face to face with his rival and ends his miserable and horrific life. The scene didn't take long, although they had comparatively quite a bit to say to each other. The whole affair seems anti-climatic due to the fact that the reader already knows Humbert's mind is made up. At the moment when he is about to leave Lolita, Humbert surrenders himself to fate; a life without Lolita is no life to him. I am not quite sure why he didn't kill himself instead, although I suspect there was a quite a bit of satisfaction to gain. He, nevertheless, states that instead of a weight being lifted from him he feels more pressure on top of him after the murder. Strange, really, because it has little to do with his sense of guilt--either for having murder Quilty or for robbing Lolita of her childhood. Since there is really no redeeming quality for Humbert at the end, the reader is left with a sense of void that is not representative of whatever other emotions are evoked by the announcement of Lolita's own death at child-birth. Quilty's death seems like an endless puppet show, really, compared to other parts of the book. Everything seems like one of those special lens effects that make everything blurry and dream-like. The culmination is no end at all. One feels the books is quite a literary masterpiece and the disgressions of the narrator are all but forgotten by the end of the story. All in all, I have to recommend this book highly for its literary value and its highly experimental use of language, allusion, and stream of consciousness.

Reading Lolita in Westlake #005-A

I didn't get a chance to finish "Lolita" last night due to a Christmas concert I was scheduled to perform in. I simply got home to late for reading. Nevertheless, I wanted to write some today dealing with the language of the novel. As I said before, "Lolita" is full of stream of consciousness, puns and other tricks of lingustic style. One critic observed that "Lolita" is not for "passive readers who resist being drawn into linguistic games." I have enjoyed the novel a great deal, and, despite its controversial topic, I feel the novel has gotten a bad rap by the literature police. The fact is inarguable, really, that one could defend the novel's basic content; there is no amount of psychology that can justify a relationship between an adult and a mere child of twelve. What is perhaps Nabokov's greatest social commentary in the work is that of the narrator living a life full of consequences. He loses his young love to typhus and as a result sees the girl transmutated into Lolita. The narrator also pays for disrrupting Lolita's life. His soul is tortured, scarred. Even though I haven't finished reading it, I can sense that Humbert Humbert's decision to kill his rival stems from the fact that he has given hope of recovering his Lolita. I keep wanting to bring the book to work and read in my prep block, but I can imagine what the reaction of people I work with would be. That's the image of "Lolita" that most people have--not the grand masterpiece of literature it really is.

Reading Lolita in Westlake #004

"Lolita" is a book about cruelty, I am now convinced. While it didn't take me long to see that, I had to over-step the depravity of the book before I recognized its true deviance. Last night I read the scene where Humbert Humbert visits the pregnant Lolita and her "lamb of a husband" Schiller. The devastation is total as the narrator realizes how far he is from his bliss. His act of giving Lolita money becomes a delayed act of reversed prostitution; the narrator not paying for the services but the other way around... him paying for his role as seducer and child molester. Martin Amis explains the cruelty of the late part of the novel this way: "Humbert is surpassingly cruel in using Lolita for the play of his wit and the play of his prose--his prose, which sometimes resembles the 'sweat-drenched finery' that 'a brute of forty' may casually and legally shed (in both hemispheres, as a scandalized Humbert notes) before thrusting 'himself up to the hilt into his youthful bride'". The cruelty of his act is then felt through the stylistic language the child-girl cannot understand. He is a manipulator, an executor. And just when things cannot get worst (or so it seems) the 'executioner' decides to kill his rival and in a way kill himself (cruelty towards self using a vehicle from without). I can't wait to see where the book might turn next. Reading "Lolita" has been an academic exercise of sorts, but it has also been an enjoyable trip through a real gem of modernist/postmodernist literature. The last installment to come soon!

Reading Lolita in Westlake #003

I continue to plunge forward with "Lolita." What still strikes me is its use of language and the avid depiction of the narrator's mind by use of stream of consciousness. The parenthesis indicating internal thought also add to the equation. Last night, as I was entering page 200 something, the scene where Lolita gets sick drew a barrage of disgust from me, but I continued reading. The reason I thought it was bad was that Humbert states that he "gives up all hope for intercourse" as Lolita burns up with a high fever in bed. I hate the degenerate selfishness. My only sympathies come when he is finally alone (before he meets up with Rita), as he bounces from one corner to the other not knowing what to do. This scene is the only place in the book where the narrator becomes human, or more than human, the quintessential heart-broken lover left to pick up the pieces of his life. The sense of alienation is terribly painful to any reader who has experienced the desolation of being abandoned by a loved one. It is only then when one feels some association to him.

I have been reading some critical analysis of the novel and I am in agreement with those that feel the ugliness of the book is necessary to counter what is otherwise a blissful use of language. Humbert speaks with a refreshing command of English and French, and this only goes a long way to make the reader appreciate Nabokov's ideas and use of language. This is not to justify the book or its subject matter. As one critic observes: "The moral structure of "Lolita" is surely strong enough to support and contain the anti-moral material the novel permits itself. A novel is not pornographic (except in the case that it can be used as pornography)when its interest in sexual excitement is a necessary part of such large and serious interests. It is not anti-cultural when its cynicism (Humbert's cynicism) dramatizes an alienation which is so moving, though unobtrusively, placed and judged." I have to agree with this assessment. Compared to "Memoirs of a Beatnik," "Lolita" is a school primer.

The Perversity of the Perverse

It seems to me (while reading "Lolita") that this country has a fascination with kicking people when they are down. In no way would I say that what the narrator has done is justifiable, but at the same time we "pious" ones tend to vilify a bit too fast. Case in point: NBC has a new series on "Dateline" entitled "To Catch a Predator." This is a worthwhile program, and it does a great deal to protect children in the United States. The problem with the program is that since it is televised, and the directors and powers that be need to produce "good television," the entire show has turned into televised lynching. For example, they go to great lengths to depict the alleged predators as the most evil of evil beings. I am in no way supporting what these men have done, but there is a problem when we turn the entire endeavor into "entertainment." And that is what NBC has done. The viewer WANTS to see the people get caught, and they want to see it in all its "gotcha" sort of distorted perversity. How does this tie to "Lolita?" Very simple. We want the narrator, Humbert Humbert, to get caught, to suffer, to pay for the damages he has caused. Our inclination to such sentiments stems perhaps from the deep ingrained idea that we would never--on any account--do something similar. But the truth is deeper than appears. We enjoy vilifying others and watching them be choked and be humiliated and shamed. Their perversity gives way to a more complex one--our own unwillingness to recognize and forgive human fault and folly.

Reading Lolita in Westlake #002

I haven't written anything down about "Travels in the Scriptorium" because I really didn't give too much thought to writing about it. I was primarily engaged in getting the links up for the Paul Auster website, etc. I did enjoy the book a great deal and found it incredibly brilliant and experimental.

About "Lolita..." Last night I read a bit more than I originally expected. I started early, as soon as I got back from work. The narrator is disturbing in his description of Lolita, but there's something complex and totally human about his attraction. In my opinion, his attraction to the "nymphets" stems from his early failed experience at the beach. He tells of this experience and his frustration early on the narrative. The more indepth the reader gets into the narrative, the more experimental language Nabokov uses. The stream of consciousness is aptly used during his journal writing. The scenes leading to the visit to the lake is full of Joycean streams. It is particularly sensory, following the lineal and bordering on the hyper. There some confusing parts. The narrator daydreams of having contact with Lolita and the way he describes is so real that the reader might get confused about whether or not it has taken place. There's no real validation or justification for his pedophiliac inclinations, but there is something deeply human about his distorted views.

Reading Lolita in Westlake

You would think that after my experience with "Memoirs of a Beatnik" I would not venture to read another book dealing with extreme intimacy. Wrong. I have decided that after owning the book for a long time (five years) it is time I finally pick up "Lolita" and make an attempt at getting through it. What strikes me as I read the first few chapters last night was the Joycean style. Although more cohesive and lineal, "Lolita" offers some of the same experimentation with language that made me read "Ulysses" twice (yes, that was a task). From what I read so far, "Lolita" is a precursor to the postmodernist movement. The many allusions and literary references even at the very opening of the novel is enough to tantalize the academic in most of us. The little that I know of the narrator already sheds light into the complexity of his character. I have heard that one cannot hate this narrator for what he does even if one tries. That to me is the sign of a "human" character, a character the reader identifies with and from whom he can accept a little (or a big) imperfection. So, I'll be updating on and off about "Lolita." If you've read it and want to comment, please do so.