Nabokov în America: Drumul spre Lolita

by Robert Roper, Carmen Ardelean (Translator)

Nascut intr-o familie rusa remarcabila, Vladimir Nabokov a ajuns in America fugind din calea nazistilor si si-a amintit perioada petrecuta aici drept cea mai implinita a vietii sale. Intr-adevar, cele mai bune lucrari ale lui s-au nascut din raspunsul sau la povestile acestui pamant. Cu farmec si profunzime, Robert Roper completeaza aceasta perioada din viata autorului: prietenia lui cu Edmund Wilson, timpul petrecut la Cornell, rolul sau la Muzeul Harvard de Zoologie Comparativa. Dar cartea isi gaseste nucleul narativ in calatoriile lui Nabokov si ale familiei sale in Vest. Roper a cercetat noi surse pentru a gasi detalii despre aceste calatorii si urmareste influenta lor semnificativa in opera lui Nabokov: pe autostrazile cu doua benzi si in motelurile si cafenelele de la sfarsitul anilor 1940, simtim cum se schiteaza Lolita si intelegem familiaritatea seducatoare a lui Nabokov cu viata cotidiana a Americii.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, Biography Memoir, History, Literary Criticism, Writing, Literature

512 pages, Paperback

First published June 9, 2015

Reviews

[Titi Coolda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cartea lui Roper mi-a făcut o poftă imensă să recitesc Lolita care, la prima lectură, recunosc m-a cam dezamăgit. Eram adolescent, ahtiat după scrieri senzațional-erotice, cu sexualitate explicită, ceea ce magnum opus-ul lui Nabokov, departe de a reprezenta.

[Irina Constantin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Citiți orice de Nabokov, orice vă pică. El există și e măreț.
Cu el îmi revin mereu după cele mai triste perioade în ce privește lecturile și după unele momente critice din viața mea interioară.

Nu pot gândurile să te doboare, ele sunt doar niște gloanțe oarbe dacă mintea ta e un ocean învolburat și aprig pornit spre cunoaștere.

La Nabokov nu au existat perioade "fără inspirație" așa cum ne plângem noi adesea, pentru el a fost doar scrisul temeinic, zilnic, programat, fără de anotimp, boală, zi sau noapte.

A conturat-o pe Lolita, nord-americana sălbatică și rebelă, moartă și apoi vie, căci nu poate fi invers.

Chiar dacă Dolores a murit la 17 ani, copila precoce există în fiecare părticică din America cea de azi.

Citiți și recitiți orice de Nabokov!
Niciodată Lolita nu va apune, pentru că ea crește mereu, îmbătrânește, e o epava dintr-un mic Titanic, ruginie pe fundul oceanului de cititorii adunați de-a lungul deceniilor, cei ce i-au rostit numele și au rămas oripilați sau fascinați de voluptatea scenelor interzise...

[David Lentz · Rating 4 out of 5]

The challenge in writing a review of this work of nonfiction is to give suitable credit to the author of "Nabokov in America" without being influenced by the content of Roper about the work of Nabokov in "Lolita." Having read both books now I can say that the work of Roper seems scholarly enough and he paints an intriguing picture of a highly gifted novelist whom many claim is a literary genius outright. Nabokov suffered for his writing by living in poverty after barely escaping Europe with his wife before chaos erupted there. America embraced his intellect and Nabokov became the darling of Wellesley and Cornell, which institutions of higher learning gave him a chance to write before he was discovered in his #1 best-seller, "Lolita." In this novel Nabokov seems to have played Faust in a Mephistophelian trade giving in to the disingenuous portrait of sheer perversity of an anti-hero who kidnaps and daily rapes his teenage step-daughter after the death of her mother. For some reason America couldn't get enough of this incredibly nasty novel and it sold 100,000 copies soon after publication. Nabokov rode his Russian-American connections in New York to publish articles with the New Yorker and Atlantic Monthly and Harpers as well as many of his other novels and Russian translations of Pushkin. He was a clever businessman and absolutely manic about the pursuit of butterflies in the Rockies and elsewhere. He cheated repeatedly on his wife, Vera, who made a home, family and drove his business interests with high intelligence and devotion to her genius writer. Roper doesn't glorify the many and at times horrendous ethical lapses of Nabokov but merely reports them for the reader to judge or not judge based upon the facts uncovered by research. So I respect this book and its tact in reporting on many issues surrounding the presentation of a best-selling storyline founded upon pedophilia. Sorry but as the father of a daughter this book was painful for me to read and "Lolita" even more so. I wanted to understand why America bought "Lolita" with such eagerness and so prolifically as to take to the top of the best-seller list. It seems, as I had understood previously, that Nabokov deemed Humbert to symbolize Europe stealing and corrupting the innocence and youth and beauty of Lolita. I find this laughable and disingenuous rationale lacking in serious literary integrity and in my search to understand what people saw in this dreadful novel about which so many scholars love to rave, I finished the book more bewildered than ever. Is it really necessary to write a perverse novel about the rape of children in order to sell enough books in America to make a decent living here? Is America as a nation so drawn to perversity to the extent that it is a necessary component of the storyline to sell? If so, I'm writing in the wrong nation and need to move my ass out of here. Really, this really kind of pisses me off more than I can say. Don't tell me it's a parody of America because, if it means to be one, you need a twisted mind to get the joke behind the repeated rape of a teenage girl by a character whom Nabokov desperately wants you somehow to find charming and even like. Somebody please show me the error of my ways: I would love to be proven wrong. I have "Pale Fire" on my nightstand but am so disgusted with Nabokov that I plan to shelve it and work on "IQ84" instead. Sorry this book is very well written but Nabokov was such an incredible dick that I hope never to read another word of or about him. My best advice is to spend your hard earned money on a book which will lead you to a higher intellectual plane. When you make deals with Mephistopheles, there's always hell to pay.

[Bfisher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vladimir Nabokov lived for most of his life in exile, first in Germany after the Bolshevik Revolution, then in France after the Nazi takeover of the German state, and then in the United States after the German occupation of France, living for the last sixteen years of his life in Switzerland, following the success of Lolita.

This book describes his American years, when he was reinventing himself as an American novelist, simultaneously eking out an income as a college lecturer, New Yorker contributor, classifier and enthusiastic collector of butterflies, and translator of Pushkin.

The author sets Nabokov’s frequent butterfly collection trips as a gathering of the background for Lolita. It does give a convincing explanation for how a European non-native-English speaker could learn the idiom of the American road trip. He asserts that Lolita was something Nabokov wrote reluctantly (“he found ways to continue to work on a novel that he also kept wanting to burn”), although no direct evidence of that is presented.

[Ratko Radunović · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tanana srž Rouperove knjige nešto je od čega se najčešće sastoje lakomislene doktorske disertacije koje vremenom završe kod renomiranih izdavača, nalik na Hemingvejevu brodicu (Hemingway’s Boat, 2011) Pola Hendriksona. Slični lako svarljivi i danas sveprisutni tekstovi obično detaljišu o striktno jednom periodu nekog kultnog pisca – ili o tvorbi i prirodi samo jednog romana, etc. – mahom imaju manje stranica od stožernih biografija i idealne su za prevođenje
u izdavačkim kućama van engleskog govornog područja gdje, recimo, do sada nije bilo nebeletristike o pomenutoj ličnosti.

Katkada takve knjige posjeduju i tezu oko koje koncentrišu čitavu papazjaniju generalno irelevantnih činjenica i trude se da oponiraju primarnim biografijama, kao što je u slučaju Vladimira Nabokova dvotomni monolit (1990/1991) i, uopšte, akademski opus Brajana Bojda. Slični naslovi, na koncu, nemaju da kažu ništa novije od onoga što smo već saznali iz brojnih drugih studija, međutim zadržavaju bogomdano pravo da ažuriraju postojeća akademska štiva.

Shodno tome, Robert Rouper tvrdi da su, zapravo, dvije decenije boravka u Americi (1940-60) i pisanje na engleskom jeziku od Nabokova načinili pisca kakvim ga danas znamo, a da su prvih dvadeset godina u egzilu (u Njemačkoj i Francuskoj) i, docnije, posljednjih dvadesetak u Švajcarskoj, samo pokazali budućeg kolosa u marginalnom usponu, odnosno u nedvosmislenom padu.

U to ime Rouper teži da što više citira Nabokovljeva pisma gdje svim srcem hvali, možda ne američke pisce koliko prirodu i jezik Sjedinjenih Država, a poslije će autor neusiljeno spekulisati i o tome kako su sjene i obrisi onog najameričkijeg od svih američkih romana, Selindžerovog Lovca u žitu, našli mjesta u Loliti. U pre-Lolita odličnom pseudoautobiografskom romanu Pnin, gdje Nabokov između ostalog ismijava američko akademsko društvo zajedno s kružokom nevažnih ruskih emigranata, Rouper naposljetku primjećuje da se u svakom poglavlju pominju američke vjeverice.

U gornjem pasusu naglasak je bio na riječi spekulisati, jer teza mora da bude potkrijepljena, ako ne očiglednim dokazima ili obzirnim dedukcijama, a onda barem plauzibilnim nagvaždanjima.

Kako god bilo, Rouper neće ni pokušati da dâ neki obazriviji odgovor na pitanje zbog čega je Nabokov često pisao o nimfetama poput Lolite. Ali će citirati zapažanje Martina Ejmisa: „Od devetnaest napisanih fikcija, ne manje od šest u potpunosti ili djelimično za temu imaju seksualnost prepubescentnih djevojčica.“

S druge strane, Nabokov je tadašnje dvije dominante, kao što su Hemingvej i Fokner, proglasio pompeznim antitalentima valjda zato što je – ako pitate Roupera – „imao namjeru da tako privuče pažnju na sebe“. Od čovjeka kog odista boli što Nabokov nije više poštovao i znao o američkoj literaturi, ne može plauzibilnije od ovoga.

Istovremeno Rouper pravilno zaključuje da je Edmund Vilson, najprestižniji tadašnji kritičar i famozni rusofil i ljevičar, bio presudan u predstavljanju i objavljivanju svog prijatelja u Americi. Doduše, ne shvatam zbog čega bi sporio da Brajan Bojd u studijama u Nabokovu tvrdi iole drugačije, osim što radi istu stvar samo sa malko manje entuzijazma i više razboritosti.

I dok je za Bojda čitav Nabokovljev opus vrijedan detaljne analize – Bojd je, između ostalog, napisao i dvije studije, o Adi i Blijedoj vatri – za Roupera „možda nisu sve njegove knjige besmrtni klasici (...).“ Pa produžava: „Moguće je da Lolita nastavlja da ruši sve pred sobom poput Oklahominog tornada (...) ali neki od nas će valjda uspjeti da prođu kroz život, a da se ponovo ne vrate Adi.

Romani Pogledaj arlekine!, Prozirne stvari, U znaku nezakonito rođenih, Očaj, Poziv na smaknuće – čak i poduži dijelovi Dara, ruskog romana kojim se (Nabokov) najviše ponosio – i nisu baš toliko neodoljivi“, piše Rouper.

Primijetićete da su, osim distopijskog U znaku nezakonito rođenih (ili Bend Sinister) svi pobrojani naslovi napisani van Amerike. Za njega mu je Vilson kazao da ubuduće ne bi trebao da se bavi politikom, s obzirom da o tome ne zna ama baš ništa i, štaviše, diči se time.

Nesumnjivo je da u svemu tome ima zrna-dva istine, mada kao što Rouper primjećuje da svaku svoju knjigu koju Nabokov čitaocima arogantno predočava kao remek-djelo, isto tako se kod njega može uočiti tvrdoglavi autorski poriv da se pošto-poto zadovolji klimava teza o Nabokovu kao o kvintesencijalnom američkom piscu. Rouper ide dotle da naglas mašta o tome kako bi Nabokov (vjerovatno) nadjenuo ime nastavku svoje autobiografije (Govori, sjećanje): možda bi se ona zvala Govori, Ameriko– umjesto dva naslova koja je veliki pisac već imao u vidu za taj nezavršeni memoar. Čak i podnaslov Rouperove knjige asocira na danas već izanđali sveamerički Keruakov klasik, Na putu.

Najbolje od svega, Rouperovi glavni izvori su upravo Brajan Bojd i autorka biografije o Veri Nabokov (1999), Stejsi Šif, što su svakodnevnicu porodice Nabokovih tako dobro prikazali da on, kao što i sâm priznaje, nema potrebe da „ponovo izmišlja točak“.

I jedino što autoru tada preostaje jeste da izvrne Bojdovu misao gdje Amerika, logično, predstavlja samo jednu fazu u Nabokovljevoj karijeri, i da od toga napravi knjigu gdje će naširoko pisati o lepidopterologiji i američkim nacionalnim muzejima i parkovima.

U jednom trenutku, Rouper naizgled konstatuje i neku vrstu proročanstva – gdje se Nabokov očito obraća Endrjuu Fildu, svom prvom biografu, 30 godina prije nego što će ga upoznati! Ima i toga.

Ipak, ako zanemarimo bombastične hvalospjeve na račun američkog karaktera i njenih sublimnih prirodnih ljepota, čovjeku koji ne zna ništa o Nabokovu, a posebno o boravku u Americi, gdje je došao bezmalo praznih džepova, a zatim ju je napustio kao besmrtni entomolog, pisac i profesor, ova knjiga mu garantovano neće odmoći.

Prije nego što je raspakovao kofere u Njujorku, Vladimir je otišao u potragu za leptirima: ne u Centralni Park, već u Američki Muzej prirodne istorije. Rouper tvrdi da je tokom boravka u Americi pisac sa porodicom prešao oko 320,000 kilometara, najradije se vozeći kolima kroz planinske predjele, gdje je većma sakupljao insekte.

Naravno, vozila je Vera. Godinu dana prije Revolucije, Vladimir je naslijedio imanje što bi danas vrijedilo 140 miliona dolara. A da mu nije bilo bliskog rođaka, Nikolasa, koji je u Americi bio poznati kompozitor, njegov 6-godišnji sin Dmitri, Vera (Jevrejka) i on vrlo vjerovatno nikada ne bi napustili Evropu. Vladimirov brat, Sergej, homoseksualac, umro je u konc-logoru Nojengameu, početkom 1945.

Liberalni Vladimirovi roditelji, anglofili, od malih nogu su ga kljukali starom entomološkom literaturom i fikcijom na engleskom jeziku. Majka, Elena, mu je čitala engleske bajke, dok je, kao malo stariji, isto kao i Česlav Miloš, bio ponešen vesternima Tomasa Majna-Rida, Irca što se borio u Meksičko-američkom ratu.

Njegov otac, V.D. Nabokof, bio je eminentni ruski liberalni član Prvog ruskog parlamenta, profesor kriminologije i borac za ljudska prava. Poznavao je i Tolstoja koga je jednom prilikom i 10-godišnji Vladimir – ako je vjerovati Vladimiru, a kome će kasnije postati literarni idol – imao prilike da vidi na ulici u Sankt Petersburgu.

Za razliku od Tolstoja, Nabokov će tokom čitave karijere negodovati protiv čitalaca koji su u njegovim knjigama tražili prikaze „društvenih problema“; svoje književne svjetonazore je jasno stavio do znanja u pismu prijatelju Vladislavu Kodaševiću:

„Pisci bi trebali da budu obuzeti samo svojim beznačajnim, naivnim, omamljivim rabotama i tek u prolazu da opravdaju sve ono čemu u realnosti ne treba nikakvog opravdanja; bizarnost takvog postojanja,neugodnost, usamljenost....i određeni spokoj unutrašnje razbibrige. I baš iz tog razloga ne podnosim nikakvu priču – inteligentnu ili ne, meni je to sve isti đavo – o ‘modernom dobu’, o ‘strijepnji’, ‘religioznom preporodu’, ili bilo kakvoj rečenici s riječju ‘poslijeratni’ u njoj.“
2015

[Bernadette · Rating 3 out of 5]

One must admire anyone willing to interlace their own prose with Nabokov's, as Roper does extensively here, quoting liberally from Nabokov's letters—especially to Edmund Wilson—as well as from his books in a study whose biographical structure is largely a framework on which Roper hangs his analyses of Nabokov's work and its influences. This being said, Roper's stated intention to "borrow Nabokov back from the scholars" never quite seems to be accomplished. His analysis of Nabokov's prose is too plodding for a popular text but insufficiently rigorous for an academic one; I found myself wanting an account that was either livelier or more erudite.

[Chrissie]

My GR friend , Leslie, led me to this article about the book: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/15/boo...

Link provided for others interested.

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

Exhaustively researched, very well written.

Notes:
Pronounced Na-BO-kuf
6 befriending ordinary folk
43 Depression shaped Edmund Wilson. Wised up considerably about the Soviets by the time he first met Nabokov (VN)
60 Lanz might have contributed to Lolita his Old World charmer person, handsome insinuating way
72 Wilson and VN had an absolute ball together.
77 Gogol translation, Garnett’s vs VN’s
82 Cambridge, lepidopterology was solace, sanctuary: he needed to be moving on…
88 on tour of Lincoln’s home he met a character straight out of Gogol, whose passion was flagpoles
93 Son Dmitri, a propensity for dawdling
95 Publisher Laughlin eager not to be taken for a mark, and drove hard bargains with writers.
97 At Alta ski resort (Laughlin’s), I walk 12 to 18 miles a day, wearing only shorts and tennis shoes.
112 Lolita 1955, set in ‘47/’48 … Huck Finn also an aimless travel novel, rich with flavors of American speech and savors of place.
115 VN’s sense of where to look for leps was astute
125 Stallings, a fellow lep … Their correspondence from the beginning had a comradely tone, with tongue-in-cheek sallies. … A galvanizing effect.
132 Cornell 1948, 11 years … worked prodigiously there, Lolita, Pnin, Speak Memory, short stories, poetry, translations … Conceived and began Pale Fire and Ada.
153 History of abduction accounts, settlers taken and carried away (Twain), by 1800, 700 captivity narratives had been published, sexual exploitation was always a subtext. Probably VN’s path to channeling this mode.
194 Pnin a good soul and an honorable man … VN ends segments with cliff hangers.
196 Pnin’s housewarming, 11/12/55 N Yorker
201 VN not good at plots, but good at schematics, a set of arbitrary preconditions, making things come out neatly. … E Wilson, I expected more of a wow at the end.
236 Lolita released 1958
238 Lionel Trilling TV interview
241-244 Dinner with publisher … his affairs … Dmitri and his wife … Clearly, the publicity tornado could carry people away.

[Ellen Klock · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was an innocent when I first read Lolita by Nabokov, not even old enough to vote. My college professor must have gotten a kick out of my reactions to this novel as I wasn’t much older than Lolita, being as naive as a youngster. I’ll admit that I had never read a book like this before, but I must have brought something to the table as I got an A in the course.

So when I saw this book, I wondered about Nabokov and his motivations. Although I didn’t remember all the details, how could one forget Humbert Humbert. Over the years I have often wondered about the topic of pedophilia. In some cultures older men take young girls as brides, and even in America children as young as fourteen have been wed (though this is not a common practice). Then there are the cases of teachers falling in love with their students. Is this a matter of “she” or “he” (this is not limited to older men and younger girls) finding “the one” – Not a matter of being attracted to all young teens, but that particular boy or girl? I would like to think the passion for another is a deep rooted feeling special for that one person, not an “epidemic” of indiscriminate sex. Yet if it’s true love, the elder should wait or “keep it in their pants” (as we say) until the child is of age, but human nature, or more accurately our animal instincts, kicks in and scandal results.

Robert Roper, an admitted Nabokovian, takes the reader on a detailed journey over the years that Nabokov lived in the United States in “Nabokov in America: The Road to Lolita”. Nabokov led a complex life filled with drama, including his escape from Europe on the last ship out of France before the Nazi occupation, saving the life of his Jewish wife and son.

Born in Russia, Nabokov was also fluent in German, French and English, often creating translations of his own works (as well as of other author’s writings). He actually could read English at the age of four, even before he could decipher his native tongue. Nabokov lived in the US from 1940 to 1960 traveling across the country by car, logging over 200,000 miles throughout the twenty year span. A naturalist who loved the outdoors, Nabokov was an avid butterfly collector, even discovering a new species. He visited numerous national parks throughout America, visiting museums to see and discuss his favorite topic – collecting butterflies and moths (lepidoperology). He even curated the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard where he identified and catalogued their large collection of butterflies.

His financial situation had its ups and downs and the family often lived on the stipends and fellowships he received from places such as the Guggenheim which supported the arts (including literature). Inbetween road trips, Nabokov worked at various universities, such as Wellesly and Cornell, teaching Russian Literature. He was a dynamic professor who brought a unique spin on the topic to his classroom. He also was a popular guest speaker at various locations throughout the country.

It was during these American years that Vladimir Nabokov wrote Lolita, which brought him the fame he knew he deserved. One of Vladimir’s close friends was a pedaphile which could easily have influenced the plot of Lolita, but Nabokov had also been fascinated by this topic while living in Europe and published other works involving pedaphilia prior to this novel. The travels of Humbert Humbert across the United States with his beloved Lolita mirrored the motor trips taken by the Nabokov family over two-lane highways, where they, too, stayed in motels and ate at roadside diners. Lolita is the story of Humbert Humbert who marries a widow to get closer to her daughter Lolita. When his wife dies, Humbert kidnaps and flees with his underaged “daughter/lover” to escape his nemesis who is also pursuing the nymphette Lolita.

Once completed the manuscript was extremely difficult to publish due to its sexual content, and ended up being distributed by Olympia in 1955 in England where some considered it to be the best book of the year in spite of its shocking content. It was finally published in the US in 1958. Despite the outrage, this book was so well written it was impossible to dismiss (plus there were no four letter words in it). By September, it was so popular it rose to number one on the New York Times Bestsellers list for seven weeks, selling 100,000+ copies in its first year and millions over the next decade. Stanley Kubrick bought the movie rights for $150,000. Ironically, while under restriction in Britain and France, Lolita was embraced by America. The author referred to this whirlwind of attention as Hurricane Lolita, making the author instantly famous at the age of 59. Other scandalous books of the time were Peyton Place, Catcher in the Rye, and Lady Chatterly’s Lover. Despite the adulation from his adopted country, when Vladimir’sy son, Dmitri, went to Italy to study Opera, Nabokov and his wife Vera moved to Switzerland to be close to their only child. Nabokov died there in 1977, visiting the US only twice, in 1962 for the release of the movie and in 1964 to do some readings.

Robert Roper writes in a literary style, analyzing and commenting on Nabokov’s life and works. He includes references to other literary giants of the era (both American and European) as well as Nabokov’s reactions to their works. This book is extremely detailed and well researched full of excerpts from various correspondence and Nabokov’s written works with a special focus on the novel Lolita. Nabokov in America: The Road to Lolita is definitely not for the casual reader, but would be an excellent source for a scholar interested in this topic. The author of this book did quite a bit of name dropping and seemed to exhibit a bit of an ego, but it did not distract from the whole. Four stars.

A thank you to Netgalley for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review. This review is also posted on my blog, Gotta Read.

[Vivian Bookmark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kind of loses focus in the last 30 pages, but a great read for Nabokov fans, such as myself, nonetheless, even if I was never made for this American nonsense. Much can be written about reading Nabokov, pulling from him proudly, as a person of color, given his and Véra's later love of McCarthyism and defense of the U.S in its invasion of Vietnam, along with the general American mythos that involves names meaningless to Black and brown denizens. It's a simultaneously frustrating and fruitful experience. I wish I could better verbalize the inherent contradiction in my interest and inspiration of Nabokov, but I'll leave that here.

All that aside, you will find some new words here, an activity that I'm sure all Nabokovians fiend for, and it provides intriguing insights into how VN wrote Lolita, along with what many say about him.

[Gultekin Irengun · Rating 3 out of 5]

First attempt to find more about one of my favourite writers, who spent a lot of time in America.
It is about the book of love of nymphets and butterflies. There are some surprising facts about him, his wife, his son, his anti-communist stance making him almost not-likeable, supporting Nixon and Vietnam war are couple of them; in the name of glorifying American way of life. He is a literary genius in the end although his fame did not come easy to him in the west side of Atlantic while being a master in Europe.

[Chris Hall · Rating 4 out of 5]

For some reason I was under the impression that this was a purely biographical book - it isn't. It probably spends as much time critiquing Nabokov's American work as it does describing how he spent his time there.

It's a good book regardless - for me at least, it offered some insights into some of his best writing.

[Richard Luck · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little rambling at times and the fact that Nabokov's interest in little girls eclipsed that of his characters makes for uncomfortable reading at times. At its best, however, an invaluable account of how the New World shaped the most European of writers.

[Tony · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good intro to Nabokov's life with a focus on his American novels, most notably Loloita, their creation and his career,

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just couldn't get into this book. Roper was will researched, but he got caught up in his own tangential details in a distracting way. Had to stop.

[Marvin Campbell · Rating 5 out of 5]

An achievement__a stunning one.

[David4439 · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

[Hamish · Rating 3 out of 5]

I get the impression that Roper is trying to set his work in contrast to Brian Boyd's (famous for his definitive, two volume Nabokov biography and several critical works). Where Boyd is practically worshipful of N, generally presents his personality in a very positive light (possibly at least partially due to needing N's widow's approval in order to gain access to his papers), and holding a high critical assessment of virtually all of his work, Roper seems almost to go out of his way to present an unflattering portrait of N's personality, is outright dismissive of most of his non-Lolita work, and calls bullshit on many of his positions on art. He notes in the afterword that he was trying to avoid both being hagiographic and overly negative, and perhaps it only seems negative in contrast to Boyd. Still, it's difficult not to read it as being a riposte against Boyd. It also feels like he wanted to take N down a peg or two, both personally and artistically. On the plus side, this leads to the inclusion of a number of interesting anecdotes that never would have made it into the two volume biography, such as the story of N's son Dmitri and N's publisher's wife. Roper also openly discusses the frequency with which the theme of pedophilia appears in N's work, which is rather strange, and goes completely untouched upon in the Boyd biography.

There are some other oddities, like the constant allusions and comparisons to writers N disdained (as fans know, N was never hesitant to disparage writers he viewed as unartistic). He dedicates a page and a half to a description of a Hamsun novel simply because it's located a few hundred miles from where Nabokov summered as a boy. He regularly references and compares N to Faulkner, each time noting N's dislike for him, almost as if he were actively trying to annoy N's ghost. There's also an out-of-nowhere discussion of Hemingway seemingly for the sole purpose of suggesting that N wasn't able to appreciate his work the way the author does, which mostly comes off as petty sour grapes.

However, for the book's stated purpose of offering a detailed account of N's years in the United States and how this contributed to the conceptualization and writing of Lolita, it largely succeeds. If you've read Boyd's biography, much of this will be old news to you. However, Roper is able to bring enough new details and to flesh out details that Boyd dealt with only in passing in a way that justifies the book's existence. It also gives a new perspective on his life (a not entirely flattering one) that is rare in N scholarship. And for the more casual N reader (who I believe this is aimed at), this is a nice primer on his glory years.

[Henry Sturcke · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is entitled “... in America,” but I think it could with equal accuracy be called Nabokov and Lolita, since it is very much about the preparation for, production, and reception of his great American novel. Roper not only immersed himself in the vast body of writing the Russian emigré created, as well as the flood of secondary literature about him, he also retraced Nabokov’s discovery of his new homeland, following him not only to the academic and literary centers Manhattan, Cambridge, Palo Alto and Ithaca, but also the many roads he and his wife drove on their frequent summer automobile trips out west, pursuing Nabokov’s passion, lepidoptery. It was interesting to learn that for months at a time, his immersion in this avocation -- both in the field and at a desk in museums back east -- was so complete that it crowded out his writing. Roper calls himself a Nabokovian, but this doesn’t prevent him from differentiating among the author’s books, making it clear they are not all great. Roper’s own writing is good, with a slightly jarring tendency to slip into slangy cliché. Edmund Wilson, for instance, “had wised up" about Stalinist Russia (p. 44), whereas Nabokov’s agent “had wanted him to write something over the American plate” (p. 191). Nevertheless, a very good read.

[Warrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some slight stylistic annoyances aside (oddly constructed sentences and a shifting viewpoint) this book combines an exploration of the travel and trajectory of Nabokov in the making of his masterpiece with a literary appreciation and assessment of the work as a whole.
Roper's book mostly traces Nabokov's American journey and the road trips the great writer took in coming to understand and ultimately describe his adopted home land in his great American road novel, 'Lolita'.
The descriptions (and some accompanying photographs) of the motels, cabins and huts Nabokov stayed in while collecting butterflies and material for his novel are my favourite part of this book. The book is deeply researched and detailed.
Nabokov fell in love with America and came to understand it too. As Roper puts it: 'He had a looked around him and recognised a curious half-asleep people - a perky populace with gloomy secrets, inhabiting a magnificent landscape that it tended too crap up, pronto to stifling social norms best depicted via caustic comedy. Gunplay would arrive in the last act, as it did in so many of the nation's stories.'

[Dean · Rating 3 out of 5]

Always admire authors who write English classics when English wasn't their primary language like Conrad and Nabokov.

Russia ' s loss is our gain. For over a hundred years now Russia has lost some it's best human capital like Nabokov.

As this book makes clear he certainly didn't have any self esteem issues and seem petty with many other authors. The most important being his first sponsor and best friend Edmund Wilson.

They disagreed about how evil Lenin and Stalin really were. Nabokov was right. Much more evil than Wilson imagined. They also disagreed about literary theory it what a great novel should be judged on. Nabokov thought it should be judged on its own merits. Only the text. Wilson thought should fit into some higher message or philosophy and judged accordingly. Nabokov didn't practice what he preached.

[Phillip Ramm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting background to the writing of that controversial masterpiece, Lolita. Hotels and travels across America, discussions and arguments with other writers, New Yorker commas, publishing controversies, the writing and translating of other works in the meantime, his luminous prose and clunky dialogue... I have read much of Nabokov many (*many*) years ago, but only caught up with Pnin last year and loved the forgetful professor. I started on Ada and got bogged down. Might try it again.

This book dwells perhaps unnecessarily much on the lepidopteral aspects of Nabokov's travels (which were very time-consuming), hence only 3 stars. Plus, half the book consists of footnotes, endnotes, and bibliography and, on a Kindle, and it was hard to keep track.

[Bevan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wanted very much to read this book, but was somewhat disappointed. The story is told in minute detail, but I came away with a not very pleasant impression of Nabokov. He was for years my absolute favorite writer, but that infatuation has abated somewhat. Still, the story of how he came to write Lolita is remarkable. Nowadays, I prefer his novels like Pnin and earlier books, like The Real Life of Sebastian Knight and others.

Finally, I have to put aside his politics and continue reading him, or reread some of his books. "Pnin" has so many beautiful, tender moments in it, I can't forget how marvelous a book it is.

[JerryDeanHalleck · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good for what it is, an examination of Nabokov's life in America 1940-1960, with an emphasis on the incidents and experiences related to Lolita. The biographer shows how many of the incidents in the novel, such as the drive West, the hospital stay, etc. were taken from Nabokov's own life.

Nabokov's life during WW2 are given little space, the book really takes off after 1945. Full of interesting facts, it seems there are conflicting stories about how the Nabokov's were able to leave Europe in 1940. Vera, Nabokov's jewish wife, claimed they were sponsered by a Christian organization, others claim a Jewish immigrant society was responsible. The author doesn't resolve the matter.

[Bruce · Rating 5 out of 5]

This extremely well researched book about the American years of author Vladimir Nabokov explores the dramatic influence his adopted country had on his writing and life. I thought I knew Nabokov and his books well, but I learned a lot from this book. Roper brought great understanding to the novels and the influences that led Nabokov to create them as he did. I enjoyed this beautifully written biography of Nabokov in America.

[Gabby M · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’d been looking forward to getting to this one for ages but honestly, I was really underwhelmed. Lolita is one of my all-time favorite books, so reading about the author’s time in America (where he wrote the book) seemed like it would provide an interesting perspective, but this was criminally boring. I’m always wary of a non-fiction book that constantly excerpts large chunks of its sources because it seldom has much original to say, and books like this are why.

[Robyn Latchford · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not usually someone who reads biographies, but I found Roper's writing to be very compelling and insightful. He describes Nabokov's unique life story, his journey to writing Lolita, as well as touching on his eccentric personality. At times it got a little slow when I felt that Roper went into too much detail about very specific subjects. Overall, however, it was a great read.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fascinating and erudite look at Nabokov's years in America in the 1940s and 1950s. Much of this time was spent on road trips across America to hunt for butterflies and gather the material that would eventually be transformed in "Lolita."

[Samuel Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

Almost. Less hagiographic than Boyd's biographies, which was useful, but didn't quite gel as a biography or a work of criticism. I do agree with Roper's assessment that VN's later novels aren't as good.

[Ophelinha · Rating 3 out of 5]

A road trip in Nabokov's discovery of America and in the genesis of his masterpiece, Lolita. Some digressions could have been shorter and the focus on Lolita even stronger. All in all, it makes for a delectable reading for the Lolita aficionados.