quotablebookquotes discussion

Pages 79 - 154

I don't even know how to even react with Humbert. Honestly. How does Nabokov write such a perverted, mentally ill pedophile so well... and so poetic?

I checked out the Everyman's Library edition from my library's consortium, and on the back it says:

"The only convincing love story of our century." --Vanity Fair

Love story. Oh no. This is certainly not a love story, I am shocked at the wording of that review. It's only misleading to people. From the first section, I was already not liking Humbert, but this section really proved himself, and it disgusts me that there are people who believe this is a love story.

At this point, I don't know whether or not Humbert is actually in love with Lolita. Right now, I'm leaning towards he's been damaged somewhere by the death of Annabel and he's unable to let go of her image, and Lolita just happens to look like her. Already Lolita is showing truly how bratty she is, and Humbert isn't comfortable with it. He has difficulty covering up her imperfect personality through his writing. He's in love with the idea of Lolita, but he's in love with the 12 year old sitting in shotgun of his car. Lolita has had sex with a girl and a boy at camp, her language isn't poetry, and she's insensitivity to his feelings.

But with her insensitivity, I don't think she's seductive like he says she is. Before when he talks about Charlotte confronting him about his diary, he says "whatever Humbert Humbert said - or attempted to say - is inessential" and "again, whatever H.H. murmured may be omitted, I think." He is manipulating his story, and is obviously an unreliable narrator. I can't trust that Lolita seduced him in bed. He drugged her, what kind of person does that to a child? I doubt that a 12 year old has the guts to seduce an older man in that manner. I've read about the stages of child psychology (for class), and the stage where a child makes innocent statements like "I want to marry you mommy/daddy" begins around 4 and ends around 7. Lolita has grown out of that for sure. I'm quite sure Humbert heard what he wanted to hear and raped her.

And let us not forget how he abducted her, lied to her about her mother's death, and threatened her with orphanages and the law (of which how would he knowledgeable in such things as he is a foreigner). I have a good feeling that Lolita is a brat, but she's no seducer (Although I'm still going with the idea that 12 year olds don't go off having sex especially in that time? Maybe I'm just seeing that whole aspect with the rose-colored glasses on).

And it is so creepy she calls him "dad" still. I get goosebumps thinking of that. I'm sure if Lolita does feel anything for him, it's just attraction because of his good looks. She does compare him to men in her magazines, and it's not like we are truly in love with men in magazines. Humbert is an obsessive, dominant, disturbed, misguided individual who doesn't understand (or maybe he does since he goes to great lengths to hide his "love") he's sick. And wrong.

But no. That is certainly not a love story. Gives me the creeps.