I would like to hear your thoughts on Lolita
I would like to hear your thoughts on Lolita
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I couldn’t finish it
Not my style either. Not all books are wholesome.
Loved it. I read it when I was a teenager and still have my copy.
Same here! The New York Public Library had an exhibit on Nobokov’s life, work, plus hand-written pages and photos many years ago. It was well worth the time. We generally stop in there when going to a Broadway matinee and come into the city early. The exhibits are always worth your time.
N’s writing style and command of language are astounding, but the subject matter here is unacceptable
@Peter, is it just off-limits here, or do you think Nabokov should not have written about it?
@Lorrie ~ it is a matter of personal choice, but I cannot endorse it. N has a gorgeous manner of writing and a broad lexicon, but this story left me shaking my head
She is asking if you disagree with the book or discussions about the book.
One of my favorite books. It really made me think about objectification and perceptions of reality and how people construct their own reality to fulfill their psychological needs. It introduced me to the concept of Solipsism. Also, Nabokov wrote about the American landscape in an incredibly evocative manner.
Just my two cents. ?♀️
In my top 3. Wonderful book
Hated it with a vengeance. I make a purpose of not knowing anything or very little about a book before reading it so as to not skew my thought/ pre conception of it beforehand. I picked it up because it is on a 100 books to read before you die. A story about a paedophile drugging an underage child is not what I call a good read. Just my opinion though.
@James Same here brother!
@James what about a psychopath murdering an old lady? Because you might want to avoid Crime and Punishment.
Some books contain challenging themes.
All humans have the capability to murder. It depends on what pushes us to that point but not all humans are capable of pedophilia. Most all humans could kill the pedophile that molested their child or would like to see them executed. We read books like Crime and Punishment to analyze why people murder. Pedophilia is pure evil and deserving of the death penalty.
Matt, like I said, it is “my opinion”. I did not like this book because of its subject matter. Still read it though
I have to wonder if people hate books about war as much as they hate books about child molestation?
Disturbingly brilliant. Brilliantly disturbing.
Can’t put it any better than this.
I surprisingly loved it. With two young girls I was sure I would hate it due to the subject matter. I honestly don’t know how you end up not really hating a him. It must take excellent writing skills for a reader not to detest a character like that.
@Sean and I suspect that’s why Nabokov wrote it. A little challenge to himself to see how good a writer he really was.
@Matt that could be the case , it’s some challenge to give yourself! I don’t know much about him so I’m unsure if he’s generally a controversial character or if Lolita was a one off.
@Sean I’d say a one off. His other books are far less disturbing, but each of them has a weird challenge for you.
Pale Fire is a very good one. Part 1 is a long poem by a (fictional) dead author. Part 2 is a line by line review of the poem by a ‘friend’… I can’t really say any more, and realize that is a poor synopsis, but I don’t want to give any more away ?
@Matt thank youn?
@Sean I think some people think Humbert Humbert is a real person and not a fictional character. No one is justifying his actions. He’s clearly depraved. That said, I can understand why those with a sensitivity for the subject matter cannot get through it. I also feel like some are looking at Nabokov himself as being a pedophile. I think a debate like this clearly proves his brilliance and there is a reason why Lolita sits on the table at the bookstore every summer under books that make you think.
Sean Gallagher “I’m unsure if he’s generally a controversial character or if Lolita was a one off.” Read Nabokov’s “Ada,” which deals with incest.
Brilliant book!
Disgraceful. The story of a pedophile obsessed with a young girl.
Unfortunately, it’s a common occurrence these days, probably always was, but the book shone a much-needed light on the subject.
I would be ashamed to write a book like Lolita but some love to shock people.
@Joan, I’d be ashamed to ignore the subject matter knowing how prevalent the behavior is, often within our own families.
Joan Noble rape, incest, pedophilia etc. existed back to the beginning of time in literature. Not to condone but to express realism. In this case, psychological. I think the fearlessness in a writer’s subject can be a fine art. Also, the ability to disturb.
Lorrie Lane There are three movies called Faces of Death showing actual death by all different ways of dying. I’ve heard of them but never seen them. If you like to be shocked and long to understand real life, you might enjoy those.
@Joan, I don’t specifically choose to read stories or see movies expressly to be shocked as you must since you knew of Faces of Death (Never heard of it.) As for longing to understand real life, try teaching for 36 years and you will see everything, realizing that family life is far from ideal and that pedophilia, incest, rape, abuse, murder are daily family occurrences and always have been. Ask any social worker about their ridiculous caseload of broken families. So, Lolita is hardly shocking to any adult who hasn’t chosen to bury his/her head in the sand.
@Joan I meant no offense. I was just having a discussion. You are entitled to your opinion. I asked for it in my post. If you read the responses, they are all varied in opinion and I respect yours as well as everyone else’s. No, I don’t think I would like those movies about all different ways of dying
I feel like the point of realism has been put forward quite clearly, but you seem intent on claiming people just want to be shocked.
I usually choose books from list so I read a lot of Pulitzer Winners. I read Lolita because it was number 4 on a list of best 100 books. ….Through fancy prose style Humbert covers up and hides his horrible actions. His verbal games serve to manipulate his readers to accept his feelings and actions and sympathize with him. The name of the book is Lolita or The Confessions of a White Widowed Male. Some people are gullible, easily manipulated and have a lot of empathy. Lolita is about a sick, deranged pedophile trying to justify and normalize his evilness.
Isn’t it amazing how people through words can be manipulated into acceptance and empathy for the most evil things in the world. Ted Bundy and Hitler are two that come to mind.
@Joan have you ever read or heard of The Prince of Tides? It may be too recent to be labeled a classic as of yet, but there are parts that are disturbing to say the least. If you are familiar with it, I’m curious of your opinion of it and it’s author Pat Conroy. It seems as though you are labeling the author of Lolita as being depraved for his imagination in creating a fictional character of disgust
@Stacey I’ve read Prince of Tides and saw the movie. Pat Conroy used the sodomizing of a character in another of his books and I can’t remember which one. I did not care for either of them because reading about a young boy being sodomized is not for me. I do love his book The Great Santini. I did not care for Outlander because of the sodomy in the book. I’ve often wondered why Pat Conroy always feels the need to have his protagonist be sodomized in his books.
One of my favorite books, I Know This Much is True by Wally Lamb has some bestiality in it. But it’s part of the story to show the development of a character. The book is about twin brothers with one being schizophrenic. There is a journal found by one brother about his grandfather in Italy so there are two stories running through the book. Lamb never ask us to accept the bestiality or condones it. But offers insight into the personality of the character through the bestiality. Just as Dostoevsky offers insight into the evilness of a character by the rape of an 11 year old girl. Dostoevsky presents the character as pure evil.
@Joan right but, are you saying that Nabokov and Conroy are condoning the actions of their villains?
@Stacey Nabokov wants us to accept his horrible feelings and actions. He manipulates us into believing he had a right to molest the girl. Even changes her name to Lolita. I saw a movie years ago with Timothy Hutton and Natalie Portman when she was about 13 and was just getting into acting. She develops a crush on Hutton in the movie and wants to be around him. Hutton is separated from his wife and is aware the girl has a crush on him. He ponders the little girl crush and how to handle it. Hutton never takes advantage of the little girl but gets back with his wife and leaves town. At the end of the movie Portman and Hutton’s best friend are standing in the yard watching them leave, he turns to her and says…”So you are the neighborhood Lolita?” Males all over the world look at little girl crushes as their Lolita after Nabokov’s book.
Boys and girls develop crushes on adults at times. I think the more mature a child is, the more likely they are to develop crushes. Vili developed a crush on his teacher Mary Kay Laterno and it just happened that she was a pedophile. The danger for childhood crushes is when it involves a pedophile. We should never condone an adult acting on a childhood crush. But always call it what it is. Perverted and evil.
Pat Conroy just uses the rape and sodomizing of a young boy to write a book that sales. It worked for Prince of Tides and he thought it would work again. The Great Santini is probably his best book and he did not have to use rape and sodomy to write a great book.
@Joan I get it. Lolita is not your cup of tea. You like literature that is pure in plot and wholesome. And that’s o.k. You are suggesting that Nabokov himself is justifying pedophilia because he wrote about it. But that Lamb and Dostoyevsky aren’t. And Conroy used sodomy to sell books. Got it.
I personally found it great reading. In fact, I watched the movie previously. And while reading the book, realized that no movie can actually bring out the author’s work in the way he had expressed or narrated.
Brilliant
I’ve read some banned books like Tropic of Cancer. The Rainbow. Lady Chatterly’s Lover. Lolita is the worst.
@Joan I’d argue that the explicit nature of the content of Tropic of Cancer is far worse.
@Matt they were all adults.
@Joan yes, I agree. I’m just saying, the way it’s described makes it ‘worse’. Very graphic
Authors have been banned for writing in explicit or graphic detail about sex, homosexuality and even bestiality. I can handle all of that. As long as they are writing about adults and not children. How much more graphic does Lolita need to be for people to get the picture that a 36 year old man lusting after and obsessed with a 12 year old girl is pure evil. And I don’t care how he words it. There is no way he can justify it and make it acceptable or manipulate me into feeling sorry for the monster.
Tremendous novel, extremely well written. Nabokov wrote the book so well he has people talking about it with such disdain still to this day.
I like to think I have an open mind when it comes to literature but this book made me sick to my stomach and I stopped reading after about 30 pages. It seemed to me the author was nothing but a pedophile who wanted to give voice to his sick ideas in the guise of literature.
@Christopher nothing really happens in the first 30 pages. There’s absolutely nothing graphic in the whole book.
@Matt I guess we have a different opinion on the definition of the word graphic.
@Matt I stand by my opinion. This is a disgusting book hidden behind the guise of literary art.
@Christopher I mean graphic in the dictionary definition sense i.e. “giving vividly clear details”, which this book absolutely does not do. Please feel free to point me to any part of it to prove me wrong.
The subject matter is unpleasant, I agree, but there is nothing explicitly laid out in it. And that really isn’t a question of opinion until you can point to a section and say “I find this part graphic”
I suppose when he describes in detail the nipples of the child. What is wrong with you?
@Christopher Please do point me to that place in the text.
And you’re now descending into silly ad homs. This is regarded as one of the finest pieces of literature in the English language; it’s not like I’ve picked out some obscure, meritless and heavy-handed jaunt into child sexual abuse…
It’s a difficult book and it has its brilliant moments. As a modern novel it’s doing something very interesting with the source material it’s riffing on (namely the structure and tone of an 18th century novel, Manon Lescaut), but it’s also I suspect deeply triggering for anyone who has childhood trauma (as I do). In the wake of #metoo and #timesup, it’s hard not to see it as part of a very big problem.
@Stephanie I was with you until the last sentence. The book is not condoning paedophilia any more than Crime and Punishment is condoning murder.
However, I am of course sorry to hear of your personal circumstance.
I know it would be a different book but I would have preferred the romantic interest to be older. That way it is easier to justify Humbert’s obsession since it seems to be what any ordinary person might feel for another person. It humanizes humbert and therefore I dont find it easy to condemn him. Apart from that the style of the book and how it perceives the world are on point. Funny at times.
Isn’t that in part the point, Humbert is persona no gratia, and yet he exists in society and is accepted in society and Nabukov can make him seem both human and someone to be sympathised with. It can be read as an object lesson in how difficult it is to identify and expose the perpetrator.
@Helen I think the point is for wishing the book to be different in order for one to be comfortable with it 🙂 you make a good point about a monster passing by through society as an okay guy (I haven’t thought about it). I have become slightly more paranoid.
That is the way the book is written. The game of words to manipulate people into accepting his feelings and actions and sympathize with him.
It is pornography. No thanks.
Except it isn’t. The book is a whole lot more subtle than that.
Ridiculous comment. There is nothing pornographic in it.
No, it isn’t pornography. There isn’t any explicit sex in the novel whatsoever. The novel is structured as Humbert Humbert’s elaborate self-justification and appeal for clemency after a criminal conviction. I don’t think Humbert is the sharpest knife in the drawer, as my own comment below shows, but even he would be aware that lewd and lecherous descriptions of his criminal activity would be unlikely to win much sympathy from a judge.
@Kevin Your final sentence could almost be about Nabokov too; whilst Humbert Humbert knew lewd sexually explicit content would not win him sympathy with a criminal judge, Nabokov (as well as his publishers) knew that it wouldn’t win sympathy in an obscenity trial.
Pornography? I got to get my order on tomorrow delivery.
https://www.npr.org/2006/07/07/5536855/why-lolita-remains-shocking-and-a-favorite
@Lorrie, thanks for posting this link. A very good article. I had read this yeeeeeeeears ago and barely remember it. Probably wouldn’t read again but that’s not written in stone.
One of the greatest love stories ever told? One of the only love stories you will ever read? This is the thrilling and beautiful aspects of the book? What kind of world do some people live in? Do people not realize that pedophilia has nothing to do with love? It is one of the most evil things in the world. And the people that commit pedophilia are sick and have evil hearts. There is nothing, absolutely nothing about pedophilia that can be considered normal.
I remember reading a story about a man that was arrested for molesting an 8 year old girl and he said she instigated the sexual relationship by hanging onto him and rubbing against him. What an evil minded man this is. Little kids crave attention and are like kittens or puppies trying to find a friend, some love and a little attention. Anybody that would molest a child and then try to place the blame on the child is sick. Mary Kay Laterno molested Vili when he was 12 years old and after 7 years in prison they married because they had two daughters. Mary Kay Laterno said Vili came after her when she was 37 and he was 12. (blame the child) Vili and those girls would have been better off if she was given life in prison.
Nobokov is a great writer. The issue or conversation is with us and has been for 1000s of years. Not a surprise. In my opinion, best to have the discussion, also the discussion about incest (It is all over the bible), sodomy, etc, etc, according to Yul Brenner. Nobokov does a masterful job and insinuates all in the tale. And asks a question a subliminal question.
@Kathy did I delete this ? If so I’m sorry , I try to remove as little content as possible.
I found that the book was not very entertaining, not to say boring
Sorry you had that experience. In my opinion, burning books, ideas, creative lights, is not a good idea. Old enough to remember seeing and hearing about the NAZI book burning. Cheers to you.
Incredible book. More than a little gross, but incredible.
@Kathy I never saw any previous posts about Lolita. I knew it would spark plenty of controversy and now I’m all the more dying to hear your response
I loved it, but I have a quite different view of the book compared to many others. Other people talk about how the book humanizes Humbert, but I didn’t get that at all. I view it as the delusional ramblings of a man who, for all his erudition, is profoundly stupid. He’s stupid about himself and others, and about the nature of his relationship with Dolores. I think we’re told about Annabel because we’re meant to understand that Humbert is displacing his idealized puppy love for Annabel to the girls he exploits as an adult. He doesn’t behave with any genuine consideration for Dolores that would actually make it seem like he loves her. And Dolores, for her part, behaves like a typical girl and not the sort of precociously sexual “nymphet” that Humbert imagines her. She’s not seductive and they have nothing in common. If Humbert weren’t so wrapped up in himself, he’d be able to see that. Consequently, I see the book as something of a black comedy and a satire on a man who can’t see past his own obsession with his youth.
It is, indeed, a folly
@Kevin Your summary is how I also felt about the novel. I enjoyed reading the book as well, it was very different, even though it was about a dark topic.
Good book though I found it tough to read in parts.
I’ve both read it and listened to it, narrated by Jeremy Irons. He has a voice like warm velvet, or melted chocolate. It was an incredibly seductive voice, reading some almost hypnotic text about an unspeakable behaviour.
I was torn how to rate it, 5 stars for the text, 1 for the subject matter. I ended up with 4/5, reflecting the beauty of the text and the discomfort it made me feel. It remains a great book. We owe it to the world not to shy away from the difficult subjects, in order to be better able to tackle them.
It’s super messed up but also an incredible book
I was mesmerized by the story (and, of course, plenty grossed out by the subject matter). I am reading his book, Pnin, right now, which was published right after Lolita. Completely different vibe as the main character is eccentric, lovable, and a real hoot. Laugh-out-loud moments.
@Donna he wrote Pnin as a coping mechanism whilst writing Lolita
Hated it. Was unable to finish it!
One of my dearest professors had said that Nabakov is his favorite novelist. I read his King, Queen Knave and didn’t see much value in it. I’m unlikely to try Lolita given the subject matter- and I’ve never watched an episode of Breaking Bad, either.
Still Lolita is a favorite book of not a few people .
Has anyone read Reading Lolita in Tehran ?
Yes, and that is a book about the topic of banned books and the government telling people what they can and cannot read. I spent one summer on bed rest after a bad car accident and spent that time reading banned books, which included Lolita and also Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence. Both are books worth reading in the scheme of things–if you’re person who reads a large cross section of books and isn’t easily offended. I also read Helter Skelter–hated that book, but I’m glad I read it (only book I ever threw away because I couldn’t bring myself to keep it or pass it on).
FYI, I laughed all the way through Lolitta because I knew that the narration by Humbert Humbert was tongue-in-cheek. He was funny. That’s the point–it’s satire; even his name is laughable. Recently, I got a copy of Rust and Stardust which is the true crime story that inspired Nabokov’s Lolita. I got it because I read recently that it begins in Camden, N.J., which is where I was born, and it happened while my mother was a teenage living in Camden when it happened. I’ve read 2 chapters, but set it aside for now to read other books (library books that I have to return soon).
@Adrienne yes I have! Fascinating book!
@Marscha
@Adrienne yes I di read that one, was good!
Sorry I did not post that video, I’ve no idea where it came from, and I think I was just planning to say thank you to Marscha for her reply .
@Nilsa
There are pictures here of a nice person and her video; I have no idea who she is or how she came up under my name.
Well written but disturbing and sickening.
I haven’t read it, but it is on the “classics” list that I guess I should read
This is a challenging book with grotesque subject matter, and I appreciate some people find this to be too much for their own sensibilities. But what I find hard to tolerate is that people are willing to post blatant falsehoods, calling into disrepute one of the greatest authors in history.
Using the word ‘pornographic’ to describe this book is absurd and offensive.
Even more so if they launch ad homs and then block you when you point out their falsehood…
@Matt He just blocked me too when I pointed out that Humbert doesn’t even see Dolores in the first 30 pages. He then lied again, claiming Nabokov used the word “buds” to describe an unspecified young girl’s nipples, when the word doesn’t appear in the novel. Frankly, I’m just as glad to have him off my feed as he is glad to have people who contradict him gone from his.
@Kevin Yes, I got the nipples lie too. He said “What’s wrong with you?” in relation to me liking the book ?
Got an equivalent comment: “The book is disgusting and if you think it’s great than that says more about you than it does about me.”
My reply was, “Indeed. It says that I read more than thirty pages before coming to a conclusion about the whole novel.”
All he has to do is read my own comment to this thread to see that I don’t think of Humbert as an alright guy, but I think that he finds actual reading tiresome and prefers self-righteous vanity.
Terrible sick topic. Well written but yuck
Masterpiece
Couldny get myself to finish it but I cant disagree that Lolita has brilliant writing in terms of how Nabokov was able to flesh out the disgust in us. It just comes to show how brilliant of a writer Nabokov is.
Phoebe Paterno that is the way the book is written. Through fancy prose style Humbert covers up and hides his horrible actions. His verbal games serve to manipulate his readers to accept his feelings and actions and to sympathize with him. He should have went to prison.
@Joan He would have done but he died beforehand.
@Joan he did–the narrator is telling the story from prison.
@Marscha I read the book years ago and remember the story but don’t remember how it ends.
@Joan That Humbert Humbert has died is revealed in the opening pages. The book is prefaced by a fictional foreword by John Ray Jr., PhD in which he says that Humbert left the manuscript with his lawyer to be published only after all the principals in the story were dead.
@Stacey The fancy prose style is to manipulate the readers into acceptance of his horrible actions and sympathize with him.
I’m not sure people understand the word pornographic… IMMORAL. Indecent. Improper. Crude. Lewde. The book is all that plus some..
The definition of pornography includes the term explicit and the book is anything but explicit.
Try The Story of O for an example of an explicit classic.
@Helen The book was pretty restrained. Nabokov was a master.
@Clay If Nabokov left you feeling sorry for the pedophile, accepting his actions and feelings and especially blaming the child then his writing achieved exactly what he intended.
@Joan Didn’t feel sorry for the pedo; I felt sorry for the whole sad situation depicted.
@Joan That’s not what Nabokov himself said about his intentions. “I would put it differently: Humbert Humbert is a vain and cruel wretch who manages to appear ‘touching.’ That epithet, in its true, tear-iridized sense, can only apply to my poor little girl.”
@Clay I have no sympathy for a pedophile. My sympathy lies with the Mother and daughter.
That would be like agreeing with Mary Kay Laterno that Vili a 12 year old boy seduced her when she was 37.. That is probably the sickest thing I’ve ever heard.
Kevin Gassaway The author’s intentions don’t necessarily have to be the reader’s. They are certainly not mine.
Clay Norris Of course. I was just pointing out that when Joan Noble claimed that he intended to make people feel sorry for the pedophile, that was the precise OPPOSITE of his stated intention. As far as Nabokov is concerned, the only worthy object of pity in this scenario is Dolores, while Humbert is dismissed as a “vain and cruel wretch”.
I’m glad that males come away from Lolita seeing the perversion in the protagonist.
The thought was that Lolita was the correlation of Europe’s fascination with America
Certifiably creepy, but there is history behind it and it IS Nobokov.
Well, I think one cannot deny it’s well written and shows a command of the English language arguably better than most English writers of the time – much like Joseph Conrad achieved a century ago. Nabokov certainly nailed a quasi-sociopathic personality in HH – the quintessential pragmatist in fact – but also attempted to soften the character with subtle humour between HH and Lolita. Overall I thought Nabokov’s attempt to explain – not forgive – how some men behave in such a fashion was effective. I’ve read the novel three times and still enjoy Nabokov’s skill.
It’s always interesting and instructive to encounter works of art that engender fierce arguments about aesthetics, morality and more. Long ago a literary theorist whose name I have forgotten talked about literary works that evidenced what he called an “ideological fault line.” From what I can see Nabokov’s novel is that kind of work, a piece of writing that arguably opens up deep cracks and fissures over what we think a novel should do and what kinds of stories it should tell. Is the book immoral? I don’t know. Is it pornography? Well, it arguably has moments that could be construed that way. Should it be banned? No. Is it a great book? I don’t know that either. I’m reminded a bit of QUILLS, the play about Sade and how his writing meant something to people, quite divorced from what he may have intended. That circles me back to the earlier post about Lolita in Teheran. That reading certain kinds of books takes on a new and different meaning in a particular context. Thanks.
@Stephanie How do you define pornographic, because there is simply nothing in it intended to titilate
Matt Nev Pope a very basic definition of porn is in the following. As to “intention” I’m not clear on how and to what extent we can reliably speak with any certainty about an author’s intentionality, and even if the author states their intention this may have little to so with the meaning of the text. Btw, I do not mean to suggest that porn is necessarily “bad.” I was merely responding to part of the thread that talked about Lolita as pornography, and that this might be an aspect that readers objected to. Basic def: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/pornography%3Famp
@Stephanie Well, Stephanie, as somebody – in law I think – said, long ago (I paraphrase): “Hmm, I really can’t define obscenity, but I know it when I see it.” The same applies to pornography, maybe. I say that because the latter doesn’t conjure up the depravities implicit in the former; at least, I don’t think so. OTOH, dictionaries typically conflate the two which I think is somewhat off the mark. For example, most would agree that bestiality is obscene; but it doesn’t fall under the rubric of pornography. Is a puzzlement, no? ?
@Roger I was just responding to matt who asked for a definition.
@Stephanie Thank you, Stephanie. No worries.?
@Matt, i can’t seem to tag you successfully in my reply to your “what is pornography” question and comment about intentionality. You’ll see my comment a coupe of posts up. thanks.
The fancy prose style of Humbert covers up and hides his horrible actions. His verbal games serve to manipulate his readers to accept his feelings and actions and sympathize with him.. And it works on some. They refer to Lolita as a love story between a 37 year old man and a 12 year old girl. Pedophilia has nothing to do with love. Rape has nothing to do with love. There is nothing about pedophilia that is normal. It is one of the most evil acts in the world. But some people are easily manipulated and will try to justify some of the most evil things imaginable. Pedophilia has been around since the beginning of time and is going on today. But lets not allow ourselves to be manipulated into calling pedophilia any type of love. Pedophiles use the term love when manipulating victims and we don’t need to aid them or give them a hand up to help with their evilness. Call it what it is. Lolita is about an evil monster and his abuse of a little girl, and how his evilness affected all their lives.
The Demons or The Possessed is one of Dostoevsky’s Masterworks, written when he returned from exile in Siberia. The book was published in installments in The Russian Messenger 1871-1872. They would not publish the chapter “Stavrogin’s Confession” because of the content. Dostoevsky tried rewriting it four times for publication but could not rewrite it to a point where it could be published. Stavrogin was confessing to a Monk of the molestation, rape and suicide of an 11 year old girl. Maybe Nabokov could have written the chapter in the same way that Lolita was written and people could have been more accepting. The Possessed is a hard, painful book to read and leaves you cringing to think about it. But at least Dostoevsky laid it out without excuses.
@Joan
Joan, I did not know that. Thank you. It’s a book I reread several times, liking the narrator, and appreciating the exposure of the villain of the piece who was still adored by his mother .
Another book by a favorite author of mine, LeCarre’s ‘The Little Drummer Girl’ I was unable to finish because he took his familiar trope of loving a person more than a cause too far -into justifying killings . Not being able to stomach this, so not finishing the book, I don’t know how LeCarre resolved this .
I read The Possessed, but I had to seek out the excised chapter in a decontextualized (that is, published in its own separate booklet) form. It is not explicit in any graphic sense; however, it’s the way the author builds up to it that makes it so squirm-inducing. It made me shudder, and I can’t imagine it didn’t make poor Fyodor shudder as well.
I haven’t read The Possessed yet. Based upon your comments, I will indeed have a read. Thanks, Clay. ?
Its a repugnant piece of work of a perverse mind.
repugnant is such a great word!
There is also the thought that Lolita was,metaphorically speaking, art and Humbert represents human obsession with art. So much that Humbert’s obsessiveness,in which his fascination with Lolita is physical and mental, has overcome him. His attention to the minute details of Lolita and her movements could represent how artists and its patrons encompass art and beauty, emotionally, physically and intellectually
I think the art aspect is valid, Nikki. I hadn’t considered that before. And I very much appreciate that perspective. Thx. ?