To Freud or not to Freud

     John Ray Jr. is the character that’s supposed to make the novel feel less fictional and somehow give the book more validity. He supposedly edits the novel and is one of the first people to look at the novel, so he takes the novel and somewhat interprets the novel for his perspective. He is the cousin of the lawyer who is defending Humbert Humbert for his sex crimes, so he does have a slight bias toward him, but Humbert has died at this point so most of the personal information he gets is either from his cousin or the novel itself.  

     The way John Ray Jr. explains the way Humbert feels and lives makes him seem as much more of a bad person than Humbert describes himself. Humbert tries to justify what he says, sometimes coming off as rather disgusting, but he at least tries to validate his actions. “I am ready to believe that the sensations I derived from natural fornication were much the same as those known to normal big males consorting with their normal big mates in that routine rhythm which shakes the world” (18). However, John Ray says that he is still a sinner and a disgrace—making him ugly. “No doubt, he is horrible, he is abject, he is a shining example of moral leprosy, a mixture of ferocity and jocularity that betrays supreme misery perhaps, but is not conductive to attractiveness” (5). While I was reading John Ray Jr., I couldn’t help but agree with him. It was easy to see his point of view and agree. But, I felt as if it was a bad place to put such a passage; I didn’t want that coming into the book. I wish I would have read chapters one through ten and then went back to read the Foreword. It somehow offset the book in a way that I didn’t want. It was most definitely strategically placed, but no one I wanted.

      The book takes on a sarcastic tone that seems different from “The Enchanter”. The characters keep explaining why they are the way they are, which isn’t a style Nabokov would generally use. However, it seems as if he is trying to draw in all types of readers to his novel—he wants to controversial while also maintaining a readership. One way he does this is by making the novel feel less of a fiction piece (talking about the trial, other people’s death, the moral and social issues with Humbert’s behavior). By making the book have a nonfiction feeling; the reader can bring in more feeling toward the character and the character’s actions. When the read feels like the character is doing something bad, it’s easier to feel hatred toward a real person (or someone who feels real) than a fiction person who isn’t actually committing the crime.

       In some ways Nabokov approaches this subject matter in a banal way, however, he does seem to do this in a rather satirical way. Nabokov writes in a way that seems to be making fun of other authors in the beginning of “Lolita.” So far, the story doesn’t seem as if it has an incredible different story line from a structured story of someone else. However, I think that something is going to happen to make a change. Nabokov always talks about the game he plays with his reader; it seems as if this maneuver is just a game he is playing. 

      While I was reading the first ten chapters of “Lolita,” I couldn’t help but think that Nabokov sounds like he is talking to Freud. While Humbert was talking about his feelings, it seemed as if Freud was psychoanalyzing him. In the first ten chapters, the reader (thinking from a Psychodynamic perspective) knew exactly why Humbert was the way he was. Freud would say that Humbert was stuck in the Phallic stage, due to his mother’s death at a young age and the first girl he loved died when she was fourteen. Since I know how Nabokov thinks of Frued, which is one of almost hatred, I can to think Nabokov is playing a game—almost a satirical game. I also felt this way about the way Cordelia was described in “The Enchanter,” but it seems to be even more obvious in the way that Humbert describes himself and the way he feels about his situation. He tries to justify his actions constantly, which is a huge aspect of Psychodynamic therapy.

      In reference to his vulgar undertones in the book, I can’t help but think it goes back to somehow spiting Freudian thought. The more vulgar and disturbing the character is, the more likely one will sympathize with him. And, it’s much easier to sympathize with a character when they feel real, which easily explains the foreword and its purpose. I feel that it’s much too hard to answer the why Nabokov is writing the way he is so soon in the book. While reading anything from Nabokov one has to be rather weary in what they take from him. He isn’t a writer who says everything, or maybe anything, just he way it is. It’s always a game—something the reader has to constantly keep in mind.