Passage on 166 - 167

In the last paragraph in section 3 of chapter 8, Nabokov talks about slides being projected onto a screen; as if in a science class room setting. They look like they are jelly because they are squashed, and to see the full detail they look disfigured. He then explains why they are wet; so they will seem bright. He likes the science of it all. But, one can tell how magnificent it is, even with just a naked eye, so says Nabokov. Hues of color shine through the class when it's not projected and someone is looking at it in between their thumb and finger. One can still see the greatness of the specimen, even when it isn't projected of magnified; it gives the specimen a different, more colorful look. This is all while he is young. To him, science is rather magical. When he is older he can see it even better under a microscope. It's a magic shaft is better for optimum study--can see it's full beauty. Since one can't see the full detail without a microscope, it's the link between what ones thinks it looks like and what it really looks like. He the big person becomes small as the small thing becomes large.

The Chase

"'You got a flat, mister'" (228), I said. Humbert pulled off the road, put the car in park and turned off the engine. I glanced at the side mirror and saw Quilty do the same 50 feet behind us. I felt at ease. Humbert clamored out of the driver's side to see the damage. He glanced at me. Out of the corner of my eye I saw him look for my gaze. I refused it. I felt him examine every curve of my body--piece by piece like he always did. Shivers ran down my spine. He almost touched me, but stopped. I tried not to move; when I squirmed, he had the power.

Humbert clamored out of the driver's side to see the damage. He looked at me again and saw my face strain. Sticking his hand in his right pocket, he marched toward Quilty. I jumped on my seat and saw Quilty smirk. Closer. I knew one would die and that would ruin the whole plan. Closer. I thought, perhaps, maybe Humbert should die, but I couldn't have that on my conscience. Closer. He loved me, I hated him; but, he couldn't die. Closer. I had to do something. Closer. I turned on the car and hoped I could get it to move. Closer. It started to roll, but Humbert didn't seem to notice. Closer. I honked. He stopped. I rolled. He ran.

He opened the car door and looked perplexed. "Are you okay, Lo?" I hated how he called me "Lo." I nodded my head. His face changed; he looked defeated. Quilty turned his car around and drove away. He knew I had won that round.

An Evening of Russian Poetry

Nabokov’s poetry is dense and full of fluid analogies. “An Evening of Russian Poetry” is all about his love for the Russian language—a love that is somewhat romanticized since he is no longer in Russia, but in the US. He writes the poem in English, which seems to suggest he wants the English readers to understand why Russian is so important to him. As English readers, most will never know Russian as he does, but those readers will see Russian as a harsh language.

Nabokov starts the poem off with saying everyone loves his or her native tongue, but sometimes the love of the language isn’t understood. “The subject chosen for tonight’s discussion is everywhere, though often incomplete” (158). His discussion seems to be toward children, for he addresses “Emmy,” “Cynthia” and “Joan,” which gives the poem a sort of lecture quality (something Nabokov did regularly); “project my name or any such-like phantom in Slavic characters upon the screen” (158). In the lecture, he seems to be giving a presentation to the three about the origin of Russian, what makes it unique and why it’s special to him.

Russian derives from Greek, giving it a simple quality; “reshaped the arrows, and the borrowed birds” (158). The words that make up Russian are round, so they flow together nicely and create beautiful literature. “Not only rainbows—every line is bent, and skulls and seeds and all good worlds are round, like Russian verse, like our colossal vowels” (158-9).

He twice brings up a child sleeping. He first talks about the sound: “most rivers use a kind of rapid Russian, and so do children talking in their sleep” (158). Russian has a harsh sound, but is still beautiful; one has to look closer to see the real attractiveness. When one looks at a river or a sleeping child murmuring there is a kind of beauty paired to it. Both also move without thought; for Nabokov, Russian is natural. He again brings up the child toward the end. When he thinks about Russia, he feels as if he is a kid again, dreaming in his sleep. “It came, that sudden shudder, a Russian something that I could inhale but could not see. Some rapid words were uttered—and then the child slept on, the door was shut” (162). Even while he sleeps, he still finds it all nostalgic. 

As a foreign language, Russian “could not rouse the limp iambus,” so it’s poetry could not be understood (159). But, as a known language, the poetry can’t be ignored. “It makes a very fascinating noise: it opens slowly, like a grayish rose in pedagogic [teaching] films of long ago” (159). And, like other languages, it has many homonyms, which creates wordplay (something Nabokov loves) and poetry. “Love automatically rhymes with blood, nature with liberty, sadness with distance, humane with everlasting, prince with mud, moon with a multitude of words, but sun and song and wind and life and death with none” (159). All of the words he chose in that passage are subjects Nabokov likes to write about, however, it seems surprising he didn’t add the word “game.” Nabokov finishes this section with a sadness that he is unable to speak and hear Russian anymore since he moved across the ocean; he now has to use a second, foreign language that he doesn’t think is as beautiful.

He then goes on to talk about his hatred for poets who make beauty banal by being too obvious with their words, or their Russian language. He likes to play games with his reader, and he especially like to make them dig deep for the meaning. Just as one has to find the beauty in Russian, one should have to find the beauty in poetry; it should be genuine and hidden.

Nabokov then says being a Russian poet is to be exiled and unneeded, even though all they want is greatness within literature. “We want the mole to be lynx or turn into a swallow by some sublime mutation of the soul. But to unneeded symbols consecrated, escorted by a vaguely infantile path for bare feet, our roads were always fated to lead into the silence of exile” (161). Nabokov was, however, a famous English writer.

For Nabokov, Russian will always be his elusive language; “the mystery remains intact” (162). He writes about Russian in a nostalgic way and seems to romanticize his love for the language. Since he wrote it in English, he is somewhat saying his readers will never know the beauty of the world because they speak English; if they knew Russian, they would be able to understand his analogies. 

Humbert's Limited View

     Throughout Lolita, there is a strong sense of the "unwritten psychoanalyst" character. Nabokov and Humbert talk about their hatred for psychology, but there are many instances when it feels as if Humbert is talking to a psychoanalyst. In some ways, this has to be done to understand characters; to understand characters deeply, as Nabokov seems to want, there has to be an understanding of the characters' thoughts, feelings, ideas, actions, etc. But, knowing that Nabokov is the type of writer who plays games with his reader, one has to wonder if it is one of his games or if he is just criticizing the American culture. It may be a mixture of both, but the critic seems to be more profound. As Mathew Winston writes in "Lolita and the Dangers of Fiction," the American culture can be summed up to "soap operas, psychoanalysis and cheap novelettes" (422). Nabokov strongly detests those things, but they are important elements that he brings into the book many times, thus the game Nabokov plays with the reader. When Humbert talks to the reader as if he or she is a psychoanalyst, Nabokov is actually scorning American culture. As Nabokov does this, he creates a false reality for Humbert, one that the reader knows isn't real, but Humbert does not. Winston addresses this by saying, "Humbert's casual remark about what we are inclined to do accurately describes a limitation of his own perceptions and a consequent tendency of his actions" (424). As Humbert progresses through the book, he becomes a monster and rather senile, but he always talks to the unwritten psychoanalyst to justify everything he does. He isn't a criminal, but a man with a skewed vision of love.

Manipulating Both H.H. and His Audience

In the article, "In Search of Aesthetic Bliss: A rereading of 'Lolita'," the author argues that there is a story within a story and Humbert made up his own reality, which was the book. The "fiction of reality" is something we've discussed a lot in class, but it seems like we have been missing something. We know Humbert isn't a reliable source, but this is mainly due to the fact that we know more than Humbert knows. It's the game Nabokov plays against his character and his reader--both are at his mercy for how the story goes. However, Nabokov seems to give Humbert the power of the story by re-writing his own story, where sometimes the story truly feels as if Humbert is writing it, instead of Nabokov. Nabokov seems to be giving him freedom, but he isn't. It's a complicated game, one that I still don't fully understand. Roth explains it as, "what Nabokov gives the reader is not reality, but a way of perceiving reality" (29). Nabokov does this for both the reader and Humbert. Both are given a story, and a reality, but the way both are viewing is by the manipulation of Nabokov. The game is much bigger than just the story, because Nabokov plays the game with perception. This is, of course, is something that happens when one reads anything, but not in the way Nabokov does it. He tricks the reader into thinking how he wants him or her to think. It's not a choice, other than choosing to read the book, but something that is forced on the reader.

The End

     Humbert's psychoanalysis of himself changes from being to end. He writes about himself more as if he is a monster, rather than a human. It's an interesting change, but rather dramatic. He becomes less analytic and more enraged with himself. 

     In chapters 18-20, it's easy to see he becomes rather judgmental of himself and starts to use psychological wording. It might be because he is writing this from memory rather then when it happened, but as soon as he and the reader understand he is about to lose Lolita, the way he writes about himself with pity and disgusted. It might be a ploy, but it might also be the way he really thinks about himself.  "In fact--said high-and-dry Humbert to floundering Humbert--it might be quite clever to prepare things--to transfer the weapon [his gun] from box to pocket--so as to be ready to take advantage of the spell of insanity when it does come" (229). He talks about insanity as if he knows and understands what insanity is; he self-diagnosis his illness. However, the reader knows he isn't insane, just a love-sick man who is will to protect the girl he loves by any means possible. Even though that sounds rather beautiful, the story is ugly. He does lose her, and becomes rather crazed.

     In chapters 27-29, he can hardly control his urges for the little nymphets, but he also finds Lolita. Humbert is uncontrollably in love with nymphets, but since he was able to be with one and really love her, his urges were bearable. "Since I sometimes won the race between my fancy and nature's reality, the deception was bearable" (264). Lolita rights Humbert a letter, just as a daughter would to a father, asking him for money (266). When she does this, he hopes in his beat up sedan and drives through the night to find her. When he does find her, he still argues that he loves her and begs for her to come back with him. "I looked and looked at her, and knew as clearly as I know I am to die, that I loved her more than anything I had ever seen or imagined on earth, or hoped for anywhere else" (277). When he realizes this, he begs her to come back with him, but she says no. At this point he makes the reader feel sorry for him. He tries to justify killing Quilty by how much he loved Lolita. 

      From chapter 33 to the end of the book, Humbert is set on killing Quilty. The scene around Humbert killing Quilty is rather dramatic, but it seems as if that's what Humbert wanted. he wanted it to be as dramatic for Quilty as it had been for Humbert to lose Lolita. He wanted Quilty to feel the pain of no longer having what he loved. Humbert was proud he killed Quilty and wanted everyone to know. "I may have lost contact with reality for a second or two--oh, nothing of the I-just-blacked-out sort that your common criminal enacts; on the contrary, I want to stress the fact that I was responsible for every shed drop of his bubbleblood; but a kind of momentary shift occurred as if I were in the connubial bedroom, and Charlotte were in the bedroom" (304). It obvious that Humbert wanted everyone to know he killed Quilty. He was proud of it because he finally took away what was most important to him as he had taken away the most important thing to Humbert: Lolita. 

     In looking at these few passages, one can see the shift in Humbert. He no longer wants to analyze himself, but all of his thoughts and feelings out. He acts like a man about to die in the last part, which would justify is actions. He still wants to be seen as a love to Lolita, but to the rest of the world, he wants to be seen as the monster who killed Quilty. 

Dogs

Enchanted hunting dogs. Nabokov once gave a lecture on the "equine theme" in Madame Bovary. Who or what is doglike in Lolita. Between dog and butterfly the dogs actually win (although butterflies and moths abound). Not only are there a lot of dogs or people that act like dogs - canine coincidence occurs at key crossroads in the book. Find seven examples to win.

     Throughout Lolita, there are many references to dogs and canines--some literal, so not. As the story progresses, the references become clearer and more descriptive of people. 

     For instance, he describes Lolita as a dog-like human when she wanted attention. "She would be, figuratively speaking, wagging her tiny tail, her whole behind in fact as little bitches do--while some grinning stranger accosted us and began a bright conversation" (164). Humbert hated when Lolita did such things because he wanted as little attention directed to them as possible. When she was being aggressive toward him, he wanted her to calm down, and he thought "down, poor beast, down" (141), just as one would say to their dog for jumping up on them; he started to see her as a nuisance.  Humbert also talks about petting her; of course, he means it in a sexual way, but it also refers someones relationship to a dog. "She would pick out in the book, while I petted her in the parked car in the silence of dusk-mellowed mysterious side-road" (146). One of the first dog references Humbert uses in relation to Lolita is directly related to his fear of her leaving him. "Lo, leaving the dog as she would leave me some day, rose from her haunches" (118). 

       Humbert talks about his canine teeth when he goes to the dentist to get information about Quilty. "The whole arrangement was a masterpiece of comfort, and my canines were in perfect health" (291). Humbert says Quilty uses the word "fetch" in reference to obtaining his glasses. "Let me fetch my reading glasses" (299). 

     My last example is a more literal reference to dogs. Humbert talks about Lolita and Dick's dog when he goes to see her. He doesn't really talk about pets, other than Lolita, in the book. "Woof, commented the dog perfunctorily... Woof, said the dog. A rush and a shuffle, and woosh-woof went the door" (269).