I know a lot of you would have heard about this book. And a lot less would have actually read it. For some reason, a lot of people term this as ‘erotica’. I won’t lie, but going by the popular opinion around, even I held a similar opinion. And now that I’ve read it, I can definitely say, it’s far from that.
Notwithstanding the perversion of the narrator, and the uneasiness that this story creates, terming Lolita as another erotica would be missing out on a beautifully written tale. The words are nothing short of magical and weave a story that shocks and horrifies you.
The dark humor at play keeps you hooked on to the words in the first half of the book. As you move towards the culmination, the story does get draggy. But perhaps that’s because your intrigue is limited to ‘what all Humbert will do’ and not living in his head, unlike any other protagonist. Humbert is different, as you’ll come to know.
I don’t want to tell you what the story is, for the fear that it might put you off from reading this. We all are prudish in our own ways, I guess? But you should give this one a shot. The way this has been written will make you enjoy the beauty of the written word more. It did to me, at least.
Apart from Humbert, you don’t get to dive into the heads of no other character. Not even Lolita. All you’re left with are questions. Questions on how they thought of all of this? Not that there are many other characters. It’s all about Humbert and his Nymphet. Or as Humbert called it, his Lolita.
Few of the characters that Nabokov creates don’t appear more than caricatures added to keep the story moving. Perhaps, the centricity of Lolita’s obsession by Humbert is what the author wanted to present here.
Lolita makes you swing between the conflict of morality and aesthetics. Nabokov makes your to-and-fro conflicted with his brilliant wordplay.
Humbert is narcissistic, a paedophile, and out there to only look after his own needs. There’s background as to why it would have ended up this weekend way, but that still doesn’t substantiate the conflict. Humbert as well as the reader is clear on the morality of it all.
Stories are stories, irrespective of whether it fits our moral compass or not. Lolita is one such story.