Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov - Well known chef d’oeuvre

 Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

Well known chef d’oeuvre

When approaching a celebrated novel that is actually placed among the best works of literature by most critics one has to tread carefully.

That is the first thought.

Then I realize that in fact I can very well knock myself out and say whatever I well please, since it would not make any difference.

A few days ago and at various times in the past, I had the chance to add on goodreads a work that had not existed there before.

Notes on that book might gain some weight, at least for the next guy who is interested and finds it on what has become an important source of information on books.

But in the case of Lolita, the image, value and standing of this masterpiece are so well established that nothing will change that, for the next one hundred years.

There would be conservatives- and I resemble them more as I age- that will not just reject, but wish to burn this book.

But other than that, there isn’t much to say about such a phenomenon, except for some opinions and subjective takes on what reading Lolita made me feel.

It is the second time that I read it and in consequence I am rating it twice, with a four stars on second approach.

It is the first review and I must say that, although plainly aware of the grandiose, magnificent story, I felt squeamish, in not on the whole, definitely in parts.

There is the main plot that is responsible and the guilty desires and acts committed by a middle age Humbert Humbert.

-          Yes, I could see that the author is ironic, disapproving, detached and even critical of the deeds, thoughts of Humbert

There is also the issue of not judging a work of art on its subject, for then what do we do about Crime and Punishment.

War and Peace and so many others would be rejected on the grounds that they deal with awful subjects.

As stated, these are notes about what a reader felt, thought when going through a book and my feelings were mixed.

It is not from a “higher moral ground” that I looked at Humbert and his inappropriate relationship and culpability.

When I was in my twenties, I had affairs with girls under eighteen, albeit never with someone as young as twelve.

So it might be a hidden guilt, something in the unconscious and the conscious feeling of having in the past been involved in maybe less outrageous, but still somewhat unethical relationships that make me feel bad reading chapters of Lolita.

There may also be a change in taste, a reluctance to accept a novel on a second taking and knowing what is about to happen.

Tomorrow I may write a note on Of Human Bondage, which I surely appreciated, but less than the first time.

A pattern, a paradigm may emerge, whereby I expect too much from an established masterpiece and when I go to it for a second time I do not experience the same exhilaration as I was fortunate to go through the first time.

To end this passage, I will just say that Nabokov had a strange appearance on Bouillon de Culture, produced and presented by the great Bernard Pivot.

When he invited Vladimir Nabokov to come on his cultural show, the worldwide famous writer had conditions…

-          He wanted to know the questions in advance…

-          And come with the written answers on TV and read from his papers

Bernard Pivot was asked, even criticized on this matter, but he replied

-          The option was between having Nabokov, who never appeared in the mass media, for interviews or anything and not agreeing with his terms and lose the opportunity probably forever…