Humbert The Character And Humbert The Narrator

The frustrations that Lolita encountered during the process of publication may teach us alot. It was said that several hired readers of the publishing house could not read it more than188 pages. One of the publishers said that if he had published this book, both Nabokov andhe would have been put into prison. Finally, when Lolita turned out to be published byMawrice Girodias' Olympia Press in Paris, 5,000 copies were produced. Fortunately, it washonored as one of the three best novels in 1955 by British critic Graham Greene in Thames.Because of his review, America published Lolita in 1958 and the so-called "hurricane Lolita"appeared.The book unfolds itself with John Ray, Jr.'s foreword for Humbert Humbert's book,entitled Lolita, or the Confession of a White Widowed Male. Humbert narrates hereafter. Hedetails his European childhood and background as a scholar and relates his tragic childhoodlove for Annabel Leigh, whose death traumatizes him. Humbert is now obsessively attractedto "nymphets," young girls who possess a mysterious seductive power. After shuttling aroundsome mental institutions and doing odd writing jobs, Humbert lands in the New Englandtown of Ramsdale. He takes a room at the house of the widow Charlotte Haze because herbeautiful young daughter, Lolita, reminds him of Annabel. Humbert lusts after Lolita andflirts with her, but is afraid to do anything lest the repulsive Haze, who wants him, discoversher lodger's pedophilia. In order to keep Lolita in his life, Humbert reluctantly marries Hazewhen Lolita goes to the summer camp. He toys with the idea of killing Haze, but is unable todo so. Unfortunately, she discovers his diary, which is full of entries about his love for Lolitaand hatred for her. Charlotte tells him that she is leaving. However, she is immediately hit bya car, and Humbert picks Lolita up at the camp. At a hotel called The Enchanted Hunter, theyhave sex for the first time. Then they start their trip across the U.S.A. When Humbert gets ajob at Beardsley College, he enrolls Lolita in the girls' school there. Lolita's desire to socializewith boys strains her relationship with Humbert, and he finally agrees to let her participate ina school play called "The Enchanted Hunters." Humbert suspects Lolita of infidelity, and theyleave for another road trip. A man who resembles Humbert's relative named Trapp seems tobe following them, and Lolita appears to be in contact with him. When Lolita gets sick andstays in a hospital, she is taken away by this man. Humbert tries to find her for the next twoyears, but in vain. He takes up with a woman named Rita for two years until he receives aletter from Lolita, now married, pregnant, and asking for money. Humbert plans to killLolita's husband, but when he visits them, finds out that her kidnaper is actually Clare Quilty,who is a playwright and with whom Lolita falls in love. Clare Quilty rejects Lolita when sherefuses to participate in his child pornography films. Humbert asks Lolita to go with him, butLolita declines. He gives her the money and leaves heartbroken.Humbert finds out where Quilty lives. After talking with Quilty and shooting himnumerous times, Humbert kills him. Humbert is arrested and put in jail, where he finishes hismemoir. As we learn from the foreword, he dies soon after his captivity, and Lolita dies whilegiving childbirth over that Christmas.In Lolita, Humbert the narrator narrates his own story. But serious problems exist inverifying the facts of his narration, due to Humbert the character's solipsistic nature and theclosed, circular nature of the story he tells. Plus, it is obvious that Humbert the character failshis attempt to "safely solipsize" Lolita, the object of his desires. Humbert the narrator andHumbert the character sometimes overlap and sometimes separate. To distinguish the twoHumberts, i. e. Humbert the character and Humbert the narrator may help us to come to thepoint that there is an underlying assumption here. When we read it from the character's stand,it is a story about the pursuit of beauty and love;while we read it from the unreliablenarrator's stand, it is a story about the parody of beauty and love. For this reason, Lolita isreally a Janus text. My dissertation consists of five chapters:The introduction part contains the introduction of Vladimir Nabokov and the plotsummary of Lolita, literature review, and the direction of this paper.Chapter one is about Lolita's controversial status in the contemporary literary world,including critics' disagreements on Lolita and Nabokov's comments on Humbert.Chapter two mainly concerns about the analysis on Humbert the Character including adivided self in a sealed world, his conception of death and his conception of time.Chapter three is the analysis on Humbert the narrator, i.e. his control over Lolita's voice,including the direct presentation of Lolita's Voice, the suppression of Lolita's voice, and thealternative use of direct and free indirect speech.The last part is the conclusion. If we read Lolita from Humbert the character's point ofview, it is a pursuit of eternal love and beauty;if we read it from Humbert the narrator's stand,it is the parody of eternal love and beauty. For this reason, Lolita is really a Janus text.