Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

This is a story of Humbert, who moves all the way across the ocean, meets a girl and falls in love with her. Or maybe he just desires her. The problem is, she is 12, and he is a full-grown adult. How will that turn out? You have to read the book to see.

I am going to be as blunt as I possibly can. I do understand the premise of the book. I think the internal thoughts of Humbert were presented well. I also find the story very eye-opening and let the reader get insight into a broken mind. However, I found Lolita very… underwhelming. Firstly, because the internal thoughts and digressions seemed to take over the main point of the plot. Secondly, because Lolita turned out to be a lot less innocent than I expected her to be which, in a way took the spotlight away from Humbert. And thirdly, I felt as if it was unfinished after I read the last few pages. While I understand that the focus in the story was different, I felt like there was something missing. Nevertheless, I appreciate the craft. 

The language was something quite difficult to grasp for me in Lolita, especially as a non-native English speaker. I usually can read through various background noises but in this case, I merge absolute silence most of the time, otherwise I had to reread the sentences to understand what was going on. If you are a native English speaker, you probably found it easier (had you read the book). I did enjoy the little word play, with various versions of Humbert’s name, as well as him speaking about himself in the third person. It almost took away from the horrible things he did, as if he was talking about someone else. I think it was a very nice touch.

The most surprising aspect of the story to me was the fact that Lolita was nowhere near as innocent as I expected her to be. Maybe it’s just my issue, I don’t know. But because of that, because she didn’t resist as much as she could have, I feel like Humbert’s actions felt more justified. I know how that sounds. The crime stays the same and he would have done the same thing regardless. But in a way, he got a permission to do what he did. I was quite stunned to see her approach which obviously doesn’t make what he did any better.

While I did like the idea of internal monologues and digressions in the book, I found there were too many of them which made me lose track of the story a few times. I do understand the purpose was to let the reader into Humbert’s mind however, some of the digressions felt unnecessary. I took away from what was happening at the moment and didn’t let me, as a reader, fully feel the story.

The descriptions were a lot less disturbing than I anticipated. The author made good use of metaphors and suggestive writing which helps if you can’t handle the visual descriptions very well. That was a big positive of the book.

Overall, I did think I’d be more mind-blown by Lolita. However, it’s still worth a read for the writing and the purpose it carries.

Rating: 3.5/5