Top ten books you can't call yourself a writer without reading?

[JCamilo]

is a non-paedophile able to write such graphic scenes about seducing a child? beware of your argument, you may just be saying something you don't mean. Unless of course you did mean to imply a guy who included paedophilia in so many of his books (no less than 6 I believe) may just have had some kind of problem?

“Asked by an interviewer if he’d ever known a girl like Lolita, the old man’s lizard eyes flickered, and just for a second the body language spoke as eloquently as anything Nabokov ever wrote in his adoptive tongue.”

“. . . The Laura joins The Enchanter (1939), Lolita (1955), Ada (1970), Transparent Things (1972), and Look at the Harlequins! (1974) in unignorably concerning itself with the sexual despoiliation of very young girls. . . [B]y sheer weight of numbers, by sheer iteration, the nympholepsy novels begin to infect one another – they cross-contaminate. We gratefully take all we can from them; and yet . . . Where else in the canon do we find such wayward fixity?

Have you even read the articles you quoted? Because they kind off label Lolita as masterpiece, reduce the problem to be an aesthetic one and justify the books due to Nabokov (and his family) own lost childhood. The best they do is to identify the theme of Lolita as Nabokov yerning for lost childhood. Not him with HH (which should be obvious, he may have meet someone like Lolita and he is emotional about it, your you thought his eyes flickering was his perveted mind?).

In fact, Amis article pretty much debunke you over and over (I guess someone already quoted Amis here to debunke you).

So my question is: are you in a cruzade against reading?

[Pumpkin337]

answer the questions I posed ... but I guess you can't because you clearly don't even realise you just said exactly what I said everyone does. Attacking the critics is not a defense. Stating how well it isvwritten is not a defense. A defense states this book is not about a paedophile because ... This book has not had an effect on the perceptions in mass media, etc because ... The author was not defending, deliberately or inadvertentlly glorifying paedophilia, perpetuating certain prejudicial perceptions about women because ...

Point to where those central bones of contention that I am neither the first nor the last to object to are made null and void by any rational proof other than 'but its good writing'

[Marbles]

I seriously think this thread should be renamed "Lolita" and the off topic posts deleted.

[Frostball]

answer the questions I posed ... but I guess you can't because you clearly don't even realise you just said exactly what I said everyone does. Attacking the critics is not a defense. Stating how well it isvwritten is not a defense. A defense states this book is not about a paedophile because ... This book has not had an effect on the perceptions in mass media, etc because ... The author was not defending, deliberately or inadvertentlly glorifying paedophilia, perpetuating certain prejudicial perceptions about women because ...

Point to where those central bones of contention that I am neither the first nor the last to object to are made null and void by any rational proof other than 'but its good writing'

You pretty much have to also criticize any book that contains murder, or you're just being hypocritical. Books, movies, or videogames that contain murder have been repeatedly shown to not make people want to go murder. The exact same thing goes for a book that contains pedophilia.

[JCamilo]

answer the questions I posed ... but I guess you can't because you clearly don't even realise you just said exactly what I said everyone does. Attacking the critics is not a defense. Stating how well it isvwritten is not a defense. A defense states this book is not about a paedophile because ... This book has not had an effect on the perceptions in mass media, etc because ... The author was not defending, deliberately or inadvertentlly glorifying paedophilia, perpetuating certain prejudicial perceptions about women because ...

Point to where those central bones of contention that I am neither the first nor the last to object to are made null and void by any rational proof other than 'but its good writing'

Nobody is attacking you (the critic, or rather, not a critic, because a critic would read the book), we are attacking your misinformed rant. You know, the nature of a debate is countering arguments.

This book is about a pedophilie. Just like every post you did in this thread is about or haven't you noticed that?

This book did had an effect on perception of the people and it was pointed, the awareness about of pedophilie increased in the last decades. So did the strictness of the law. In fact, you are a Child of Lolita, my dear.

The author is not defending pepophilie because if you read the book, you will notice the pedophile is a villain. The book does show him as monster, manipulative, cruel. Lolita's mother call him by names a detestable, abominable and a fraud. He classifies himself as rapist.

Those questions weren't avoided, they were ridiculous. It is like someone reading the bible and asking who was Jesus. You should know the answers already.

But to this, you would need to read the book or perhaps even the stuff you have been misquoting. You have to read.

As long you rant as if you are some genius we all must bow down, accusing others of some sort of snobery because anyone really knows how fragile is your argumentation, when you do not do the very basic: reading. As long you avoid it, it will be as ridiculous as you claiming the Lolita complex or that Gigi was inspired by Lolita.

As the off-topics, the mods could put appart the thread? We can named "Why reading is so important in a Literary forum"

[R.F. Schiller]

One attempt at lending Lolita an autobiographical base is that Nabokov was a victim of abuse. Many critics have been able to piece together some of Nabokov's early childhood. According to Brandon Centerwall, as a young boy Nabokov had an uncle who was a paedophile. Uncle Ruka apparently abused Nabokov as a boy, and although his parents knew of the abuse, they did nothing to stop the scandal. Uncle Ruka was Nabokov's mother's brother, who had no children of his own. When Uncle Ruka died he left his fortune to Nabokov. It was a trifle odd that a teenager was left millions, but it can be thought of as some sort of compensation for his ‘sexual services’. There are many parallels between Uncle Ruka and Nabokov, and Humbert Humbert and Lolita. The first and most obvious similarity is that Nabokov was age twelve during the escapade and Uncle Ruka was thirty-seven. Lolita was a young nymphet of twelve and Humbert Humbert was thirty-seven.

But another similarity was that Nabokov had a strange relationship with his own mother, as did Lolita with Charlotte. One critic points out that all the women in Lolita die. Humbert’s mother also died when he was very young, and then his caretaker took a turn for the worse, Charlotte was killed, and in the end Lolita died during childbirth, (the passage through life when she is to become a mother). Freud did numerous studies on the Oedipus complex, when a young boy has intimate feelings towards his mother and has a dislike to his father, or the other man in his mothers life. Although Freud's preoccupation with the Oedipus complex is subject to question, psychological evidence confirms that incestuous thoughts and feelings, largely subconscious, do play a part in human behavior. Nabokov did not keep his dislike of Sigmund Freud a secret. At the end of The Annotated Lolita, he wrote, “I detest symbols and allegories (which is due partly to my old feud with Freudian voodooism and part to my loathing of generalizations devised by literary mythists and sociologists)”.

I just read the article written by Centerwall (http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.230...21104558239543 --> you might not get access to the full version; I needed to log in to my University of Toronto account). Centerwall is not a literary scholar, he is a psychologist. He uses two texts for his arguments, Speak, Memory and Andrew Field's mistake-ridden biography. Several factual errors already present themselves. He claims the protagonist of The Enchanter is named "Arthur", when he is simply known as "The Man" (he no doubt got this from Andrew Field who made the error in the first place). The claim the ages of H.H. and Lolita (37 & 12 respectively when they meet) is the same as V.V.N. and his uncle is also incorrect. Vasily Ivanovich Rukavishnikov (1872-1916) would be 39 when Vladimir Vladimorovich Nabokov (1899-1977) was 12. I strongly believe that Lolita's age was chosen to be twelve simply because of physiological reasons. Nabokov did a large amount or research on young girls for his novel, including the average age of the onset of puberty for American girls in the 1950s... which is not susprisingly twelve years of age. Some of Centerwall's comments are also ridiculous. "Humbert Humbert's name is Vladimir Vladimirovich's most direct admission to pedophilia" --> Yes, because both the author and his character have double names, the character must be an exact alter-ego of the author and therefore, be a pedophile. Also this quote: "Even so, Uncle Ruka did make Vladimir his sole heir, and young Nabokov inherited the Ruka millions in 1916, after his uncle died (72). Nabokov is laconic on this point, not elaborating on why Uncle Ruka chose to make a teenager the sole inheritor of his fortune, rather than Vladimir's mother (Ruka's sister), the Nabokov children jointly, or some other arrangement. Perhaps it was payment for services rendered". In pre-revolutionary Russia, it was standard practice for the eldest male to receive inheritance. As Uncle "Ruka" was childless, naturally, the eldest son of his closest relative would be designated heir. Nabokov was already 17 as well, not like he was 10.

Centerwall cites this passage as his main piece of evidence for Vladimir being "sexually harassed" in Speak, Memory (VN speaking about his uncle): "he would invariably take me upon his knee after lunch and . . . fondle me, with crooning sounds and fancy endearments". Really? One thing he is right about is that Uncle "Ruka" was a known homosexual and would hold Vladimir quite tightly in many of the family photographs. Vladimir was admitted he was "embarrassed" by this, but there is zero evidence that their relationship went beyond some fondling, Centerwall sounds like an overzealous psychologist trying to stir up controversy when there isn't sufficient evidence.

As for your second paragraph, where did you get that information that Nabokov had a strange relationship with his mother? Andrew Field? Because I know that Andrew Field believed that Vladimir Nabokov addressed his mother as "Lolita" in his letters. This is because while he was compiling them for his biography, Nabokov would cross out sections that he felt were too personal and didn't want to share (he did this with Vera's letters as well), including the name, which he only left the first letter, "L". Field saw that it had about six letters so came upon this assumption. Dmitri Nabokov explained that the name was "Lyolya" (maybe I spelled it wrong), which is a short form for Helene/Elene (his mother's name) in Russian. And the name "Lolita" was conceived very late in the publication of the novel. In Nabokov's first drafts, the girl was called Juanita Dark --> this was decades after the letters to his mother were written. As to the fact that many of the female characters die... well what does that have to do with Nabokov's relationship with his mother? Many of the male characters die as well (all characters die!). Humbert Humbert dies, Quilty dies, Charlie (the boy Lolita lost her virginity to) dies in the (Korean?) War. Looking more closely, I suppose more females do die compared to males. But everything I've read of Nabokov's relationship with his mother has been pretty standard, nothing like Lolita/Charlotte. Nabokov's relationship with his homosexual brother Sergey on the other hand... that's another story. Nabokov's hatred of Freud, at least I believe, is because Freud's Oedipus Complex destroyed Nabokov's vision of childhood. Nabokov had "the happiest childhood imaginable" and was offended that "the Viennese Quack" would reduce the beautiful innocence he experienced as a child to crude sexual desire.

My sources:

The Russian Years - Brian Boyd
The American Years - Brian Boyd
Vera - Stacy Schiff
Speak, Memory - V.V. Nabokov
On a Book Titled The Enchanter - Dmitri Nabokov
The Annotated Lolita - Alfred Appel Jr.

To conclude, I find it interesting that so many people try to find pedophilic elements in Nabokov's life when there is very little evidence. The one controversial thing that is present in his literary works and his personal life that is not too widely talked about is his extreme homophobia. Every homosexual character every written by Nabokov is a bad artist and has very nasty attributes in general. Just off the top of my head, they appear in The Real Life of Sebastian Knight, Pale Fire, Despair and even briefly in Lolita (Gaston Godin). Nabokov's brother Sergey was gay and Vladimir was very embarrassed by this, leading to a strained relationship (Sergey would often wear lipstick and makeup). Sergey was then killed in the Holocaust, likely because he was gay.

[R.F. Schiller]

the argument that one HAS to experience something in order to form an 'informed' opinion is specious. Do you have to take drugs, smoke weed, jump in front of a speeding train to decide these things would be a bad idea?

Another bad analogy. The assumption that smoking is bad for you is a conclusion that scientists have validated based on experimentation and is based on facts. The effects of smoking on the body are physiological in nature and objective. Furthermore, I have yet to see a legitimate scientist claim that smoking is not bad for health. Art, on the other hand is dependent on firsthand experience. It is in the mind of the person and is entirely subjective. Furthermore, most "serious" critics agree that it is a quality work and not "disgusting" as you would suggest. If you have a different opinion that is fine, but it better be a strong, well-supported one; AKA one that requires someone to actually read the book rather than just get information from hearsay and quote mine from random articles.

Attacking the critics is not a defense.

This sentence is highly ironic, because it is YOU who are essentially attacking the critics. What most of the posters in this thread have stated are shared by the majority of critics in the literary world. Just because you can find one of two people who dislike Lolita on the internet, doesn't mean we are "attacking the critics".

“. . . The Laura joins The Enchanter (1939), Lolita (1955), Ada (1970), Transparent Things (1972), and Look at the Harlequins! (1974) in unignorably concerning itself with the sexual despoiliation of very young girls. . . [B]y sheer weight of numbers, by sheer iteration, the nympholepsy novels begin to infect one another – they cross-contaminate. We gratefully take all we can from them; and yet . . . Where else in the canon do we find such wayward fixity?

He missed The Original of Laura (2009) for this list actually. Also, do you see a recurring pattern? Except for The Enchanter, every other book about little girls was written after Nabokov landed in America. Another European, Aldous Huxley similar was disturbed by the developing promiscuity and sexualized culture. of America in the twentieth century and wrote about it in Brave New World . Nabokov is more or less commenting on what he is seeing.

The problem with Nabokov is that he seems to think paedophilia is funny!

Quite a bold (and mind you incorrect) statement for someone who hasn't read the book.

just on the basis of the assumption into the regular lexicon of the word 'lolita' to describe a sexually precocious girl who comes on to an older guy thus justifying her subsequent abuse (because in most places in the world sex with an underage girl is abusive, illegal, and proscribed) is harm enough. It's also the name of a lifestyle/fashion style where grown women dress up like little girls. It's even the name given to a psychological complex for heaven's sake! The harm this kind of branding does to the image of women is immeasurable and this book, its name, is a focal point for a great deal of it regardless of what is in the book itself which I do not care to immerse myself in.

And then what about all the films it has spawned? From the first film version through films such as Gigi - with that dreadful song 'Thank Heaven For Little Girls' to Kevin Spacey's "American Beauty"? And many more besides.

DO NOT tell me this book and its effect in the common perceptions is negligible or harmless.

Yes, the world "Lolita" and "nymphet" have been incorporated into the English language. Also, what is exactly wrong with the bold? It seems weird in our culture, but quite normal in Japan. Lolita fashion in Japan is not directly tied with sexuality and there is no evidence to suggest it is harmful. Furthermore, many oriental cultures have been altering appearances to look more youthful and diminutive (see stories of Chinese girls binding their feet to make them smaller) long before Lolita was published. Lolita fashion is just a term to describe modern examples. You've made numerous claims that Lolita has resulted in the degrading of women in society with no concrete evidence. At least find a sociological study or something that backs up your claim. However, just for sake of discussion on my next point, let's grant that you are right about this - Lolita has caused damage to society. Should Nabokov, or Lolita be held responsible? Nabokov wrote the novel with no deliberate intentions of spawning any kind of female degradation in future generations. Therefore, should Niels Bohr, J.J. Thomson and many other physicists in the early 20th Century who merely did experiments for sake of scientific discovery be held responsible for the Atom Bomb being dropped in Nagasaki, Hiroshima or the nuclear accident in Chernobyl, all of which were direct descendants and links to their work on nuclear physics? Are they therefore "disgusting" as well, like you have called Nabokov?

[Pumpkin337]

la la la la la la - same old same old ... why can't any of you actually defend the book in any way other than to say 'but its art / good writing / don't attack it if you haven't read it'? I'm so bored now .... the only difference between you and the other defenders on the net is the degree of erudition.

No one going to tackle my questions?

Read Lolita - because it is NOT shocking! http://mycardboardcastle.wordpress.c...o-read-lolita/

and finishes with - 'read it because it is good'

Read Lolita - because it is good (yawn) and "illuminated with sparkling prose and dry sardonic humour." (and I was WRONG? for saying Nabokov has a perverse sense of humour?)

http://www.swide.com/art-culture/boo...iew/2013/02/17

because I see nothing that is in the least bit 'amusing' sardonic or otherwise in the passage quoted in support of this opinion -

“She was musical and apple-sweet. Her legs twitched a little as they lay across my live lap; I stroked them; there she lolled on in the right-hand corner, almost asprawl, Lola, the bobby-soxer, devouring her immemorial fruit, singing through its juice, losing her slipper, rubbing the heel of her slipperless foot in its sloppy anklet, against the pile of old magazines heaped on my left on the sofa—and every movement she made, every shuffle and ripple, helped me to conceal and improve the secret system of tactile correspondence between beast and beauty—between my gagged, bursting beast and the beauty of her dimpled body in its innocent cotton frock …”

What is 'amusing' about that? It's perverse and disturbing and not funny!

at least after hashing on about it being funny and saying 'read it because its good' he does actually get ' the truly disturbing thing about the book is the empathy the reader has for the main character Humbert.'

And this POV expressed many times over and over is in itself not shocking? The fact that it is so well written you feel sympathy for the pervert? Why isn't there something disturbing in that? Why isn't that reason enough to say this book is, at very least, (and I am being horrifyingly kind) confused in its moral stance.

read it because it is a love story (a truly perverse notion on the part of the person who thought that up)

http://www.npr.org/2006/07/07/553685...and-a-favorite

"and for all its controversial subject matter, Lolita is one of the most beautiful love stories you'll ever read. It may be one of the only love stories you'll ever read. This is the most thrilling and beautiful and most deeply disturbing aspect of the novel — and it's what most persuasively recommends the book — that in addition to finding Humbert's soul on the page, we also find, like it or not, a little of our own."

Nope there is no way I can twist my head on so far backwards I can see the story of perversion as a 'love' story. And you want to tell me this book doesn't have any kind of negative effects ... it convinced a whole bunch of people to think that black is white and evil is good.

To go back to my point about the effect of Lolita in pop culture:

Why Should I Care?

We could tell you to care about Lolita because it is a classic of twentieth-century American fiction – or because it has been banned and scorned by so many librarians, literary critics, and judges. But the real reason you should care about Lolita is that the character of 'tween Lolita has become an icon and inspiration in popular culture. Almost disturbingly so.

Lolita isn't just a character in a Nabokov novel or a famous nymphet; Lolita has been claimed by fashionistas and fetishists, transformed into the embodiment of knee-sock and mini-plaid skirt wearing promiscuous school girl. Lolita has inspired everything from the subculture of "Gothic Lolita," a popular Japanese style that embraces Rococo and Victorian clothing types, to "Sweet Lolita," "Classic Lolita," and "Punk Lolita."

The most well known in America is the plain old Lolita-influenced style. The sexy 'tween image of a younger Britney Spears or Miley Cyrus owes a big debt to Lolita, for good or ill. Popular culture seems to love the image of young sexy girls. Skin tight miniskirts for 11-year-olds? A "hottie" t-shirt for a fifth-grader? Are these things empowering or exploitative? A book called The Lolita Effect (2008) by M. Gigi Durham is dedicated to this subject, explaining that the very word "Lolita" is now shorthand for an overly sexualized, provocative adolescent.

What's interesting about this cultural phenomenon is that it makes no mention of Humbert, the middle-aged man whose exploitative urges ruin young Lolita's life.

http://www.shmoop.com/lolita/

And if you don't think there is something wrong with children dressing sexually provocatively / old for their years at one end of the spectrum and grown women at the other end trying to dress like children you have something wrong with your perceptions of what is appropriate. Do children have be sexualised early and do adults have to dress like children to be attractive? There is something profoundly wrong with this.


and another book -Chasing Lolita: How Popular Culture Corrupted Nabokov's Little Girl All Over Again

There's a new interview on Nerve with Graham Vickers, the author of Chasing Lolita: How Popular Culture Corrupted Nabokov's Little Girl All Over Again, in which the author explores the way the icon has entered the culture - and how thoroughly that perception distorts Nabokov's actual novel. Nowadays, a Lolita is any underage temptress - "from Amy Fisher to Hard Candy" - whereas the character is very much a creation of adult male fantasy. Weirdly, as our culture's obsession with pedophilia grows, the character of Lolita has become more of a vixen and less of a victim."Lolita" is one of those terms that has entered the culture without having much to do with the character who inspired it. Whereas Nabokov's character is essentially just a kid - albeit a precocious and disturbed one - who's explicitly a canvas for the projection of Humbert's fantasies. As Vickers puts it, "She almost doesn't exist as a person to him." When we talk about a "Lolita" nowadays, it's usually in the context of a little Jezebel who manipulates men; it's a sexually-charged term for sure. How can we have taken such an ambiguous character and invested her with such a simplistic - not to say misleading - meaning? And why does this poor child get all the press? Why hasn't Humbert-Humbert entered the culture as a prototypical pedophile in the same way? Sure, he's less "sexy", but shouldn't that kind of be the point? We're talking, after all, about pedophilia, which is supposed to be the most feared subject of our times. In a way, the wholesale acceptance of the term "Lolita," the insistence on viewing her as a sexy temptress in the face of Nabokov's beautifully-crafted ambiguity, is a handy (if simplistic) mirror for the weird duality with which we view young girls as a whole. As Vickers says, it feels like awareness of the generality of "pedophilia" is all around us - an openness to childhood abuses, public registries and the risks to which children are subject every day. And yet, young girls are increasingly sexualized and the line between childhood and womanhood has never been more blurry. Vickers makes the point that most of the people who toss around the term "Lolita" are probably more familiar with one of the movie adaptations than the actual novel. Ironically, in their unwillingness to ever cast a really young girl in the role (both Sue Lyon and Dominique Swain were 15, as opposed to the novel's 12), the films are serving to blur the creepiness of the situation and so the picture these people see is probably less shocking.

oh and lets not forget this little gem:

http://news.google.com/newspapers?ni...g=6127,7700794

I didn't actually molest a 13 year girl - she seduced me! Its the ... wait for it .. .LOLITA DEFENSE! But no, the books ideas are not to blame for this association ... its just a misunderstanding on the part of all the people who came to his defense because they didn't understand it is just 'art'.

And this wasn't just an isolated case:

http://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20070221000071

Except they called his sexual attraction to children the "Lolita Syndrome". Gee I wish these psychological types would make up their minds. Is the pervert who has the inappropriate sexual attraction for minors the one with the Lolita Syndrome, or the girl with absent father issues making up for it by coming on to older men? Either way ... its a problem.

This essay discusses 'The Deceptive Veil of Language in Lolita'

http://www1.umassd.edu/corridors/bestessay25810.html

Humbert Humbert’s changing voice is meant to emphasize the aesthetic nature of his appreciation for young nymphettes rather than expose him for a perverse pedophile, suggesting that even the most disturbing things can be momentarily masked by the beauty of art.

and ends by saying:

Lolita is a testimony to art itself. Humbert’s narration exemplifies the idea of language as an art form as he uses intricate word play to appeal to an audience. His skill is ultimately a performance that attempts to disguise his unorthodox appreciation of young women, or Lolita in particular. The beauty in his words veils the harshness of pedophilia. Though his linguistic artistry serves as a mask, it only manages to momentarily distract the readers from the truth. In the end of the novel, even Humbert himself acknowledges reality as it is, and readers walk away from his memoir with the satisfaction that morality cannot just be compromised by aesthetic trickery.

All I'm saying is that there is insufficient aesthetic anything in the world to cover up, even momentarily, the wrongness of paedophilia and to attempt to do so is wrong. What possible good sane motivation could there be for trying to make something so repugnant (or what should be so repugnant) 'beautiful'? The fact that so many defend the beauty while ignoring (at best) the repugnant nature of the subject matter is another proof this book does it job a little too well.

[stlukesguild]

la la la la la la - same old same old ...

Well at least we know what we're dealing with here. A 12 year-old like Dolores herself, sticking her fingers in her ears and chanting, "La la la la la... I can't hear you!"

...why can't any of you actually defend the book in any way other than to say 'but its art / good writing...

Once again:

The artist is the creator of beautiful things.
There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.

There is no need to defend a work of literature upon moral grounds. Art is not about morality.

Having said this, any number of individuals have made critical points as to the fact that in no way does the novel, Lolita promote pedophilia or present it in a positive manner. But you clearly haven't bothered to read these comments any more than you bothered to read Lolita. The fact that you haven't even read the work makes you wholly unqualified to comment upon it and appear increasingly ridiculous.

don't attack it if you haven't read it'? I'm so bored now ....

Brilliant response! You're so bored with others suggesting that just perhaps one should have read a book before bothering to offer critical comments upon it?

No one going to tackle my questions?

Your questions and comments have been replied to repeatedly. You simply dislike the answers.

Read Lolita - because it is NOT shocking!

Who suggested that? Certainly Lolita could be deemed by many as shocking. So could MacBeth, Ulysses, Dante's Comedia, and endless other books of great merit.

She was musical and apple-sweet. Her legs twitched a little as they lay across my live lap; I stroked them; there she lolled on in the right-hand corner, almost asprawl, Lola, the bobby-soxer, devouring her immemorial fruit, singing through its juice, losing her slipper, rubbing the heel of her slipperless foot in its sloppy anklet, against the pile of old magazines heaped on my left on the sofa—and every movement she made, every shuffle and ripple, helped me to conceal and improve the secret system of tactile correspondence between beast and beauty—between my gagged, bursting beast and the beauty of her dimpled body in its innocent cotton frock …

What is 'amusing' about that? It's perverse and disturbing and not funny!

... at least after hashing on about it being funny and saying 'read it because its good' he does actually get ' the truly disturbing thing about the book is the empathy the reader has for the main character Humbert.'

And this POV expressed many times over and over is in itself not shocking? The fact that it is so well written you feel sympathy for the pervert? Why isn't there something disturbing in that? Why isn't that reason enough to say this book is, at very least, (and I am being horrifyingly kind) confused in its moral stance.

Yes, the passage is perverse... in that what is being presented are the internal thoughts of the perverse villain. So how should the writer present the Villain? Milton's Satan, Cormac McCarthy's Judge Holden, Shakespeare's Iago are all perverse characters... villains... yet villains with a degree of brilliance, if not genius. This is what makes them so dangerous. They are endlessly seductive. At times they seduce the reader and make him or her uncomfortable... or worse yet... begin to empathize with their perversity.

You seem to want a happy literature where nothing makes you uncomfortable... or if you allow for villains, you seemingly want those of the clear cut-out variety.

To go back to my point about the effect of Lolita in pop culture:

Why Should I Care?

We could tell you to care about Lolita because it is a classic of twentieth-century American fiction – or because it has been banned and scorned by so many librarians, literary critics, and judges.

Huckleberry Finn, Ulysses, Romeo & Juliet, To Kill a Mockingbird, Brave New World, Of Mice and Men, Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, The Grapes of Wrath, The Collector, Slaughterhouse Five, The Metamorphoses, Things Fall Apart... even the Bible are all among the books frequently censored or banned. Often, such books are banned due to sexual content or profanity, but they are also banned due to political content. Parents certainly should have the right to oversee what their children are reading or watching and Lolita is certainly a book that should probably be reserved for a mature audience. Perhaps you simply aren't ready.

But the real reason you should care about Lolita is that the character of 'tween Lolita has become an icon and inspiration in popular culture. Almost disturbingly so.

Lolita isn't just a character in a Nabokov novel or a famous nymphet; Lolita has been claimed by fashionistas and fetishists, transformed into the embodiment of knee-sock and mini-plaid skirt wearing promiscuous school girl. Lolita has inspired everything from the subculture of "Gothic Lolita," a popular Japanese style that embraces Rococo and Victorian clothing types, to "Sweet Lolita," "Classic Lolita," and "Punk Lolita."

And how do these fetish subcultures affect you or larger American culture? By the way, Japanese fetish for underage girls/school girls long predates Lolita. I can certainly pull up some examples from Japanese prints and photographs if you so desire. Indeed, the underaged school-girl fantasy/fetish in the West certainly predates Lolita. You only need to look to the Surrealists... the poet, Andre Breton, Georges Bataille, Louis-Ferdinand Céline... look up the art of Hans Belmer. Hell, go back to the Marquis de Sade or the Roman, Petronius.

And if you don't think there is something wrong with children dressing sexually provocatively / old for their years at one end of the spectrum and grown women at the other end trying to dress like children you have something wrong with your perceptions of what is appropriate. Do children have be sexualised early and do adults have to dress like children to be attractive? There is something profoundly wrong with this.

Please! You are making a lame attempt at appearing holier-than-thou... oh so concerned for the welfare of children which has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the literary merits of Lolita.

[stlukesguild]

Am I the only one who gets the feeling that we are in the presence of the banned member ftil resurrected?

[JCamilo]

Aye, I was feeling a deja vu as well. Dunno if it was because she (I call she only because the pumpkin nickname and the content make me think of Married with children Kelly Bundy, so if she is a he, my apologises) is basically repeating the same non-sense... but now that you mention...

[HCabret]

Walden.

[HCabret]

Why? Please enlighten us. But be sure to use small words, we're not all as smart as you are.

Also your list is almost exclusively the product of western civilization. No Japanese writers, or african writers, no arab writers?

[HCabret]

So, since we're all talking in english, let's assume we are talking about the Anglosphere. I think it's safe to say that we are not talking about Korean Horror Fiction, or any other regions or obscure genres like that. Also, since this is called "The Literature Network," I would assume we are talking about aspiring Literary writers. I would think that all this would be already implied.

3 of the books on your list weren't originally written in english. Leo Tolstoy didnt write his books in english to the best of my knowledge; some french, but no english.

[Marbles]

Don't know about the writing bit but what this thread proves is that you can't call yourself a reader without reading Lolita