Lolita, and other great FPN's

[hawthorns]

I just finished listening to the audiobook of Lolita performed by Jeremy Irons and was completely blown away.

So...now I'm desperately trying to find something similar. Let's see...something with first-person narration, Nabokov's ingenious style, and read by Jeremy Irons :lol: I wish Nabokov had written a library worth of stuff. Speak, Memory maybe? Interestingly, I've found that most of my favorite works are in the first-person (wholly or partially), which is something I never noticed until now.

Any recommendations you could throw my way would be great!

Thanks

[JCamilo]

Pale fire from Nabokov uses a similar strategy. Dostoievisky Undergroun Man also. Machado de Assis did all quite well, specially Dom Casmurro. Thomas Mann Doctor Faustus do the trick and with the funny idea of being told by the perspective of a secundary character.

[Lykren]

I'm curious, what is an FPN? [EDIT: Oh. First Person Narrators.]

To be on-topic, I think Speak, Memory might be a good next choice, as well as Notes From Underground. Fitzgerald and Waugh are also two great stylists, so you might want to consider looking into their works. Brideshead Revisited is in the first person.

[mona amon]

Lolita is a tough act to match - so quirky and unique. The only other Nabakov I've read is Pale Fire. As JCamillo says, it follows the same pattern as Lolita. In both books we see the story only through the distorted vision of the psycho narrators and have to read between the lines to get the other side of the story. Pale Fire's narrator is much more unreliable even than HH, and although it does not come anywhere near Lolita in beauty or anything else, it's still an excellent book.

My favourite first person novels are Jane Eyre, Villette, Huckleberry Finn, Heart of Darkness, Remains of the Day...there must be more but can't remember them right now.

[hawthorns]

Great stuff. I think those suggestions are a bullseye, as several mentioned are also among my favorites.

Thanks much

[PeterL]

In addition to first person being important to Lolita the narrator is rather unreliable. If you like ureliable narrators, the Pale Fire should be next for you. It is so completely unreliable that I got sick of reading it, but it is interesting. You might also find some of Lovecraft's writing interesting; he often used first person narrators of questionable reliability or canity.