In a note at the end of the book, Nabokov writes,
“My private tragedy, which cannot, and indeed should not, be anybody’s concern, is that I had to abandon my natural idiom, my untrammeled, rich, and infinitely docile Russian tongue for a second-rate brand of English … “
Ha! If the writing in this book is second-rate, then how am I to feel? Even as a native English speaker, if I were to sift through the entirety of my own writing and muster my best single page, I feel it would still be inferior to any randomly chosen page from this masterpiece by Nabokov. Alas, I am thankful for great writers. Even if they destroy my hope of becoming like them, they still inspire me to try.
On the style of Nabokov’s writing, I took note of a few things. Concluding sentences that tie up the preceding chapter with a bow before proceeding to the next. Small details of imagery that put a magnifying glass between the reader’s eye and the scene. Humor, endless humor, even in the darkest circumstances (murder, for example), often self-deprecating. Personifying intangible themes with names like “McFate.” Using em dashes to sneak in asides. Digressing for several pages at a time, somehow returning.
And of course the plot and character development. Humbert eventually going crazy, hallucinating the follower Trapp, driven to madness by his love for Lolita. And Lo, at first enamored with Humbert, then not necessarily resistant to his advances (she even engages the first time with Humbert, if I recall), but eventually aware that their love affair is not normal, longing for other things (as children do) but Humbert keeping her from them.
A recurring question I have: can a book’s plot be interesting without love or violence? Without sex or murder? There seem to be a handful of themes that arouse and captivate the human interest. Almost all classical books seem to incorporate this handful in some way. Is this because the writers encounter these themes in their own experiences? Or because they are aware that these themes arouse the reader?
There was one section of Part Two, Chapter Two which I did not enjoy as much when Humbert recounts in a cataloging way randomly remembered details from various stops and attractions that he visited with Lolita in the early days of their American road trip. Even amid this slog of rambling, short sentences and phrases stood out, shining, showing Nabokov’s brilliance all on their own.