Post for 10/29

This scene is a re-write of Charlotte's finding of Humbert's writings.

Mystery, that's all those Europeans are, is mystery. He won't let me in. I will let myself in. I want to see what's in that big European head of his. Hum called them locked up love letters. I know better. I know better. He starts sweating when he lies. He's not a very good liar. He always ends his lies with the twinge of a smile. It's as though he thinks he got away with it. He must have some self-doubt. He must believe on some fundamental level that he's a good liar. Well, if not on a fundamental level, then at least on some level. He's a horrible liar. You'd think a European, you'd think he'd be more intelligent, more cultured. Maybe he is. Maybe he's writing about his cultured things. Maybe he's writing in French. Ah! There's the key. Okay, and now to open the table. Papers. Okay. Oh my god. "The Haze woman. The fat old Haze woman." I'm furious. I can't imagine. Why on earth would he write this? Jesus. He's in love with Lo. No, this isn't love. This is something else. Oh, my. He comes in, with his wheezing breath. I turn to him, and I yell.

"The Haze woman, the big bitch, the old cat, the obnoxious mamma, the--the old stupid Haze is no longer your dupe. She has--she has had enough. I've had enough of you, I've had enough of your lies! I've had enough of Dolores, that insufferable little girl you say you're in love with. I know it's not love. It can't be love. I know things are different in Europe, but this is America. We don't let our fathers touch their daughters! I won’t let you near her again, you big brute!"

"My dear," he says, “come here, and we’ll talk about it.”

“You’re a monster. You’re a detestable, abominable, criminal fraud. If you come near—I’ll scream out the window. Get back!” He tries to come near me. As if one of his disgusting sloppy kisses would change things.

“You’re the monster,” he mutters. I pretend not to hear.

“I am leaving tonight. This is all yours. Only you’ll never never see that miserable brat again.” He left, and I place a call to Leslie Tomson.

“Leslie, could you please call my home and tell my husband that I’m dead?”

“Who is this?”

“Charlotte Haze.”

“Oh. Yes. I suppose I can.”

“Thank you, goodbye.” I hang up, and open the sideboard. There is a replica of me. If Humbert can make up his Quilty, then I can have a wax replica. I run into the street, stand her up, and run, with my bag. Someone will hit her soon enough.

Post for 10/24

Danielle and I have been collaboratively assigned Nabokov's poem "The Ballad of Longwood Glen" as signifying something about Nabokov's themes, and narrative quirks, in reflecting Lolita. The poem is typically Nabokovian in a number of ways.

First, and most obviously, is the reflection (and parody) of folk tales. The piece is about a father who (never having climbed a tree) goes into the tree, to find a ball in a tree, never to return. This is fantastical in the same way a fairy tale, and almost seems like a cautionary tale without a moral, or an invocation of caution in its audience. This isn't much unlike Lolita in the sense that Humbert loves fairy tales, (as messed up as they are) and in fact, is constantly creating "real life" (whatever that means in this book) parallels between his life and fairy tales.

Secondly, is the fun Nabokov has creating a puzzle for his readers. The poem seems, to me, really to be a poetic reflection of his statement that good art places not characters against one another, but rather the author against the reader. In this reading, Art, (you see what I'm saying?) is symbolic of Art, and the people at the bottom of the tree try to analyze, try to unpack, and try to understand where Art went, but are unable to. Art places itself against the reader, and hides itself. Lolita is a sparring match. It's wonderful, though difficult and elusive. Not only is Humbert Humbert's reliability completely questionable, but the whole story forces you to either (in my opinion) misread him, or you are forced to have complicated feelings about him. And like Joyce's Ulysses, there are no arguments that hold up, unchallenged. Nabokov has the humanity, or rather, the understanding of the complexity of humanity that reflects Humbert Humbert, not as an archetype, but rather, as a person.

Thirdly, the piece is very clearly structured, and the aesthetics, and the "rules" of the game are very clear. The poem is written in AA BB CC format. This is, perhaps, a variation from Lolita in a certain way. Part of the fun of Lolita, is that it's a game we don't know the rules to. But, the way the poem and Lolita are connected, is through the fact that there are very much rules that are tightly followed by the author. I think about Nabokov's insistence that he is in control of his novels. He is in control of his writing, micromanaging, and being hyper selective with every word.

There are a number of other small details that are typically Nabokovian, (the doppelgänger names of Paul and Pauline, the judgemental narrator, the importance of names, the use of epic language, the frequent appearance of cars) that are more nitty-gritty, and perhaps less interesting for the greater picture of understanding Nabokov as an author and elusive figure overall.

Post for 10/22

I really liked the Winston article we had to read for Tuesday's class. It is interested, as I am, in the intersection between humanity and the fictionality of the story. However, the element I hadn't really considered, is the way Humbert fetishizes and tries to imitate fiction. I had thought about it more in terms of "lying" and "truth." But Humbert's problem is that he can't separate fact from fiction, right? Right. He can't separate fact from fiction, because he won't let himself accept the harsh realities. Instead, he tries to fictionalize his life to make things better than they were. I had always seen this as connecting to others. I had never really thought of Humbert's lying as (possibly) being entirely self-serving. I suppose, for all my rhetoric of "understanding others complexly" I was just thinking of Humbert as so uncomplicatedly bad, that I suppose I didn't consider that he really may be telling the story (and occasionally not telling the truth) really for himself. Almost telling the story as an act of repenting. And in fact, the final bit really comes close to that idea. The truth is that if we can agree that Humbert Humbert can't keep fact from fiction (not a particularly daring thesis) than it would be obvious to me that Humbert is telling the story to seek a redemption.

Humbert Humbert cannot separate fact from fiction. This is his fatal flaw. He wants everything to be perfect. He wants everything to fit in the neat, beauty of prose. Life, however, resists narrative structure, and this is Humbert Humbert's problem. He is trying to put the messiness, and complication of life into the simplicity of fiction. It doesn't work. It won't work. And that's the problem with his framework of thought. Not at all unlike cinderella's sisters, he tries to cut the heels off reality to make his reality fit into the shoe of fiction, or of prose. However, by doing this he ignores the complexity of life. Of his, less, but more importantly of Lolita's. He's so set on making everything perfect, and fable-like, that he's ignoring the reality of the situation. He doesn't realize how he's destroying Lolita's life, because he refuses to see the messiness, and contradictions of her personhood, due to his desire, or incapability to see the world outside the frame of a traditional narrative. Relevantly, Winston says here, "Humbert's solipsistic imagination refuses to acknowledge the individuality of the girls he loves or to allow them freedom to shape their own lives" (424).  This is so much what I'm trying to say. Humbert is telling us his story, not his life. Whether or not he can tell the difference is a different story.

Post for 10/17

I'm still dealing with and unpacking the Roth. (In a sidenote, I loved that Roth couldn't tell that John Ray Jr. wasn't a "real" editor." I find the fictionality of that character so absolutely paramount to this book. I wonder how Roth would react upon realizing the falsehood of the character.) I really like Roth's conceptions of reality, fiction, and the way Nabokov blurs the boundaries of both. I think, if we follow Roth's idea, (or perhaps it was Appel's) that the characters  that the most virtuous characters are the ones who are able to balance the the "real" as well as the "fictional" worlds. Roth goes on to discuss (rightly so,) that Humbert Humbert is completely incapable of balancing these two. This ends up destroying him. What I think is sort of interesting about this, is that this makes Lolita a tragedy, in a fairly traditional sense. Humbert Humbert, incapable of both keeping track of reality or fiction, is fatally flawed. Humbert can't remember or understand the difference between a reality or fiction. So, what makes that interesting, is the idea that Humbert may be honest, and also not accurately tell the story.  This slips into the idea of the subjectivity of truth. I just read "Six Characters in Search of an Author" for another class, and I have since been thinking about the way the two works deal with "reality" by creating a "real" infrastructure around the story. I think about the idea of the difference between Truth and truth. Facts vs. truth. I don't really have the feeling that Humbert intentionally lies very much, because I think he does not have the appropriate grip on what is and is not real, what is right and what is wrong. I don't know. It's all so complicated, and difficult. I keep trying to work and re-work these ideas, and they so often don't follow through.

More than the how, which Roth goes rather deeply into, I'm more interested in the why. What is the point? Why does Nabokov play with reality and fiction? What should Humbert's inability to sort reality from fiction say about us as people? Is Nabokov just playing a game to say that the best way to go about things is to be able to neatly separate "reality" from "fiction"? What a horribly secular thing to think. What a horribly separatist thing that is to say. If we can agree that Humbert Humbert is being honest, despite how often he lies, than wouldn't it be fair to say that we are all full of massive subjectivities, and that Nabokov is trying to say that we should both keep our realities in place, as well as acknowledging our own fictions, and the realities and fictions of others? I don't know if that question made any sense.

Post for 10/15/13

What's the use of commenting on the fictionality of a story? It's not new. What does it do? It plays with the boundaries of storytelling. But what is the point of that? Is it just another game to play, or is there a reason we're playing? I keep coming back to this, as I consider and re-consider Nabokov and Joyce. Joyce does a lot of play on the fictionality of the story. Is it just a reminder? By the way, this is all made up. Is it a comfort? Don't worry, this is all made up. Is it a claim of virtuosity? "I'm so great, this is all made up." Is it a disclaimer? Don't blame me, this is all made up. Maybe it's a bit of all of these things. I think about the way authors lives are used to invalidate their fictions. In that way, Nabokov is constantly claiming that this story is made up, and that it's not him. It's not his life. I have a hard time buying that as the idea. I don't know. I think about the importance of fiction. About the importance of made up stories. I think stories are important because they allow us to see something, or somebody we normally might not see. Now, this is sort of complicated by the fact that a great deal of fiction is about just the opposite. It tries to create intentionally hollowed-out characters, so that people will see themselves in the work they're reading. Does this mean that the importance of made up stories is not in connecting to others, or does it mean that different fictions have different purposes?  I have so many questions. I keep wondering about why we care so much about fiction. Maybe fiction is about both identifying and welcoming the other. Well no, I don't like that definition because it excludes the possibility to appreciate a story that one does not see a piece of themselves in. But at the same time, aren't those the stories we like most? Stories that reflect certain parts of us, or our likes, and deflect others? The stories I like, even if I don't agree with them per se, have elements I agree with. Is a complete inversion automatically unlikeable? If I see something that is completely opposite of me, in my personality, and in my literary preferences, is that reason enough to dislike a story? I don't know. Hm.

Post for 9/8/13

I have figured out what I would like to write about. I had been seeking some intersection between Nabokov's commentary on the artificiality of the novel, as well as his discussion of the way we reduce people to images or labels. Well, fortunately, I've found a way I think I can do that. Humbert Humbert, has many pleas to his audience. Some of which are "my learned reader" some of which are "ladies and gentlemen of the jury" etc. What I think is fascinating is the way (I find) humanity and artificiality come together in these invocations. For instance, when Humbert Humbert says "Ladies and gentlemen of the jury--I wept" (103). This moment is fascinating because Humbert Humbert is asking us to see him as an image. He wants us to see him as the image of a weeping man, a man who weeps. Humbert Humbert, in this fascinating moment (amongst others) makes an appeal based on an image, or a stereotype we have in our minds. It doesn't matter whether or not he is lying, he is trying to use these tropes, these images, to show us that he is not a monster, and that he hurts, and feels too. What I personally love so much about this is that we know better. Humbert Humbert presents us with an image of himself, but we are very aware that it is a false image. Nabokov, in this way, forces his reader to stop and say "Hey, you're not this two dimensional." Constantly, throughout the text, there are appeals, calls to the humanity of the reader. What is (in my opinion) so interesting, is the fact that Nabokov and Humbert Humbert deal with the question differently. For Nabokov, the text at large is a motion of humanization.

In the one axis of intersection is the breaking of fiction. This happens throughout the book in about a million different ways (Nabokov's range of ways to break or tinker with the artificiality of fiction are quite vast.) However, I particularly like the "ladies and gentlemen of the jury" because it addresses an audience that is both fictional and real. Humbert Humbert is aware that whoever reads this book (his book) is going to try to make a judgement call about him, or is going to decide upon the morality of his actions. This is what he means when he says "of the jury." He is aware that we are going to judge him for his behavior. So, he makes several appeals, to this reader, who will, after all, judge him. After all, it is his humanity and moral indiscretion that the book deals with. However, it isn't clear who he is making that appeal to. On the one hand, I think that we are the readers. We, in the nonfictional, tangible world, are the readers. And we aren't not the readers. I know that probably sounds silly, but it's not that I'm trying to deny our reading of the book. I am, however trying to say, that he is appealing to both an imaginary reader (one who exists in the same external (external meaning outside Humbert Humbert's) world) and a "real one" (you, Tess, Kayla, Danielle, or anyone else holding Nabokov's book.) I suppose that's a better way of categorizing. There are a set of imaginary people reading Humbert Humbert's book, and a set of "real" people reading Nabokov's book.  It's not clear which (if any) of these groups Humbert is crying out to. I find that fascinating.

Post for 10/3/13

I would like to focus my attention in Lolita to the fictionality of the story, as my thesis for the class. I'm interested in the way Nabokov breaks the realism of the story with interruptions of all sorts. The book has an incredible self-awareness. But not only does the book have great self-awareness, but the characters also seem to know they're in a story. (Lolita's 'you sound like a book' comes to mind.) Nabokov is constantly breaking from what is expected of him. He breaks radically from the realist tradition. But what's fascinating about his break with realism is that it's (in many ways) more radical a break from realism than a movement like surrealism, or a fantastic tale is. Surrealism, for instance, places itself in a way that's nearly antithetical to realism. The game is (partially) based on breaking the rules of reality. In that way, surrealism becomes reliant on realism as a foil. Nabokov's reality is much more threatening to realism, because it doesn't seem to regard the rules. It's not an inversion of realism, but it's also definitely not a support of realism. It's an odd third thing. Being that it doesn't play by the rules, but is also not simply reversing them, Nabokov says that the rules of realism are meaningless. This is, clearly much more threatening than surrealism, because surrealism's dependence on realism still validates the existence of realism, where Nabokov's abrealism (normal/abnormal, realism/abrealism) doesn't rely on the rules of anyone else's games. Ambiguity is always threatening in a world of extremes.

But I'm also fascinated in Nabokov's interest in seeing others complexly. The book is absolutely racked with the dichotomy between image and reality. One of the central themes of the book, in my opinion, or rather, is Nabokov's discussion of how quickly we write people off by their labels. It's true, it's an incredibly American thing to do. (My mother always goes off on these rants about how obsessed America is with ways of categorizing, labeling, and dehumanizing people. She is Italian, and didn't grow up hearing ridiculous terms like "baby boomer" and "middle child syndrome.") By labeling these personalities, we reduce people to words, to ideas, and thus to one dimension. It is not as though Nabokov is merely resistant to this idea. The weight of this very story relies upon a reader with humanity to see and understand Humbert Humbert. Not because he's a good person, deserves redemption, or anything else. But rather, because he's a person. He deserves the three dimensions of portrayal others get. (Well, some others get.) Deep within this story is an absolutely massive amount of humanity. Nabokov asks us not only to be good readers, but he also asks us to be good people. We should try to understand and listen to Humbert Humbert because he's fascinating. He's complicated, horrible, brilliant, and full of the inconsistencies in personality that make us human.

There must be a way these two intersect. I will find it. Once I can find it, that is the thing I want to write about.