"Lolita" Part 1 Blog

When reading the first part of "Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov I was very uncomfortable with what I had read.  I felt the book was very hard to read because it was so awkward.  Although the reading showed a man dealing with pedophilia which was interesting, it was disturbing.  Before this class I had never heard of "Lolita" so I was unsure of what to expect.  After understanding what the book was about I was uneasy about reading it.  I did find some of the book very interesting and worth talking about.

The first sentence in "Lolita" explained what the book would be about.  "Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins.  My sin, my soul."(page 3).  After reading this sentence I realized the book would be very interesting and that this sentence showed what type of person we were about to discover.  Humbert then goes into all his stories about different young women he had feelings for and their stories.  His first love was with a young girl named Annabel.  He visually describes what he remembers about Annabel and their times together.  "All at once we were madly, clumsily, shamelessly, agonizingly in love with each other;"(page 12).  Although Humbert said they were in love we soon find out they failed at making love.  He goes on to talk about many different prostitutes he had been with.  After the prostitutes he discovers his attraction is only for the nymphets.  A nymphet is a young girl who is sexually attractive.  He discovers he enjoys the young girls who are younger then the age of 14.

Humbert speaks in a very descriptive way through some of his thoughts.  He describes the girls and himself in great depth.  I feel he tries to come across as a good man when he uses "exceptionally handsome male" and "soft dark hair"(page 25).  He doesn't want people to think of him any differently just because of his thoughts on younger girls.  Humbert then goes on and describes his vision and meeting of Lolita.  "the vacuum of my soul managed to suck in every detail of her bright beauty"(page 39).  He has finally found his love and the one he has been looking for.  He tries to find the right time to talk to his Lolita but doesn't find the right time till no one else is around.  

When Humbert begins to play with Lolita in his lap I became uneasy.  I felt that even though Nabokov used very descriptive writing the thoughts and things that were done were very wrong.  His description of his sexual feelings were very repulsive.  I felt that even though he is talking about the person he loves and that age doesn't matter it is still an issue in many peoples eyes.  I feel sorry for him.  Even though he loves this girl it comes across as being very wrong and disgusting to the readers.