Tag Archive: Lolita


THE BOOK I READ : LOLITA

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September 10, 2014

The fourth in a series of 13 book reviews from my pre-blogging years.

LOLITA by Vladimir Nabokov (1955)
lolita-book-cover

Lolita continues to draw its share of critics because it deals with a sexual relationship between a middle-aged man and a 12-year-old ‘nymphet’ without taking then easy option of moralising or sensationalising the story.

The novel examines the desires of the lonely and slightly pathetic Humbert Humbert but pointedly refuses to present him as a pervert or a monster.

Nabokov’s neutral tone is what exasperates and antagonizes those looking for any excuse to label the novel as depraved and obscene.

The Russian born author also writes so brilliantly that the story is vivid, believable and disturbing. He doesn’t need to write lurid sex scenes to convey the true nature of the man’s fatal attraction to the young girl. Continue reading →

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A LONG HAUL THROUGH A SHORT BOOK ABOUT A SMALL TOWN

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May 26, 2014

THE BOOKSHOP by Penelope Fitzgerald (First published 1978)

thebookshop I was in the mood for a book I could read quickly but although this is only 123 pages, it took me longer than it should have to finish, always a bad sign.

It is set in the fictitious English seaside town of Hardborough, East Anglia in 1959. The slim plot follows the fortunes of a kind-hearted widow Florence Green who hates being idle and decides that “courage and endurance are useless if they are never tested”.

She makes the bold decision to open a bookshop in a badly maintained and possibly haunted old house. In this way she becomes a “business woman in middle life”.

Things never go smoothly. She faces some spiteful opposition from the uncultured locals and stocking Nabokov’s Lolita causes controversy in the small-minded conservative community. She takes on a ten-year assistant who subsequently  leaves to focus on her school work.

If this synopsis makes the novella sound dull, it’s because it is! The problem is that nothing of note really happens and I find little of interest in any of the characters.

It was nominated for the Booker Prize and I can only think 1978 must have been a very lean year. Fitzgerald actually won the following year for Offshore which I sincerely hope is better.

At the end, Florence belatedly realises “the town in which she had lived for nearly ten years had not wanted a bookshop”. If only this had been clearer from the start I could have saved myself the trouble of reading it.

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SONG FOR INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY

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March 8, 2012

Not exactly a ‘sisters are doing it for themselves’ tune I’m intrigued by Lana Del Rey’s song Video Games enough to choose it to as a soundtrack to this year’s  International Women’s Day.

She may cultivates a Lolita look but this is more than the usual sugar-sweet pop tune.  The lyrics could have made a brash disco anthem but it is a rendered as a nervous piano ballad where she sounds like she’s about to crack up remembering good times gone sour. : “Heaven is a place on earth with you /Tell me all the things you want to do /I heard that you like the bad girls/Honey, is that true?”

For her debut UK television appearance on Later, the look of shy vulnerability is either highly contrived or perfectly genuine.

I think she looks pretty cool but you decide.

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NABOKOV : LAUGHTER IN THE DARK

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March 7, 2008

LAUGHTER IN THE DARK by Vladimir Nabokov

“I ask myself where lust comes from / Is it something to use / Or to overcome” Lyrics by Matt Johnson from The The’s ‘Bluer Than Midnight’ on the album ‘Dusk’

nabokovThere is no laughter but plenty of darkness to be found in this sadistic and mean spirited novel which Vladimir Nabokov originally wrote in Russian in 1933 (he did his own English translation five years later).

As a life spirals out of control, Nabokov lingers upon premeditated evil as a source of entertainment. This trait according to Craig Raine, in his after word, is why many regard Nabokov as a “connoisseur of pain”. The short novel dwells on human weakness in the face of lust and the capacity for cruelty motivated by greed.

None of the small cast of characters has many redeeming qualities and so it’s hard to feel any sympathy for their fates. Continue reading →

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