MAP Forum

Recently i came across this video on YouTube that suggest the author of Lolita may have been a pedophile.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDSz_LnsEjA

For years Lolita was thought of as a tragic love story about a middle aged mans obsession with a young girl but the current widely accepted opinion created by CSA survivors and female leftist on Tumblr and Twitter is that Lolita is about the grooming rape and kidnapping of a young girl by an evil unreliable narrator.

Nabokov is on record calling it a love story and saying his book is about love not sex and i am currently reading the book and feel while in some parts HH may be an unreliable narrator but for the most part he is being completely honest because an unreliable narrator doesn't tell on himself.

To me the idea that Nabokov was a champion of CSA victims' rights and a strict opponent of sexualizing children which is also a narrative being pushed nowadays is hilarious.

Nabokov is not rolling in his grave because young girls are on the front cover of Lolita if anything he would be more upset at the ambiguously aged women on some covers.

What do you guys think?

Thoughts?

Some people suggest that this story is based on the relationship between Charlie Chaplin and Lita Grey, who married in Mexico to avoid being accused in the molistation (she got pregnant at 15 or 16.).

Harlan wrote: ↑Mon Oct 07, 2024 3:27 am Some people suggest that this story is based on the relationship between Charlie Chaplin and Lita Grey, who married in Mexico to avoid being accused in the molistation (she got pregnant at 15 or 16.).

I do not think that is the case.

Pretty sure Nabokov wouldn't have taken it as seriously as people take it now. You have to remember, in the past the main concern with girls having sex was them becoming unwed mothers. It's only later (i.e. during the 70s) that the idea of childhood sexual trauma became so important to people (for example see Florence Rush and The Freudian Coverup theory). I think Humbert would have been viewed as more of a comical figure.

PorcelainLark wrote: ↑Tue Oct 15, 2024 4:46 am Pretty sure Nabokov wouldn't have taken it as seriously as people take it now. You have to remember, in the past the main concern with girls having sex was them becoming unwed mothers. It's only later (i.e. during the 70s) that the idea of childhood sexual trauma became so important to people (for example see Florence Rush and The Freudian Coverup theory). I think Humbert would have been viewed as more of a comical figure.

Good point.