Instant Access To 100,000+ Essays!

What can we intuitively learn about the taboo subjects of incest and pedophilia when such a tale is told by Humbert Humbert, the narrator of Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita? This “maniac’s masterpiece” (257) evolves from an abhorrent, debauched tale of perversion into a witty, tragic love story precisely because Humbert tells it so convincingly. He is a true maniac, fueled by lust, petty jealousy and murderous actions. Although he denies he is a poet (72), Nabokov’s literary creation speaks the language of longing and lust so perfectly that it’s impossible by confession’s end for the reader to deny the power of Humbert’s voice. From the opening sentence, with his ruminations on the name of his beloved, Humbert Humbert dives into his biography to persuade the reader that there are justifiable reasons for his doomed love affair with Lolita. He tells us that “You have to be an artist and a madman, a creature of infinite melancholy” in order to see “the little deadly demon among the wholesome children” (17). It is in his own adolescence where Humbert’s first sexual encounter with Annabel (“no nymphet” to him) begins the journey of his obsession (17). A