Nabokov, a closet Pedophile?
Posted: Wed Jan 13, 2010 12:47 am
According to Nabokov, he stated " of all my books, Lolita has left me with the most pleasurable afterglow."
Such tenacious preoccupation with a taboo theme as perservering as Humbert's yearning for Annabel...belies Nabokov's assertions that Pedophilia held no special significance for him. But was he a pedophile himself?
I find it most intriguing to look beyond the solipsism, abuse, puns, and allusions and delve into the reason Nabokov spent decades writing about child molestation and rape. His penchant for literary intimacy with very young pre pubescent girls exposes a man who chose to ignore the sexual slavery of a twelve year old girl and violate deep rooted sexual and social taboos.
He first developed the theme of the hidden pedophile in his novel "Dar", written between 1935-37. Then expanded the theme into a novella "The Enchanter" in 1939; wrote the 300 plus page "Lolita" between 1949-1954; drafted a full length screenplay in 1960; single handedly translated Lolita in Russian over a two year period, 1965-67; followed by "Ada" in 1969.
To stop undesirable speculation, Nabokov insistantly portrayed himself as naive on such matters of pedophilia and that he had to do extensive research simply to be able to write about the subject intelligibly.
He claimed he read so many case histories, travelled America, collected butterflies or whatever. An excellent maneuver, but there was just one little problem: Ten years or more before "Loilta", Nabokov had written two or more portrayals of pedophilia that between them demonstrated unequivocally that he had complete mastery of child kidnappping, rape, and intimate details of pre pubescent girls bodies.
Such tenacious preoccupation with a taboo theme as perservering as Humbert's yearning for Annabel...belies Nabokov's assertions that Pedophilia held no special significance for him. But was he a pedophile himself?
I find it most intriguing to look beyond the solipsism, abuse, puns, and allusions and delve into the reason Nabokov spent decades writing about child molestation and rape. His penchant for literary intimacy with very young pre pubescent girls exposes a man who chose to ignore the sexual slavery of a twelve year old girl and violate deep rooted sexual and social taboos.
He first developed the theme of the hidden pedophile in his novel "Dar", written between 1935-37. Then expanded the theme into a novella "The Enchanter" in 1939; wrote the 300 plus page "Lolita" between 1949-1954; drafted a full length screenplay in 1960; single handedly translated Lolita in Russian over a two year period, 1965-67; followed by "Ada" in 1969.
To stop undesirable speculation, Nabokov insistantly portrayed himself as naive on such matters of pedophilia and that he had to do extensive research simply to be able to write about the subject intelligibly.
He claimed he read so many case histories, travelled America, collected butterflies or whatever. An excellent maneuver, but there was just one little problem: Ten years or more before "Loilta", Nabokov had written two or more portrayals of pedophilia that between them demonstrated unequivocally that he had complete mastery of child kidnappping, rape, and intimate details of pre pubescent girls bodies.