History Literature / Lolita

Adapted into two films, one by Creator/StanleyKubrick, the other by Adrian Lyne.

* TheLostLenore: Annabell for Humbert. {{Lampshaded}} with many references to EdgarAllanPoe in her description.

'''Lolita''' is a 1955 novel by Creator/VladimirNabokov about the relationship between erudite pedophile Humbert Humbert and his stepdaughter/kidnappee Dolores Haze. The action takes place between 1947 and 1952, and is chock-full of convoluted wordplay, multilingual puns, and allusions to everything from entomology to Creator/EdgarAllanPoe. Originally written in English and set in the US, it had to be published in France as pornography because no one else would touch it. Nabokov himself pointed out that this is probably the main reason why parents [[NeverLiveItDown don't name their daughters "Lolita" any more]].

'''''Lolita''''' is a 1955 novel by Creator/VladimirNabokov about the relationship between erudite pedophile Humbert Humbert and his stepdaughter/kidnappee Dolores Haze. The action takes place between 1947 and 1952, and is chock-full of convoluted wordplay, multilingual puns, and allusions to everything from entomology to Creator/EdgarAllanPoe. Originally written in English and set in the US, it had to be published in France as pornography because no one else would touch it. Nabokov himself pointed out that this is probably the main reason why parents [[NeverLiveItDown don't name their daughters "Lolita" any more]].

* MakingASpectacleOfYourself: In the 1962 film, Delores is first seen in an outfit that includes [[HeartSymbol heart-shaped]] sunglasses.

* DawsonCasting: Averted in both film versions, which is rather surprising given the subject matter.

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'''''Lolita''''' is a 1955 novel by Creator/VladimirNabokov about the relationship between erudite pedophile Humbert Humbert and his stepdaughter/kidnappee Dolores Haze. The action takes place between 1947 and 1952, and is chock-full of convoluted wordplay, multilingual puns, and allusions to everything from entomology to Creator/EdgarAllanPoe. Originally written in English and set in the US, it had to be published in France as pornography because no one else would touch it. Nabokov himself pointed out that this is probably the main reason why parents [[CriticalBacklash don't name their daughters "Lolita" any more]].

* PerspectiveFlip: ''Lo's Diary''. Would be a POVSequel, except that it was written by Pia Pera and not Nabokov (whose family was [[http://www.nytimes.com/books/99/10/31/reviews/991031.31udovitt.html less than pleased about it]]).

* DriveInTheater: One scene takes place there in the StanleyKubrick film.

* AntiVillain: Humbert Humbert again. He does show a streak of genuine guilt from time to time in his narrative and try to make up--in part--for what he's done to Lolita.

* ABoyAndHisX: A man and his under-aged lover.
* AffablyEvil: Humbert Humbert in spades. There's at least one moment in the book (which also turns up in some form in the movie adaptations) in which he contemplates killing his wife and how easily he could get away with it, but finds that he really is just too nice to do it. In some ways, this actually makes him even ''worse'', and the mid-story DiabolusExMachina that puts her out of his way is made that much more bitterly ironic. The unabridged audio book version, read by Creator/JeremyIrons, carries this further - Irons' reading over twelve hours almost makes the character's actions excusable.

* AwesomeMcCoolName: {{Invoked}} by the narrator when he tells that he introduced himself to Charlotte as [[Creator/EdgarAllanPoe Edgar]] H. Humbert.

* BreakTheCutie: The entire book could be considered one for Lolita, considering her childhood is essentially destroyed. Most of the time she doesn't show this (except [[TearJerker when she cries at night]]), and at the book's very end [[spoiler:when she is pregnant and married at 16]] she seems oddly accepting and bears no ill will towards H.H.

* DaddysGirl: [[DarkerAndEdgier Though Humbert's love for his "daughter" is not so fatherly...]]

* PrettyInMink: Early in the 1962 film, Delores wears a white rabbit fur wrap to a party.

* YouAreGrounded: Humbert enforces a curfew on Lolita to keep her from dating boys or calling the police.

* FootFocus: Both films have several close-ups of Lolita's bare feet.

* AffablyEvil: Humbert Humbert in spades. There's at least one moment in the book (which also turns up in some form in the movie adaptations) in which he contemplates killing his wife and how easily he could get away with it, but finds that he really is just too nice to do it. In some ways, this actually makes him even ''worse'', and the mid-story DiabolusExMachina that puts her out of his way is made that much more bitterly ironic. The unabridged audio book version, read by JeremyIrons, carries this further - Irons' reading over twelve hours almost makes the character's actions excusable.

* LiteraryAgentHypothesis: The book is presented as a memoir written by the main character written while he was in prison and published posthumously with names changed to protect the innocent. In the Jeremy Irons version, Quilty {{lampshade|Hanging}}s this, saying "You are a foreigner, you are an agent of a foreign power, you're a foreign literary agent."

Adapted into two films, one by StanleyKubrick, the other by Adrian Lyne.

Appel's preface to the annotated edition goes out of its way on this point: "Of course, the annotator and editor of a novel written by the creator of [[PaleFire Kinbote]] and John Ray, Jr., runs the real risk of being mistaken for another fiction, when at most he resembles those gentlemen only figuratively. But the annotator exists; he is a veteran and a grandfather, a teacher and taxpayer, and has not been invented by Vladimir Nabokov." Of course, that's just what a character ''would'' say. . . and before the Introduction is over, Appel is saying that you, gentle reader, are "manipulated by Nabokov's dizzying illusionistic devices to such an extent that [you] too can be said to become, at certain moments, another of Vladimir Nabokov's creations."

* AuthorAvatar: Oddly, given his crimes and Nabokov's own opinion toward him, Humbert could count for this, being one of a number of Nabokov protagonists who, like the author himself, is a highly cultured emigre. This is tidily averted in one aspect: Nabokov was a respected lepidopterist. H.H. sees hawk-moths in the Arizona twilight and thinks they are ''hummingbirds''. It is also interesting to note how Humbert discredits his journal as being a work of fiction using people he knows as archtypes and putting them into extreme situations. He even says that this is part of the trade of the author as well.
* AwesomeMcCoolName: {{Invoked}} by the narrator when he tells that he introduced himself to Charlotte as [[EdgarAllanPoe Edgar]] H. Humbert.

* BreakTheCutie: The entire book could be considered one for Lolita, considering her childhood is essentially destroyed. Most of the time she doesn't show this (except [[{{TearJerker}} when she cries at night]]), and at the book's very end [[spoiler:when she is pregnant and married at 16]] she seems oddly accepting and bears no ill will towards H.H.

* LiteraryAgentHypothesis: The book is presented as a memoir written by the main character written while he was in prison and published posthumously with names changed to protect the innocent. In the Jeremy Irons version, Quilty [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] this, saying "You are a foreigner, you are an agent of a foreign power, you're a foreign literary agent."

Lolita is a 1955 novel, Creator/VladimirNabokov's wacky [[RoadTripRomance road-trip "romance"]]. Chronicling the misadventures of erudite pedophile Humbert Humbert and his stepdaughter/kidnappee Dolores Haze. The action takes place between 1947 and 1952. Chock-full of convoluted wordplay, multilingual puns, and allusions to everything from entomology to Creator/EdgarAllanPoe. Originally written in English and set in the US, but had to be published in France as pornography because no one else would touch it. Nabokov himself pointed out that this is probably the main reason why parents [[CriticalBacklash don't name their daughters "Lolita" any more]].

* OnceMoreWithEndnotes: ''The Annotated Lolita,'' with said annotations added by Alfred Appel, who had once been Nabokov's student at Cornell. It's funny how Alfred Appel added the annotations, given the author's affinity for [[AddedAlliterativeAppeal alliteration]]. Given the author's fondness for bilingual puns, it's also fun to note that the French for "reference mark" is "appel de note". Does this man even really exist?\\
\\
Appel's preface to the annotated edition goes out of its way on this point: "Of course, the annotator and editor of a novel written by the creator of [[PaleFire Kinbote]] and John Ray, Jr., runs the real risk of being mistaken for another fiction, when at most he resembles those gentlemen only figuratively. But the annotator exists; he is a veteran and a grandfather, a teacher and taxpayer, and has not been invented by Vladimir Nabokov." Of course, that's just what a character ''would'' say. . . and before the Introduction is over, Appel is saying that you, gentle reader, are "manipulated by Nabokov's dizzying illusionistic devices to such an extent that [you] too can be said to become, at certain moments, another of Vladimir Nabokov's creations."

Lolita is a 1955 novel, VladimirNabokov's wacky [[RoadTripRomance road-trip "romance"]]. Chronicling the misadventures of erudite pedophile Humbert Humbert and his stepdaughter/kidnappee Dolores Haze. The action takes place between 1947 and 1952. Chock-full of convoluted wordplay, multilingual puns, and allusions to everything from entomology to EdgarAllanPoe. Originally written in English and set in the US, but had to be published in France as pornography because no one else would touch it. Nabokov himself pointed out that this is probably the main reason why parents [[CriticalBacklash don't name their daughters "Lolita" any more]].

* AffablyEvil: Humbert Humbert in spades. There's at least one moment in the book (which also turns up in some form in the movie adaptations) in which he contemplates killing his wife and how easily he could get away with it, but finds that he really is just too nice to do it. In some ways, this actually makes him even ''worse'', and the mid-story DiabolusExMachina that puts her out of his way that much more bitterly ironic. The unabridged audio book version, read by JeremyIrons, carries this further - Irons' reading over twelve hours almost makes the character's actions excusable.

* AuthorAvatar: Oddly, given his crimes and Nabokov's own opinion toward him, Humbert could count for this, being one of a number of Nabokov protagonists who like the author himself, is a highly cultured emigre. This is tidily averted in one aspect: Nabokov was a respected lepidopterist. H.H. sees hawk-moths in the Arizona twilight and thinks they are ''hummingbirds''. It is also interesting to note how Humbert discredits his journal as being a work of fiction using people he knows as archtypes and putting them into extreme situations. He even says that this is part of the trade of the author as well.

* BottleFairy: Rita, an alcoholic whom Humbert once described as "amiably drunk".

* ChildrenAreInnocent: Subverted; Humbert is astonished by how much Lo already knows, even though a large part of his worldview revolves around the existence of a class of pubescent girls that are non-innocent by nature. Most likely due to UnreliableNarrator. See FridgeBrilliance, below.

* FilleFatale: Lolita in the book. H.H. even suspects her of trying to pimp her classmates to him. This is arguable due to the UnreliableNarrator.

* FreudianExcuse: H.H. has one of these, but neither he or the author really think it excuses him. You see, he is a pedophile because he fell in love when he was 12, but his 12-year-old girlfriend died and he never got over it. Considering the author's loathing of psychological literary criticism (he would later refer to Freud as "that Viennese witch-doctor") and Humbert Humbert's gleeful attacks on future attempts to psychologically profile him, and really the entire prologue, much of the book is spent [[DeconstructedTrope destroying this trope]]. Also, consider that H.H.'s alleged excuse is basically a prose interpretation of Poe's Annabell Lee. Is it real, or is H.H. mocking you with a ready-made Freudian excuse?

** Charlotte in her letter to Humbert takes EverythingSoundsSexierInFrench to an extreme in an attempt to show her affection for him. Charlotte in everything, really - arguably an attempt to sound more cultured, more European, the middle-class, pretentious rube that she was.

* KillEmAll: [[spoiler:In the end, Dolores escaped from her abusers and married a man she actually loved. When she becomes pregnant, she contacts Humbert to ask for support, and tells him the story from her point of view. Humbert then leaves her his money and goes off to kill Quilty, end up in jail and dies of illness there. Dolores dies in childbirth, along with her child.]]

* LookBothWays: When Charlotte finds Humbert's diary, detailing his disdain for her and lust for her daughter, she confronts him with the evidence and tells him she intends to take Lolita to a strict year-round boarding school and away from his grasp forever. However, crossing the street to post letters setting this plan in motion, she is killed by a passing motorist, leaving Humbert as Lolita's sole guardian.

* OverprotectiveDad: A very grim variation. The reason why Humbert's keeping others boys (and men) from banging his little girl is that he wants to ''do it himself''.

* RuleOfSymbolism: Everywhere you look, but notably near the book's end, when we learn that [[spoiler:Dolly has taken refuge in a community where everyone seems to have a disability. Her husband is deaf, their next-door neighbor an amputee. Like her, they're all in some sense broken: but like her, they are survivors. Dick Schiller's deafness is particularly significant, because ''no one will ever hear'' Dolly's story.]]

* TastesLikeDiabetes: Humbert's in-universe reaction to girly magazines and corny music that Lolita enjoys.

* UnreliableNarrator: Understatement of the century. This is a book you ''need'' to read twice, just to appreciate how horribly screwed up everybody is. And we mean ''everybody'', seriously. To the extent that [[spoiler: everything after Humbert recieves Lolita's letter simply could ''not'' have happened. If you start with the date of Humbert's death in prison (November 16, 1952) and go back the fifty-six days he very pointedly says it took him to write the memoir, the absolute latest that he could have started was September 22--the day he gets Lolita's letter.]] Yeah, a bit of a MindScrew there.\\
\\
Or else that's just [[spoiler: a screwup by an author who, though normally quite attentive to detail, was capable of dating a check or a letter with the previous year, not just in January (like most of us), [[http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/boyd1.htm but in October]]. And, while writing his ''Lolita'' screenplay for StanleyKubrick to use in his movie adaptation, Nabokov [[http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/boyd2.htm managed to miswrite]] September 1960 as ''Oct 1930.'' In that light, mixing up "November 16" (the date as written) and "November 19" (a date which works, chronologically) wouldn't be too much to ask.]]
** As Nabokov noted in his afterword, one publisher rejected the manuscript on the grounds that ''Lolita'' [[DarknessInducedAudienceApathy had no good people in it]]. [[invoked]]

** Most of which are [[RealityIsUnrealistic actually possible]], just very, very unlikely to happen, though reconciling "I'm suffering from a ''disease'' that makes me attracted to little girls" with "It's ''normal'' for adult men to be sexually attracted to little girls" is far more than ''very, very unlikely''. Also, Beatrice was nine, to be sure, but [[FromACertainPointOfView so was Dante]].
* WifeHusbandry: On several levels. Humbert actually muses on the possibility of impregnating Lolita with Lolita: The Next Generation. Ideally really soon, like before she grows up and gets uninteresting. And then doing it again to the next Lolita, and possibly the next...
* VillainProtagonist: Humbert Humbert
* YouAreGrounded: Humbert enforces a curfew on Lolita to keep her from dating boys or, you know, calling the police.

* EvilForeigner: {{Invoked}} several times with Humbert.

* AffablyEvil: Humbert Humbert in spades. There's at least one moment in the book (which also turns up in some form in the movie adaptations) in which he contemplates killing his wife and how easily he could get away with it, but finds that he really is just too nice to do it. In some ways, this actually makes him even ''worse'', and the mid-story DiabolusExMachina that puts her out of his way that much more bitterly ironic. The unabridged audio book version, read by JeremyIrons, carries this further - Irons' reading over twelve hours almost makes the character's actions [[{{YMMV}} excusable]].

Adapted into two films, one by StanleyKubrick, the other by Adrian Lyne. Other adaptations include the Broadway musical ''Lolita, My Love'' and a loosely adapted Russian porn (with happy endings involving threesomes!).

[[quoteright:370:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lolita14_1_9762.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:And this Lolita is 15. Imagine if she were 12 like in the book. Shudder.]]

[[quoteright:370:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lolita14_1_9762.jpg]][[caption-width-right:370:And this Lolita is 15. Imagine if she were 12 like in the book. Shudder.]]

* {{Drive-In Theater}}: One scene takes place there in the StanleyKubrick film.

* {{The Film of the Book}}: Twice.

* FilleFatale: Lolita in the book. H.H. even suspects her of trying to pimp her classmates to him. This is arguable due to the UnreliableNarrator.
* {{Foil}}: Quilty to Humbert (also a writer, also a pedophile).
* GratuitousFrench: Many characters, especially Humbert. Charlotte in her letter to Humbert takes EverythingSoundsSexierInFrench to an extreme in an attempt to show her affection for him. Charlotte in everything, really - arguably an attempt to sound more cultured, more European, the middle-class, pretentious rube that she was.

* {{Harmful to Minors}}
* [[IDidntMeanToTurnYouOn I Didn't Mean To Turn You On]]

* InMediasRes: The Kubrick film begins with Humbert [[spoiler:shooting Quilty.]]

* {{Love at First Sight}}: One-way.

* {{Murder the Hypotenuse}}

* PrecociousCrush: It's noted that Lo had a bit of a crush on Humbert on account of him looking like one of her favorite movie stars. [[{{BreakTheCutie}} She probably wasn't expecting he'd reciprocate...]]

** Assuming you believe that the car crash actually happened, of course. After all, Hum's the one writing the book.
*** The car crash is one element that pretty much has to be accepted: Dr. Ray, who diligently researched the current locations of quite minor characters, seems to have found no evidence that Charlotte Haze's death was not as H.H. describes it.

* AuthorAvatar: Oddly, given his crimes and Nabokov's own opinion toward him, Humbert could count for this, being one of a number of Nabokov protagonists who like the author himself, is a highly cultured emigre.
** Tidily averted in one aspect: Nabokov was a respected lepidopterist. H.H. sees hawk-moths in the Arizona twilight and thinks they are ''hummingbirds''.
** It is also interesting to note how Humbert discredits his journal as being a work of fiction using people he knows as archtypes and putting them into extreme situations. He even says that this is part of the trade of the author as well.

* FreudianExcuse: H.H. has one of these, but neither he or the author really think it excuses him. You see, he is a pedophile because he fell in love when he was 12, but his 12-year-old girlfriend died and he never got over it.
** Considering the author's loathing of psychological literary criticism (he would later refer to Freud as "that Viennese witch-doctor") and Humbert Humbert's gleeful attacks on future attempts to psychologically profile him, and really the entire prologue, much of the book is spent [[DeconstructedTrope destroying this trope]].
** Also, consider that H.H.'s alleged excuse is basically a prose interpretation of Poe's Annabell Lee. Is it real, or is H.H. mocking you with a ready-made Freudian excuse?
* FilleFatale: Lolita in the book. H.H. even suspects her of trying to pimp her classmates to him.
** This is arguable due to the UnreliableNarrator.

* GratuitousFrench: Many characters, especially Humbert.
** Charlotte in her letter to Humbert takes EverythingSoundsSexierInFrench to an extreme in an attempt to show her affection for him.
** Charlotte in everything, really - arguably an attempt to sound more cultured, more European, the middle-class, pretentious rube that she was.

** Which are TruthInTelevision: In Spain, women called Dolores are frequently called by the familiar form "Lola". "Lolita" is the diminutive form.

* MeaningfulName: Everywhere. Dolores, conceived in Mexico, was named for Nuestra Señora de Dolores, Our Lady of Sorrows. "Haze", of course, is an obscuring cloud or fog (after he and Dolores part, Humbert realizes that "I simply did not know a thing about my darling's mind"); and a "Dolly" is a pretend person, a human-shaped thing to play with, which is all that Dolly Haze ever is to Humbert.

** Also, Richard Schiller- Friedrich Schiller was an 18th century philosopher who wrote on ethics and morals. Notably relevant is his writing on the moral value of 'play' on moral/aesthetic experience. And of course, Richard is referred to as "[[HehHehYouSaidX Dick]]".

* OnceMoreWithEndnotes: ''The Annotated Lolita,'' with said annotations added by Alfred Appel, who had once been Nabokov's student at Cornell.
** It's funny how Alfred Appel added the annotations, given the author's affinity for [[AddedAlliterativeAppeal alliteration]].
*** Given the author's fondness for bilingual puns, it's also fun to note that the French for "reference mark" is "appel de note". Does this man even really exist?
*** Appel's preface to the annotated edition goes out of its way on this point: "Of course, the annotator and editor of a novel written by the creator of [[PaleFire Kinbote]] and John Ray, Jr., runs the real risk of being mistaken for another fiction, when at most he resembles those gentlemen only figuratively. But the annotator exists; he is a veteran and a grandfather, a teacher and taxpayer, and has not been invented by Vladimir Nabokov." Of course, that's just what a character ''would'' say. . . and before the Introduction is over, Appel is saying that you, gentle reader, are "manipulated by Nabokov's dizzying illusionistic devices to such an extent that [you] too can be said to become, at certain moments, another of Vladimir Nabokov's creations."

* PunnyName[=/=]MeaningfulName: Lolita's name puns on her given name "Dolores" (Latin: pain) and the variation Dolly (objectification), while Humbert's name puns on the French word for "shadow" and the Spanish word for "man" -- two apt descriptors for him.
** [[{{EdgarAllanPoe}} Annabell Leigh.]]

* UnreliableNarrator: Understatement of the century. This is a book you ''need'' to read twice, just to appreciate how horribly screwed up everybody is.
** And we mean ''everybody'', seriously.
*** To the extent that [[spoiler: everything after Humbert recieves Lolita's letter simply could ''not'' have happened. If you start with the date of Humbert's death in prison (November 16, 1952) and go back the fifty-six days he very pointedly says it took him to write the memoir, the absolute latest that he could have started was September 22--the day he gets Lolita's letter.]] Yeah, a bit of a MindScrew there.
*** Or else that's just [[spoiler: a screwup by an author who, though normally quite attentive to detail, was capable of dating a check or a letter with the previous year, not just in January (like most of us), [[http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/boyd1.htm but in October]]. And, while writing his ''Lolita'' screenplay for StanleyKubrick to use in his movie adaptation, Nabokov [[http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/boyd2.htm managed to miswrite]] September 1960 as ''Oct 1930.'' In that light, mixing up "November 16" (the date as written) and "November 19" (a date which works, chronologically) wouldn't be too much to ask.]]

*** Most of which are [[RealityIsUnrealistic actually possible]], just very, very unlikely to happen, though reconciling "I'm suffering from a ''disease'' that makes me attracted to little girls" with "It's ''normal'' for adult men to be sexually attracted to little girls" is far more than ''very, very unlikely''. Also, Beatrice was nine, to be sure, but [[FromACertainPointOfView so was Dante]].