The Viability of Narration in Nabokov’s Lolita

Kaushal Kishore Sharma

Both famous and infamous Lolita remains the most important work of Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov. Regarded as one of the finest achievements of twentieth century Lolita has attained the status of classic. Amidst kaleidoscopic themes including prison, psychiatry, culture and narration it’s the last one which serves the food for thought in the present research paper.

The  quandary  of Humbert’s narration in Lolita has been discussed and debated  by critics and scholars  ever since its  publication in 1955.An inherent abundance of lengthy redolent passages about young girls incited more than a few to wonder whether Nabokov shared some of Humbert’s  obsession. In order to face such allegations Nabokov added an afterword to the American edition, “On a book entitled Lolita”, attempting to clear up several misconceptions about the book. He plainly states that he does not share Humbert’s morals and disagrees with him on several other subjects (315). Pifer notes that despite this statement many critics were still not convinced. They claimed that Nabokov’s praise of “aesthetic bliss” in fiction shows that the style of Lolita encourages the reader to sympathize with Humbert rather than Lolita. Pifer argues that these critics have missed the many signals, embedded in the discourse, with the purpose of having the reader break identification with the narrator (186).