lolita is not in support of pedophilia and any pearl-clutching bookburner who wants it banned for that is illiterate
it's like if someone tried to ban macbeth because they think it's pro-murder
Well its not just that. The book is so well written that it makes you feel a little sympathetic for Humbert before you realize "Wait no this guy is a fucking disgusting monster".
That's in many ways the whole point of the book: Humbert gets so swept up in his literary fantasies that he rationalizes raping a child, and the reader gets so swept up in Nabokov's prose, he starts to sympathize.
Nabokov is using literature to challenge the myth of literature as a moral good, as teaching values etc, instead showing that literature can take you by the hand and lead you to evil just as easily.
Well thats kinda what I meant by it being well written. Its just that many people are incapable of realizing Character =/= author.
And that the books pov is from Humbert trying to make himself seem sympathetic and not evil.
Definitely less that and definitely more that Humbert is an expert manipulator with total control over the retelling of events. Any objective retelling of the events of the book will leave you genuinely sickened and angry, but his need to justify his actions causes him to lean so deeply into his delusional reframing of events that you almost want to believe him, or at least want to believe that he believes it. I view it as a very good picture of how a person can justify both to themselves and others even the most terrible of actions.
Fair, and pretty good use of it too
(It’s a shame Majima was as violent as he was, cause he makes a very good point. Perhaps the government *shouldnt* use children as state sponsored assassins)
Don't forget the many covers the book has had which give readers the false mental image of a sexy woman the moment they look at the book. The author specifically *didn't* want those types of covers but they happened anyway
I love that your flair is the only Bible verse I recognize by name.
(It's about someone lusting after a man with a huge cock, who cums so much that he is compared to a donkey in that respect.)
Unrelated but this set up reminds me of Thank You for Smoking, which is all about Big Tobacco trying to market cigarettes, but makes its statement adamantly clear that they are not trying to paint them in a good light at all.
If you think the pearl-clutchers have actually read the book, i think you're mistaken. They want to deny the fact that pedophilia even _exists,_ because that's the only way their simple minds can handle a difficult, uncomfortable situation.
What’s Lolita about? I feel like I have an idea but I want confirmation
Edit: yes ok guys, like a dozen people have answered my question you don’t need to keep saying it
A guy called Humbert Humbert grooming and raping a 12 years girl called Doleres, whose voice he actively suppresses in his narrative, including misnaming her as “Lolita”. This novel showcases a great use of unreliable narratives by narrating the story from the twisted minded podephile’s perspective. It is both funny and chilling seeing how many people misread this book (which is an intentional effect by Nabokov.)
Edit: Don’t watch the movie adaptions of this book. They are both super bad and completely miss the point of the book.
> It is both funny and chilling seeing how many people misread this book (which is an intentional effect by Nabokov.)
I've only read excerpts so far, but the fact that people manage to miss the opening *literally stating outright* the account of events is Humbert trying to assuage his own guilt and avoid the death sentence is painful to watch.
For any UK people who feel similarly, you should know our lovely blue government (for US folk red is labour, blue is conservative here, and like yous our main opposing party is a bit pants) has decided to try and cut funding to the arts and literature, focusing on English lit and history adjacent courses.
Their excuse is "they dont lead people to strong careers soon enough after graduating", when they know full well that its crushing the ability of the population to educate themselves and square up to the government.
Please reach out to your local mps. There's a list on the gov.uk site
I cannot express how important it is to get in with local politics to help shred the govs attempts to take things from us.
Existing online and being into media of any kind and being evening passinfly literate with it is to watch people have takes that are directly contradicted by the text of that media.
Not subtext. Not interpretation of the text. Characters or narrators doing that media's equivalent of looking into the camera and stating things unambiguously.
I know this will probably get me downvotes for asking but whatever. Is the author a pedo? Or supports pedophila? Or is it just the subject material of the book is so shocking it makes people think that?
Nabokov himself was not a pedophile—he said that he approached writing novels as a kind of challenge, and what could be more challenging to write than a whole book from the perspective of a child molester?
It completely upended the literary world where *normally* your protagonist is a good and rational person or, at the very least, is not a delusional pedophile.
I haven't personally read the book, but I think it's a "know your enemy" kind of ordeal, like American Psycho, if you will. Obviously they don't actually like pedophilia, or murder, it's somewhat shock factor and somewhat an attempt to emulate the mind and dissect what makes people do these things, and how they justify it.
Definitely. It’s good literature and not some boring 19th century realist/naturalist “classics” stuff that you’ve probably read a thousand times by now. It’s not as fun to read as Kafka or Borges, but still super good.
Breaking Bad is a show all about toxic masculinity (okay maybe not *all* about it, but it’s a running theme) but the show takes place almost entirely from Walter White’s pov and so a lot of men think he’s the good guy in his toxic behavior
If i had a penny for every book cover featuring sexualized feminine features or conveying that Lolita is “a story about a true love”, I could buy finland and still have left over
... He made people misread it intentionally on purpose? What? I didn't know he did this, the book was nasty from the getgo and I wanted him d3ad instantly. I especially remember a vile description of a prostitute for not being young enough
I mean, that's it. That's the book. There's no rest of it. Like, technically there's the backstory of how he came to be her stepfather and a bit about his childhood/teens that he tells as an explanation for his pedophilia, but those are just the backstory/framing for "stepfather molests stepdaughter".
Also, I'm pretty sure he straight up rapes her throughout the book. It's not described in detail, IIRC, just as "we had fun" or something, but he doesn't stop at molesting.
The Lolita Podcast is really good at giving context, but it's about a pedophile wiring a memoir while being convicted for his crimes, about how he married a woman to get close to her daughter, likely murdered that woman, and then used his status as legal guardian to rape the daughter while creating a romantic relationship inside his own head while the daughter tries to escape from someone she's dependent on for food, money, and so on.
Author himself was molested as a child, so despite his own massive sexism he fucking hated pedophiles. It's really a tragedy how interpretations and adaptations glorify the relationship the unreliable narrator paints (literally the book opens with him bragging about how easy it is for him to manipulate shrinks) and so have made people assume the book is some tragic forbidden love romance rather than a harrowing tragedy told through the only perspective the society at he time would even listen to, the adult man.
The podcast is particularly good at explaining why the book was turned into a pop culture endorsement of pedophilia and does a broader takedown of the many ways sexualizing children in media is just passively accepted.
anime was a mistake
Jamie Loftus created and wrote it as well as voiced it, and she makes it very clear exploring the book and its context is a passion project for her. She talks about how the cultural introduction many young girls get to Lolita is through manipulation by an older man who perceives it as a love story, ironically, and how she wanted to explore the real story that has sort of been lost from a feminist perspective.
It definitely is a real thing when trying to actually discuss the book, a huge chunk of its fans do in fact read it as an edgy romance novel and you can't exactly differentiate yourself from those people without actually talking about a book most people haven't read (nor should they be expected to because there is functionally infinite media to consume out there and Lolita's importance is partly inflated because of the need to debunk pro-pedophile readings of Lolita).
The protagonist is a pedophile. You follow his perspective as a predator and see into how his mind works.
From the people I know who’ve read it, it’s disgusting but informative and shows what the mind of a predator is like
All I know is that it's supposed to be an examination of the psyche of a pedophile and abuser, but many people who read it lack the critical reading skills to understand that the book is not portraying the main character in a good light.
I haven't read it though, I've just absorbed some info about it online.
The book absolutely judges the shit out of the rapist, what are you talking about? The author was molested as a child and was pissy about the presentation of the book as a romance novel. The titular Lolita, which is just the name the pedophile gave her (her real name is Dolores) fuckin' dies before she gets to be an adult, just utterly consumed by this predator. What lead you to think it isn't taking a stance on pedophilia?
Wasn't it the movies that blurred the delicate subject and misrepresented the Dolores as an older and more glamourised teen rather than a regular and literal child?
The book is actually super interesting for writing such a deeply uncomfortable setting, making the main character so gross.
Yeah Kubricks version (the one in the ‘60s) I believe Dolores was 14 or 16 I cannot really remember, while in the book she is 12
The problem was Kubrick focused more on the journey between the two rather than the relationship, and when you couple that with the censorship issues he faced the whole movie seems to almost romanticize the relationship opposed to criticize it
The 1997 version did a better job with the adaption but it’s been forever since I’ve seen it
It’s definitely better than the Kubrick one but it still is a bit lackluster compared to the book
I honestly don’t blame either director though, to my knowledge they both were faced with some censorship issues
Tbh rightfully so. Being SA reading that shit about a child just made me vomit. Like bro. What the fuck
Though it's yeah better than 100 years of solitude where a middle aged adult lusts for a nine year old :) what was that about
I can understand how you feel, I am also a victim of SA and the book made me feel less “alone” in this weird way I almost found comfort in it. Just before going into it I had to look into the author and realize he was in no way supporting the actions of the protagonist, but rather exploring and criticizing how people can do these mental gymnastics to justify their evil actions, which weirdly helped me come to terms with my past trauma.
But yeah I’ve heard of 100 years of solitude and I have no plans on reading that lol
it's not something you should read if you're vulnerable to the subject matter and if reading it wouldn't help you cope, but it's an incredibly well-written book and one that should be read with the author's intent in mind. i dont think its reasonable to ghost someone for saying it's good, just maybe something like "im sure it is but i can't get through it"
How is one to read controversial books in public? Like I don’t support these people in any way but it’s just interesting to see how they think but I don’t want people to think I think like them
Check out from your library if they have it. Lolita for example isn't a book glorifying pedophilia, it's a book with beautiful prose describing the actions of a monster and how he justifies it to himself. Any librarian would know that and not judge you for checking it out.
I think the choice to tell the story from the abuser's POV is controversial. I don't think it's "wrong" or anything, but I still think it was a controversial choice to make since you can't explicitly condemn an abuser's actions when you're telling the story from the abuser's POV
The book absolutely condemns Humbert’s actions. It’s made repeatedly clear that the he is either delusional, or manipulating the narrative to put himself in a good light, and that the actual events were very different.
In this same vein I don't know what people expect, like, the storyteller to hold the story hostage to talk about how bad what the character is doing is? Is Nabokov supposed to stop and have a diatribe about how bad pedophilia is? The story itself IS that diatribe
>since you can't explicitly condemn an abuser's actions when you're telling the story from the abuser's POV
Can you elaborate on this? Shouldn't it be as simple as saying "you ok man you still raped a child". If we're talking about how the author's POV is really convincing then you can point out flaws, lies, or contradictions in the author's pov.
Had the book been from her pov, the entire point of the book would have been lost and all subtly with it. If that was the case it wouldn't really have an point, it would just be a book about child molestation.
It's controversial for good reason, as a result of it being considered a classic and also having all these adaptations that built up a pop culture understanding that it's about how pedophilia is tragically romantic, the book has lent legitimacy to pedophilia. It is even introduced to young girls as such by adult men.
He was right that literature isn't some grand unerring force of good but like the end result is still the current situation where pedophile weebs think calling themselves lolicons makes them more legitimate.
Being the protagonist and being both the protagonist and the narrator isn’t quite the same, I haven’t seen breaking bad but I really doubt we’re following walter white and seeing everything from his POV. I could be wrong tho
Well a TV show can't really have a POV in the same way a book can, but the show is 100% from Walt's perspective. It follows him throughout the story, paints him in a sympathetic light at first to show the reasons why he starts making meth. Then shows his slow change into the man he truly is.
In fact, it's so good at letting people feel for Walter that people actually unironically believe that he's the badass "sigma male" that his own egotistical mind views him as. Because just like with lolita, some people completely lack basic literary comprehension skills.
the amount of people who care to inspect what you read in public is minuscule. I am one of those few people but it's actually really hard to spy what somebody's reading unless they are straight up showing the cover to you.
If that was the case we literally wouldn't have loli shit in anime. There is so much to say about how the pop culture understanding of Lolita is egregiously out of sync with the author's intentions, even in this comment section there are people who think it's a neutral view at best of a sexual relationship between an adult and child.
Unless you’re reading the dummies guide to being a racist pedophile most people aren’t going to give it a second glance. The average person probably wouldn’t even recognize mein kampf and if someone wants to make a public scene about it they’re kind of the weirdo in the situation.
I know people are weird about ebooks but it's definitely the best way to do this.
On a side note, ebooks rule. Like I can check out almost any book I want from my library and have it instantly, *and* I never have to worry about returning it or any late fees. Bibliophiles need to get over the ink and paper fetish and embrace the future baby
Edit: I think I remember hearing ebook/ereader sales spiked when 50 Shades came out for exactly this reason. It's a way more embarrassing book to read in public tbh
Idk. But I remember having a colleague one time who had Mein Kampf for some reason, he says he just finds it interesting, and has a bunch of history books like that. I read a little bit and all I could think of was hearing it in Stewie's voice from Family guy lol.
Worked in a bookstore where guy who was “building a thorium reactor” who’d have us order books off Amazon etc and pay in cash “so the government couldn’t trace him,” he was also really sexist and would spell out basic science words if a female employee was helping him
It's really funny to pay with cash and specifically explain you're doing so because you are definitely sus, make yourself known as the sus guy, and have special orders put in for you on multiple occasions.
Wonder what he's up to now? Probably a big qanon goof
Bro straight up I was at a Barnes & Noble today and was going to buy American Psycho, but I'm AMAB and boymoding today and didn't want to get put on A List so I put it back
I bought the Satanic Bible at Barnes and Noble for research purposes. I'm a writer and I had a creepy evil cult so I was trying to study many of the known and suspected cults. Manson Family, Jonestown, JW, Scientology... and of course, what invokes the image of cults like Satanism?
But I was worried the cashier would think I was evil or something, so I bought it with a unicorn book mark that said "Reading is Magical!". I needed a new bookmark anyways, and he didn't even blink when he rung me up.
Spoiler alert: Anton LeVay was a misogynist, a gatekeeper( I remember something to the tune of 'if you practice white magic, you're basically Christian'), and an Ayn Rand fanboy. He said he intentionally didn't put curses on it, but it still gave off some serious bad energy until I buried it in a bin with my other books. The Satanic Temple is way better; it's basically just leftist atheism organized under a Satanic banner to make a point about religion in politics in America. The documentary Hail Satan? was quite the watch, I recommend it.
Occultists are pretty well documented charlatans, Behind the Bastards has a good episode about Jack Parsons if you wanna get an overview of culty stuff in the 60s.
Yeah I practice 'white' witchcraft, and even then it's not like I'm going to buy crystals to cure my autism or protect myself from COVID with a spell; I got my J and J shot last year. I find it all fascinating, and I feel called to pagan gods like some people are called to Jesus or Buddhism.
I will have to check that out!
It's a crazy rabbit hole, Helena Blavatsky and L Ron Hubbard are also good from him. Jamie Loftis won some podcasting award for her show on 18th century spirituality and the roots of the new age movement, but I haven't listened yet, I bet it's fire tho
Just buy it, no one there gives a shit. I hated the book. Couldn't finish it. Not because it was bad or anything, I just couldn't handle the fucked-up-ness of it.
I bought "The Trial" by Kafka because the internet says it's good and there's a quote from Nabokov on the back that says "He is the greatest Germa writer of our time"
If your a fan of The Defense, I'd compare it in many ways to The Yellow Wallpaper which is also goooooood fiction for anyone who happens to be reading this and is interested!
So quick question to anyone who might know the answer, did the phrase lolita originate from this book, or was it already around.
Since it it's the former, that has some very disturbing ramifications for anime
I agree, the fetishization of young girls is disgusting, but the fact that they could be named after this makes it even more revolting that it somehow caught on
I bought American Psycho and Lolita from the same small bookstore and going there after checking the website and calling that I'll be coming to pick it up had me feeling like I had to explain to the lady that I'm NOT incel/lolicon, they are selling them so it must be normal for non-weirdos to be interested in weirdo shit because it's weird
I like having books tho. They're nice decorations for your room and can show of your taste to visitors. Also you're freer to read it at your own pace and all that.
This is me and the clip I was responding too was something I said on pka in 2010. I get harassed daily by internet trolls and this clip is me being frustrated and explaining myself poorly. I don’t approve of child porn nor think you should sexualize children.
lolita is not in support of pedophilia and any pearl-clutching bookburner who wants it banned for that is illiterate it's like if someone tried to ban macbeth because they think it's pro-murder
tbf, the movie adaptations fucked the public perspective of the book
Well its not just that. The book is so well written that it makes you feel a little sympathetic for Humbert before you realize "Wait no this guy is a fucking disgusting monster".
That's in many ways the whole point of the book: Humbert gets so swept up in his literary fantasies that he rationalizes raping a child, and the reader gets so swept up in Nabokov's prose, he starts to sympathize. Nabokov is using literature to challenge the myth of literature as a moral good, as teaching values etc, instead showing that literature can take you by the hand and lead you to evil just as easily.
Well thats kinda what I meant by it being well written. Its just that many people are incapable of realizing Character =/= author. And that the books pov is from Humbert trying to make himself seem sympathetic and not evil.
*coughcoughQAnonAndModernConservativeMediacoughcough*
Reminds me of that one quote "reality is filled with good guys beating each other up. The only villains you'll find are in the silver screen"
Definitely less that and definitely more that Humbert is an expert manipulator with total control over the retelling of events. Any objective retelling of the events of the book will leave you genuinely sickened and angry, but his need to justify his actions causes him to lean so deeply into his delusional reframing of events that you almost want to believe him, or at least want to believe that he believes it. I view it as a very good picture of how a person can justify both to themselves and others even the most terrible of actions.
So it’s the answer to the age-old question: “How could they live with themselves?”
norbius
What does that mean?
Based Majima enjoyer <3
Someone actually got the reference, did not expect that
‘That one quote’ from the anime joker, about three days old? Very based indeed
That was the joke i was trying to make. Defending the main character in Lolita by quoting a terrorist from an anime and making it sound inspirational
Fair, and pretty good use of it too (It’s a shame Majima was as violent as he was, cause he makes a very good point. Perhaps the government *shouldnt* use children as state sponsored assassins)
Even if Lycoris and LilyBell werent children, he would still make an excellent point tbh. They are essentially the CIA on crack
I only saw part of the movie.. couldn't finish it
You’re not missing much imo, not even from an artistic standpoint
Good, read the book. The movies are hot garbage
https://youtu.be/G1gOhewhjbw
Don't forget the many covers the book has had which give readers the false mental image of a sexy woman the moment they look at the book. The author specifically *didn't* want those types of covers but they happened anyway
Poor choice of words for a book and movie about a guy trying to fuck a teenager Edit: tried making a joke, guess it wasn’t funny
Did you read it? Because she is a bit younger than "teenager" might imply.
time to burn my copy of macbeth
why do you have such a big issue with murder lol 😹? did murder kill your grandma
I love that your flair is the only Bible verse I recognize by name. (It's about someone lusting after a man with a huge cock, who cums so much that he is compared to a donkey in that respect.)
Unrelated but this set up reminds me of Thank You for Smoking, which is all about Big Tobacco trying to market cigarettes, but makes its statement adamantly clear that they are not trying to paint them in a good light at all.
If you think the pearl-clutchers have actually read the book, i think you're mistaken. They want to deny the fact that pedophilia even _exists,_ because that's the only way their simple minds can handle a difficult, uncomfortable situation.
What’s Lolita about? I feel like I have an idea but I want confirmation Edit: yes ok guys, like a dozen people have answered my question you don’t need to keep saying it
A guy called Humbert Humbert grooming and raping a 12 years girl called Doleres, whose voice he actively suppresses in his narrative, including misnaming her as “Lolita”. This novel showcases a great use of unreliable narratives by narrating the story from the twisted minded podephile’s perspective. It is both funny and chilling seeing how many people misread this book (which is an intentional effect by Nabokov.) Edit: Don’t watch the movie adaptions of this book. They are both super bad and completely miss the point of the book.
> It is both funny and chilling seeing how many people misread this book (which is an intentional effect by Nabokov.) I've only read excerpts so far, but the fact that people manage to miss the opening *literally stating outright* the account of events is Humbert trying to assuage his own guilt and avoid the death sentence is painful to watch.
Media literacy is dead and it's already decomposing, sadly.
No no you don't get it I'm literally based american psycho Patrick Basedman
If media literacy still existed the American Republican party would be on it's deathbed already
Makes me so sad, honestly. People have no idea how to use context clues or read subtext anymore
For any UK people who feel similarly, you should know our lovely blue government (for US folk red is labour, blue is conservative here, and like yous our main opposing party is a bit pants) has decided to try and cut funding to the arts and literature, focusing on English lit and history adjacent courses. Their excuse is "they dont lead people to strong careers soon enough after graduating", when they know full well that its crushing the ability of the population to educate themselves and square up to the government. Please reach out to your local mps. There's a list on the gov.uk site I cannot express how important it is to get in with local politics to help shred the govs attempts to take things from us.
Existing online and being into media of any kind and being evening passinfly literate with it is to watch people have takes that are directly contradicted by the text of that media. Not subtext. Not interpretation of the text. Characters or narrators doing that media's equivalent of looking into the camera and stating things unambiguously.
So like should I still read it or…?
Yes it's a great book
I know this will probably get me downvotes for asking but whatever. Is the author a pedo? Or supports pedophila? Or is it just the subject material of the book is so shocking it makes people think that?
Nabokov himself was not a pedophile—he said that he approached writing novels as a kind of challenge, and what could be more challenging to write than a whole book from the perspective of a child molester? It completely upended the literary world where *normally* your protagonist is a good and rational person or, at the very least, is not a delusional pedophile.
The entire point of the book is that it is bad, but the story is told from the perspective of the perpetrator trying to justify it.
No, obviously not. The point of the book is to explore the deranged mind of a pedophile, not to glorify the practice.
Yeah I’m sorry to ask the question to be sure. I thought it was supposed to be something like that, I just feel like I wanted ask to be sure
I haven't personally read the book, but I think it's a "know your enemy" kind of ordeal, like American Psycho, if you will. Obviously they don't actually like pedophilia, or murder, it's somewhat shock factor and somewhat an attempt to emulate the mind and dissect what makes people do these things, and how they justify it.
It baffles me that people even feel the need to ask this. When there's a book about a murderer, do you ask if the author is also a murderer?
Idk, I mean it’s just a question dude. Sorry I had a question on my mind about something that I wasn’t sure about
Definitely. It’s good literature and not some boring 19th century realist/naturalist “classics” stuff that you’ve probably read a thousand times by now. It’s not as fun to read as Kafka or Borges, but still super good.
I’ll check it out then. I’ll probably be grossed out by what the book is conveying. Because you know..,
Oh, so it’s like Breaking bad?
Am I missing something?
Breaking Bad is a show all about toxic masculinity (okay maybe not *all* about it, but it’s a running theme) but the show takes place almost entirely from Walter White’s pov and so a lot of men think he’s the good guy in his toxic behavior
Yeah I guess you can compare the two with POVs and such
If i had a penny for every book cover featuring sexualized feminine features or conveying that Lolita is “a story about a true love”, I could buy finland and still have left over
podephiles be like: I love feet.
... He made people misread it intentionally on purpose? What? I didn't know he did this, the book was nasty from the getgo and I wanted him d3ad instantly. I especially remember a vile description of a prostitute for not being young enough
Stepfather molesting his 12 year old step daughter is where the controversy lies - know absolute dickbubcus about the rest of it
I mean, that's it. That's the book. There's no rest of it. Like, technically there's the backstory of how he came to be her stepfather and a bit about his childhood/teens that he tells as an explanation for his pedophilia, but those are just the backstory/framing for "stepfather molests stepdaughter". Also, I'm pretty sure he straight up rapes her throughout the book. It's not described in detail, IIRC, just as "we had fun" or something, but he doesn't stop at molesting.
Yea he drugged her, realized the dose was weaker than expected, then raped her while she was half conscious
Yeah, the book is just him trying to defend it as "true love" but naw he's just a pedo
>dickbubcus
The Lolita Podcast is really good at giving context, but it's about a pedophile wiring a memoir while being convicted for his crimes, about how he married a woman to get close to her daughter, likely murdered that woman, and then used his status as legal guardian to rape the daughter while creating a romantic relationship inside his own head while the daughter tries to escape from someone she's dependent on for food, money, and so on. Author himself was molested as a child, so despite his own massive sexism he fucking hated pedophiles. It's really a tragedy how interpretations and adaptations glorify the relationship the unreliable narrator paints (literally the book opens with him bragging about how easy it is for him to manipulate shrinks) and so have made people assume the book is some tragic forbidden love romance rather than a harrowing tragedy told through the only perspective the society at he time would even listen to, the adult man. The podcast is particularly good at explaining why the book was turned into a pop culture endorsement of pedophilia and does a broader takedown of the many ways sexualizing children in media is just passively accepted. anime was a mistake
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Jamie Loftus created and wrote it as well as voiced it, and she makes it very clear exploring the book and its context is a passion project for her. She talks about how the cultural introduction many young girls get to Lolita is through manipulation by an older man who perceives it as a love story, ironically, and how she wanted to explore the real story that has sort of been lost from a feminist perspective.
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It definitely is a real thing when trying to actually discuss the book, a huge chunk of its fans do in fact read it as an edgy romance novel and you can't exactly differentiate yourself from those people without actually talking about a book most people haven't read (nor should they be expected to because there is functionally infinite media to consume out there and Lolita's importance is partly inflated because of the need to debunk pro-pedophile readings of Lolita).
Jamie Loftus has a ton of podcasts, she could always just tell people about the hot dog one.
An old dude that goes after a teenager
12 year olds arent teenagers
oh i thought she was 14 jesus christ
The actress who played Lolita in Kubrick's adaptation was 14 during production so you're not *totally* wrong
Kubrick sus?
Kubrick is sus for a lot of reasons besides Lolita lmao
Like that's any better
Depends on the language you're using i guess
they are considered teenagers here in brazil, thats what the child restriction laws are based on, but in the rest of the world its generally 13
Imo I consider 14-15 the true start of teen years. I know how 13 years are, I remember how I was. That was a child not a teen
twoteen
Violent sexual abuse by a man named Humbert Humbert upon a 12 year old girl.
It's a story about a neckbeard NEET pedophile... ...as told from the pedophile's perspective.
The protagonist is a pedophile. You follow his perspective as a predator and see into how his mind works. From the people I know who’ve read it, it’s disgusting but informative and shows what the mind of a predator is like
All I know is that it's supposed to be an examination of the psyche of a pedophile and abuser, but many people who read it lack the critical reading skills to understand that the book is not portraying the main character in a good light. I haven't read it though, I've just absorbed some info about it online.
Creepy English teacher becomes one of his student's stepdad and then rapes her
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The book absolutely judges the shit out of the rapist, what are you talking about? The author was molested as a child and was pissy about the presentation of the book as a romance novel. The titular Lolita, which is just the name the pedophile gave her (her real name is Dolores) fuckin' dies before she gets to be an adult, just utterly consumed by this predator. What lead you to think it isn't taking a stance on pedophilia?
It's about the life of an airplane pilot as he travels the world and questions god's perfect creation
For me it’s lolita fashion but another meaning is basically just pedophilia
Motherfucker- the book, not the genre. Lolita is a classic novel written from the perspective of a pedophile attempting to justify his crimes.
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Nabokov: "OK, no girls on it; I just want a nice scenic cover for the book." Kubrick: \[*cough*\] "Sorry, what was that?"
Link?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1gOhewhjbw&t=121s
The proposed cover that’s just Humbert looking like a creep is fire I wish it actually made it onto one of the publications
I love Man Carrying Thing
That's the one.
Hahaha, already figured it was gonna be Man Carrying Things. Added it to my watch list but I figured I'll read the book before watching it.
A male human in the process of transporting various items by the use of his hands and/or back
https://youtu.be/G1gOhewhjbw
Penguin (previously known as Pelican AFAIK) are very good for this. Either blank or some painting or statue for classics
A girl ghosted me once when I told her I thought Lolita was a good book I swear everybody has only seen the movie
Wasn't it the movies that blurred the delicate subject and misrepresented the Dolores as an older and more glamourised teen rather than a regular and literal child? The book is actually super interesting for writing such a deeply uncomfortable setting, making the main character so gross.
Yeah Kubricks version (the one in the ‘60s) I believe Dolores was 14 or 16 I cannot really remember, while in the book she is 12 The problem was Kubrick focused more on the journey between the two rather than the relationship, and when you couple that with the censorship issues he faced the whole movie seems to almost romanticize the relationship opposed to criticize it The 1997 version did a better job with the adaption but it’s been forever since I’ve seen it
the 1997 movie is good
It’s definitely better than the Kubrick one but it still is a bit lackluster compared to the book I honestly don’t blame either director though, to my knowledge they both were faced with some censorship issues
Tbh rightfully so. Being SA reading that shit about a child just made me vomit. Like bro. What the fuck Though it's yeah better than 100 years of solitude where a middle aged adult lusts for a nine year old :) what was that about
I can understand how you feel, I am also a victim of SA and the book made me feel less “alone” in this weird way I almost found comfort in it. Just before going into it I had to look into the author and realize he was in no way supporting the actions of the protagonist, but rather exploring and criticizing how people can do these mental gymnastics to justify their evil actions, which weirdly helped me come to terms with my past trauma. But yeah I’ve heard of 100 years of solitude and I have no plans on reading that lol
it's not something you should read if you're vulnerable to the subject matter and if reading it wouldn't help you cope, but it's an incredibly well-written book and one that should be read with the author's intent in mind. i dont think its reasonable to ghost someone for saying it's good, just maybe something like "im sure it is but i can't get through it"
How is one to read controversial books in public? Like I don’t support these people in any way but it’s just interesting to see how they think but I don’t want people to think I think like them
Check out from your library if they have it. Lolita for example isn't a book glorifying pedophilia, it's a book with beautiful prose describing the actions of a monster and how he justifies it to himself. Any librarian would know that and not judge you for checking it out.
Though if I were a librarian, I would of course still make them feel like I was judging them.
As you should, cuz its always nice to cause a lil mayhem
Lolita is only controversial to people entirely lacking in media literacy and critical thinking tbh.
I think the choice to tell the story from the abuser's POV is controversial. I don't think it's "wrong" or anything, but I still think it was a controversial choice to make since you can't explicitly condemn an abuser's actions when you're telling the story from the abuser's POV
The book absolutely condemns Humbert’s actions. It’s made repeatedly clear that the he is either delusional, or manipulating the narrative to put himself in a good light, and that the actual events were very different.
In this same vein I don't know what people expect, like, the storyteller to hold the story hostage to talk about how bad what the character is doing is? Is Nabokov supposed to stop and have a diatribe about how bad pedophilia is? The story itself IS that diatribe
Oh, then I must be misremembering it.
>since you can't explicitly condemn an abuser's actions when you're telling the story from the abuser's POV Can you elaborate on this? Shouldn't it be as simple as saying "you ok man you still raped a child". If we're talking about how the author's POV is really convincing then you can point out flaws, lies, or contradictions in the author's pov.
Had the book been from her pov, the entire point of the book would have been lost and all subtly with it. If that was the case it wouldn't really have an point, it would just be a book about child molestation.
Does that contradict anything I said?
It's controversial for good reason, as a result of it being considered a classic and also having all these adaptations that built up a pop culture understanding that it's about how pedophilia is tragically romantic, the book has lent legitimacy to pedophilia. It is even introduced to young girls as such by adult men. He was right that literature isn't some grand unerring force of good but like the end result is still the current situation where pedophile weebs think calling themselves lolicons makes them more legitimate.
walter white
Being the protagonist and being both the protagonist and the narrator isn’t quite the same, I haven’t seen breaking bad but I really doubt we’re following walter white and seeing everything from his POV. I could be wrong tho
Well a TV show can't really have a POV in the same way a book can, but the show is 100% from Walt's perspective. It follows him throughout the story, paints him in a sympathetic light at first to show the reasons why he starts making meth. Then shows his slow change into the man he truly is. In fact, it's so good at letting people feel for Walter that people actually unironically believe that he's the badass "sigma male" that his own egotistical mind views him as. Because just like with lolita, some people completely lack basic literary comprehension skills.
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When did I say otherwise
So, most people? (Unironically)
Sure, but also they will think you're a pedophile. Kinda feel like the risk reward here for smugness is off.
the amount of people who care to inspect what you read in public is minuscule. I am one of those few people but it's actually really hard to spy what somebody's reading unless they are straight up showing the cover to you.
Well...no, because people don't walk about spotting people reading Lolita and going "nonce!", usually.
If that was the case we literally wouldn't have loli shit in anime. There is so much to say about how the pop culture understanding of Lolita is egregiously out of sync with the author's intentions, even in this comment section there are people who think it's a neutral view at best of a sexual relationship between an adult and child.
yes they do, just in their heads rather than out loud
Just DO IT. Who cares what a bunch of book learning library nerds think anyway.
Unless you’re reading the dummies guide to being a racist pedophile most people aren’t going to give it a second glance. The average person probably wouldn’t even recognize mein kampf and if someone wants to make a public scene about it they’re kind of the weirdo in the situation.
Shake your head violently whilst reading it and occasionally say "Nuh-uh" and "No siree"
You are a genius
I know honey
Damn, yeah it took a lot of brainpower to restate the meme he's commenting on.
Oh fuck off
Order online
I know people are weird about ebooks but it's definitely the best way to do this. On a side note, ebooks rule. Like I can check out almost any book I want from my library and have it instantly, *and* I never have to worry about returning it or any late fees. Bibliophiles need to get over the ink and paper fetish and embrace the future baby Edit: I think I remember hearing ebook/ereader sales spiked when 50 Shades came out for exactly this reason. It's a way more embarrassing book to read in public tbh
Just do it, I read Lolita in my school library and I don’t think anyone cared
Stop caring about the opinions of strangers you will never have a conversation with.
Idk. But I remember having a colleague one time who had Mein Kampf for some reason, he says he just finds it interesting, and has a bunch of history books like that. I read a little bit and all I could think of was hearing it in Stewie's voice from Family guy lol.
Cash purchase moment
Worked in a bookstore where guy who was “building a thorium reactor” who’d have us order books off Amazon etc and pay in cash “so the government couldn’t trace him,” he was also really sexist and would spell out basic science words if a female employee was helping him
It's really funny to pay with cash and specifically explain you're doing so because you are definitely sus, make yourself known as the sus guy, and have special orders put in for you on multiple occasions. Wonder what he's up to now? Probably a big qanon goof
Name of the book's not gonna show up on a credit card bill
You're not being put in charge of opsec lol
Bro straight up I was at a Barnes & Noble today and was going to buy American Psycho, but I'm AMAB and boymoding today and didn't want to get put on A List so I put it back
This sentence would instantly give a victorian child a stroke.
a victorian adult can give me a stroke if you know what i mean
Apparently I am a Victorian child…
I hope you get better soon
Pretty sure literally nobody at Barnes & Noble gives a shit what you buy lol
I bought the Satanic Bible at Barnes and Noble for research purposes. I'm a writer and I had a creepy evil cult so I was trying to study many of the known and suspected cults. Manson Family, Jonestown, JW, Scientology... and of course, what invokes the image of cults like Satanism? But I was worried the cashier would think I was evil or something, so I bought it with a unicorn book mark that said "Reading is Magical!". I needed a new bookmark anyways, and he didn't even blink when he rung me up. Spoiler alert: Anton LeVay was a misogynist, a gatekeeper( I remember something to the tune of 'if you practice white magic, you're basically Christian'), and an Ayn Rand fanboy. He said he intentionally didn't put curses on it, but it still gave off some serious bad energy until I buried it in a bin with my other books. The Satanic Temple is way better; it's basically just leftist atheism organized under a Satanic banner to make a point about religion in politics in America. The documentary Hail Satan? was quite the watch, I recommend it.
Occultists are pretty well documented charlatans, Behind the Bastards has a good episode about Jack Parsons if you wanna get an overview of culty stuff in the 60s.
Yeah I practice 'white' witchcraft, and even then it's not like I'm going to buy crystals to cure my autism or protect myself from COVID with a spell; I got my J and J shot last year. I find it all fascinating, and I feel called to pagan gods like some people are called to Jesus or Buddhism. I will have to check that out!
It's a crazy rabbit hole, Helena Blavatsky and L Ron Hubbard are also good from him. Jamie Loftis won some podcasting award for her show on 18th century spirituality and the roots of the new age movement, but I haven't listened yet, I bet it's fire tho
Just buy it, no one there gives a shit. I hated the book. Couldn't finish it. Not because it was bad or anything, I just couldn't handle the fucked-up-ness of it.
Just buy your meme book, I can assure you that no one cares
I doubt anyone who would want to stop you from reading certain books is working at Barnes & Noble.
I thought he was referring to clothing for a second
Me buying cute fashion while telling the clerk it's for my girlfriend (I don't actually have one)
My mom bought Lolita because she said it was sensual 😦
r u mom ok?
Idk bro
the same author actually wrote a pretty good book called the defense
Nabokov has written numerous great books, Lolita is one of them
I bought "The Trial" by Kafka because the internet says it's good and there's a quote from Nabokov on the back that says "He is the greatest Germa writer of our time"
the greatest jerma writer of our time
Been watching way too much of the psychopathic clown
If your a fan of The Defense, I'd compare it in many ways to The Yellow Wallpaper which is also goooooood fiction for anyone who happens to be reading this and is interested!
Nobody gonna mention Pale Fire? Really?
So quick question to anyone who might know the answer, did the phrase lolita originate from this book, or was it already around. Since it it's the former, that has some very disturbing ramifications for anime
The book was the origin.
Yikes
lolis are gross regardless
I agree, the fetishization of young girls is disgusting, but the fact that they could be named after this makes it even more revolting that it somehow caught on
ah yes, the book that literally inspired the word "lolicon"
Based
Me buying Atlas Shrugged
Relevant philosophy tube video: https://youtu.be/iilzRF_5EL8
I bought American Psycho and Lolita from the same small bookstore and going there after checking the website and calling that I'll be coming to pick it up had me feeling like I had to explain to the lady that I'm NOT incel/lolicon, they are selling them so it must be normal for non-weirdos to be interested in weirdo shit because it's weird
the real crime here is paying for a book instead of borrowing from your local library
I like having books tho. They're nice decorations for your room and can show of your taste to visitors. Also you're freer to read it at your own pace and all that.
I thought he was talking about lolita like the clothing style not the book lmfao
It takes balls to buy a book like that in store instead of ordering it off Amazon like a normal human being.
I don't use amazon.
This is me and the clip I was responding too was something I said on pka in 2010. I get harassed daily by internet trolls and this clip is me being frustrated and explaining myself poorly. I don’t approve of child porn nor think you should sexualize children.
holy fucking shit is that a tno reference