The Sexual Euphemism in Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov Essay

Animated Merkins and Little Deadly Demons Sexual Euphemism in LolitaAt the beginning of Vladimir Nabokovs Lolita, the narrator, imprisoned Humbert Humbert, invites his jury to look at his account of his crimes, his tangle of thorns, and to judge him (9). Nabokov gives us the choice to judge Humbert as we read Lolita, to hate him completely or to allow him a measure of sympathy. Although we may expect to despise Humbert easily because of his pedophilia, we may find ourselves enjoying his fancy prose style for its myriad literary allusions, puns, and dark humor (9). We may begin to identify with our narrator, even as we deplore his kidnapping and rape of a child. The reader forms an opinion of Humbert largely from Humberts discussions of his sexuality, particularly when he shares his illicit feelings for young girls and when he recalls his sexual experiences with various women and the two girls Annabel and Lolita. While Humberts use of euphemism and indirection to romanticize his sexual fantasies and encounters with nymphets enforces the readers impression of Humbert as a monster trying in vain to justify his rape of Lolita, this indirect language also invites the readers pity for Humbert because it suggests a sincerely romantic aspect of his attraction to children.Nabokov gives the reader cause to abhor Humbert in the novels opening lines, in which Humbert reveals his pedophilia, describing Lolita as an object of sexual desire, fire of my loins, but clearly a child, standing four feet ten in one sock (9). But a few pages later Humbert tells the story of his childhood romance with Annabel, an experience that has left him with miserable memories because the two were interrupted before they could have intercourse at the end of their summer vacation, and Annabel died a few months later. If he were to describe their relationship only in terms of sexual attraction, we might see it only as the cause or a...