Research

"Romantic American Ideals and Disruptive Perceptions: Human and Character Disconnections in Nabokov’s Lolita with Observations from Kubrick’s Film" - MLA Commons

• Abstract: Vladimir Nabokov's "Lolita" is known for its seductive writing despite its destructive subject matter. How does this novel accomplish such a juxtaposition? How does the novel keep the reader interested despite Humber blatantly attacking Dolores Haze? This essay explores critically explores the technical method which Nabokov uses in "Lolita." The essay argues that, as a novel standing between the ages of Modernism and Postmodernism, there is an effective distancing between Humbert Humbert and Dolores Haze. In other words, the reader's access to Dolores Haze is constantly disrupted and distanced by Humbert's invention of Lolita. This technique is translated into Stanley Kubrick's film of the same name, looking at how the novel's aesthetics could transfer from a textual medium into a visual one.