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HelpRe: Just to make you all know...
in reply to a message by queenv
Of course you are supposed to identify with Humbert and understand him, but that isn't the whole point. The point IMO was for you to reflect critically on how you could be seduced into apologizing for immoral behavior. It was to make you (general reader) curious to figure out -- what is it about the way you think and feel, and about the story, that made you so available to relate to a character whose behavior was so selfish, self-absorbed, and self-destructive?
It's all too easy to just accept the narrator's cleverly self-serving descriptions, and fail to give Lolita's character credit for being a human being, always existing for herself, independent of his desire. There is no love in that speech you are quoting - it's madness. If we take that to be love, then we can rationalize most any amount of depravity for the sake of desire. I think the book shows us how hideous desire can be, and demands that we think about when and how it becomes immoral and insane.
- mirfak
It's all too easy to just accept the narrator's cleverly self-serving descriptions, and fail to give Lolita's character credit for being a human being, always existing for herself, independent of his desire. There is no love in that speech you are quoting - it's madness. If we take that to be love, then we can rationalize most any amount of depravity for the sake of desire. I think the book shows us how hideous desire can be, and demands that we think about when and how it becomes immoral and insane.
- mirfak
This message was edited 7/31/2016, 11:25 PM
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