I wasn't really looking forward to reading this book. The only other Nabokov book I read, The Defense, was about chess (a metaphor) and wasn't particularly interesting. Perhaps it was my age (early twenties). Perhaps the subject of the book. Who knows? Lolita, on the other hand, was wonderful! The subject was disturbing, to be sure, but the style was poetic and beautiful, and Nabokov did a great job making this pervert simultaneously disgusting and sympathetic. We appreciate the honest portrayal of his emotions, his desire for Lolita, who is herself a spoiled, vicious, unpleasant, self-centered, rude brat. But we also turn away from the actions of this lust-filled pedophile who repeatedly rapes a twelve-year-old then listens, sexually satiated, as she cries in her bedroom. We feel bad for him as he tries to make the best of a sham of a life with Lolita, while trapping her--his sexual slave, literally--in a twisted relationship from which she cannot escape. Masterful!
The book is filled with surprises and interesting twists of the plot. The language is beautifully poetic and sensually imagistic. Sure, it dragged in sections, but overall the writing was easily strong enough to hold the book together. Nabokov constantly reminds us of Humbert's perversion and Lolita's youth throughout the text, just to make sure we are never won over by the haunting and hypnotically poetic prose. I especially like the elliptical references to sexuality incorporated throughout the book. Humbert seems to be disgusted with himself and cannot even bring himself to discuss his lust in the frankest of terms, treating their unions with delicacy and tact. I could not put the book down, finishing it in two days. The only question is, what book on my Top Ten will be replaced by Lolita?
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Saturday, February 23, 2008
To the Lighthouse
Hmm, interesting novel. It took me a long time to figure out if I was enjoying the novel. I'm happy I read it, certainly. It was an unusual novel, having very little dialogue, little "plot" in the traditional sense, no protagonist, and no main conflict. However, it did portray the sensibilities of several characters, and the fact that it lacked the elements found in traditional novels was appropriate since Woolf was attempting to portray the inner lives of people as closely as she could. Life has no "plot", and what happens inside ourselves--our perceptions of life and each other, and what we make of our experiences--is as important as what happens outside ourselves (i.e., the experiences themselves).
The novel struck me as autobiographical, though I know little about Woolf. I remember reading a brief excerpt from her nonfiction that was used on an AP Language and Composition test one year. In it, she recounted an experience on a boat with her father and brother, a scene which closely mirrored the trip to the lighthouse with Cam, James, and their father. It seemed to me that Cam was supposed to represent Woolf in the novel, although Lily also seemed to share some of her sensibilities as well and was the same age as Woolf when she wrote it. The text was difficult to follow at times, and I found myself drifting off on several occasions, scanning whole paragraphs without really reading them. Although the novel was very short--barely 200 pages--it took me longer to read than I thought it should. The lack of dialogue, the long paragraphs, and the serpentine, complicated syntax was off-putting but still artistically impressive. I can see how the book can be considered the quintessential Modernist novel. She definitely moved beyond the prose style and novel structure of most other novelists of the time.
This is a novel I'll have to return to eventually.
The novel struck me as autobiographical, though I know little about Woolf. I remember reading a brief excerpt from her nonfiction that was used on an AP Language and Composition test one year. In it, she recounted an experience on a boat with her father and brother, a scene which closely mirrored the trip to the lighthouse with Cam, James, and their father. It seemed to me that Cam was supposed to represent Woolf in the novel, although Lily also seemed to share some of her sensibilities as well and was the same age as Woolf when she wrote it. The text was difficult to follow at times, and I found myself drifting off on several occasions, scanning whole paragraphs without really reading them. Although the novel was very short--barely 200 pages--it took me longer to read than I thought it should. The lack of dialogue, the long paragraphs, and the serpentine, complicated syntax was off-putting but still artistically impressive. I can see how the book can be considered the quintessential Modernist novel. She definitely moved beyond the prose style and novel structure of most other novelists of the time.
This is a novel I'll have to return to eventually.
Saturday, February 16, 2008
Dickens
Great Expectations
This is the second Dickens novel I've read, A Tale of Two Cities being the first. The novel was well-polished and fun to read. An awful lot of coincidences, which detracted from the novel's believability, but I didn't really mind since the story was so interesting. I was familiar with much of the plot ahead of time, which allowed me to concentrate on the novel's style and structure. (I think I mentioned in an earlier blog--due to a comment made by fellow literatus Michael Berry--that I seem to focus more on the stylistic and structural elements of a novel than on character or theme.) Although the coincidences were off-putting at times and the novel as a whole had a melodramatic tone, I was able to get past those elements and immerse myself in the language. It was a beautifully-written piece of work: the descriptions, the point of view, the narrative, all were varied yet all flowed seamlessly. I enjoyed reading it more than A Tale of Two Cities, although the latter is a more significant work. (I also read Cities several years ago, so my memory is a bit hazy.)
Oliver Twist
Part of me didn't want to jump into another Dickens novel right away. Two Nineteenth-century novels in a row is kind of like eating at two buffets in one day: a lot of substance, a lot of chewing. I'm glad I did, though. My basis of comparison is much clearer than it had been with A Tale of Two Cities. I can confidently say that Oliver Twist was my least favorite of the three. The prose was slightly more dense, it was much more maudlin, and I didn't care for the sarcasm that pervaded the text. I mean, it was constant. So much so that it became annoying. The title character was surprisingly absent through much of the story, which was okay with me since I didn't care for him in the slightest: The kid was annoyingly pure and incorruptible. The only part of the story in which he appealed to me was when he actually fought back against Noah Claypole near the beginning. Despite that single scene, Oliver was the least interesting of all the characters. This book also had numerous coincidences--a hallmark of Dickens, apparently--but they seemed to work less well for me than they did in Great Expectations, though this may only be due to the fact that I had endured so many of them and their prevalence in the other works of Dickens made me particularly attentive to them as I read. I didn't know much about the novel, but I was able to predict much of it because of this. I could tell from the less-confident prose and overly-complex conclusion that this was an earlier Dickens. It was okay, but I won't read it again.
This is the second Dickens novel I've read, A Tale of Two Cities being the first. The novel was well-polished and fun to read. An awful lot of coincidences, which detracted from the novel's believability, but I didn't really mind since the story was so interesting. I was familiar with much of the plot ahead of time, which allowed me to concentrate on the novel's style and structure. (I think I mentioned in an earlier blog--due to a comment made by fellow literatus Michael Berry--that I seem to focus more on the stylistic and structural elements of a novel than on character or theme.) Although the coincidences were off-putting at times and the novel as a whole had a melodramatic tone, I was able to get past those elements and immerse myself in the language. It was a beautifully-written piece of work: the descriptions, the point of view, the narrative, all were varied yet all flowed seamlessly. I enjoyed reading it more than A Tale of Two Cities, although the latter is a more significant work. (I also read Cities several years ago, so my memory is a bit hazy.)
Oliver Twist
Part of me didn't want to jump into another Dickens novel right away. Two Nineteenth-century novels in a row is kind of like eating at two buffets in one day: a lot of substance, a lot of chewing. I'm glad I did, though. My basis of comparison is much clearer than it had been with A Tale of Two Cities. I can confidently say that Oliver Twist was my least favorite of the three. The prose was slightly more dense, it was much more maudlin, and I didn't care for the sarcasm that pervaded the text. I mean, it was constant. So much so that it became annoying. The title character was surprisingly absent through much of the story, which was okay with me since I didn't care for him in the slightest: The kid was annoyingly pure and incorruptible. The only part of the story in which he appealed to me was when he actually fought back against Noah Claypole near the beginning. Despite that single scene, Oliver was the least interesting of all the characters. This book also had numerous coincidences--a hallmark of Dickens, apparently--but they seemed to work less well for me than they did in Great Expectations, though this may only be due to the fact that I had endured so many of them and their prevalence in the other works of Dickens made me particularly attentive to them as I read. I didn't know much about the novel, but I was able to predict much of it because of this. I could tell from the less-confident prose and overly-complex conclusion that this was an earlier Dickens. It was okay, but I won't read it again.
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