[fantasyfan]

There are some really interesting ideas in the posts. I'll just comment on a couple:

Originally Posted by Synamon

I'm about 40% in and yes the author is painting a detailed picture of Humbert's particular perversion, but I honestly don't get the reaction people have to this book. Hannibal ate body parts of his victims and no one freaks out when people read The Silence of the Lambs. We happily read extremely violent books, books from a serial killer's perspective, biographies of monsters like Hitler or Stalin, etc. and don't blink an eye, but if the topic is sex everyone gets squeamish. Damn those Puritans.

I also thought about Silence of the Lambs during my reading. I think, though, that SOTL makes it easier for us to tolerate {barely} Hannibal Lector because the film presents another perhaps even more horrible serial killer whom Hannibal is helping to capture. Further we are never really invited to deeply explore his thought processes to the extent that we are with Humbert; Nabokov pulls us into the horror through incredibly beautiful prose in which Humbert massages self-justifications and rationalizations to excuse hideous evil. In a way, Lolita is far mor frightening than SOTL

Originally Posted by crich70

Maybe it's even a mix of the two. We can understand rage and how it could get out of control to the extent of committing murder, and on some level we can understand what drives a man like Humbert, though we don't want to because at some time or other we all want to do something that we know is socially unacceptable. Not necessarily what Humbert chose to do in particular but something which we know is based in the dark side of our human natures. Most of us of course resist acting on such impulses and consider them to be 'unthinkable' when we hear about someone doing such acts, but at the same time it's like when we're out driving and come across a car accident. We can't help but look for the red stuff.

I think that is a powerful insight. Our pity is for Dolores--the innocent and helpless victim--but our fear is that Humbert is an evil mirror of our own weaknesses--whatever form they take. It is the pity and the fear that make reading Lolita so uncomfortable--even painful--despite the beauty of the language.