Subject
Re: Fwd: Re: Nabokovian blunders
From
Date
Body
Dear Andrew
I greatly appreciate much of Nabokov's humour, including his apeing take-
off of Poe's short story The Murders in the Rue Morgue. But I don't think
there is anything funny hiding behind Nabokov's gender-bending game. I
believe Nabokov was involved in a covert attempt to overturn Freud's myth
of the Oedipus complex (i.e. incest is a brutal reality for children, not a
fantasy.) He also intended Lolita, I believe, to spark widespread reform of
the criminal law statutes. All too often 1950s the criminal law failed to
recognise that boys too could be victims of child sexual assault. I discuss
this failure in SNLR.
My opinions are entirely consistent with what Stacy Schiff had to say was
on Nabokov's mind when he was actually writing Lolita. She observed:
"Nabokov had indeed researched "Lolita," but not the way most people
thought. He had studied the law regarding orphans, consulted tables on
sexual maturation, read "The Subnormal Adolescent Girl," taken notes on
acne and Tampax, borrowed faithfully from the tabloids. He acknowledged
that Lewis Carroll had long been on his mind."
While we're on the topic of Lewis Carroll... why have VN's literary
scholars been so loath to address Nabokov's very serious interest in this
most influential of British writers? This ostrich-like behaviour is not
only embarrassing, it does Nabokov absolutely no favours at all.
Jo Morgan
Sydney
----- End forwarded message -----
EDNOTE. I seriously doubt whether VN had interest in or expectation of changing
laws. Also, there is quite a bit of literature on VN and Lewis Carroll.
I greatly appreciate much of Nabokov's humour, including his apeing take-
off of Poe's short story The Murders in the Rue Morgue. But I don't think
there is anything funny hiding behind Nabokov's gender-bending game. I
believe Nabokov was involved in a covert attempt to overturn Freud's myth
of the Oedipus complex (i.e. incest is a brutal reality for children, not a
fantasy.) He also intended Lolita, I believe, to spark widespread reform of
the criminal law statutes. All too often 1950s the criminal law failed to
recognise that boys too could be victims of child sexual assault. I discuss
this failure in SNLR.
My opinions are entirely consistent with what Stacy Schiff had to say was
on Nabokov's mind when he was actually writing Lolita. She observed:
"Nabokov had indeed researched "Lolita," but not the way most people
thought. He had studied the law regarding orphans, consulted tables on
sexual maturation, read "The Subnormal Adolescent Girl," taken notes on
acne and Tampax, borrowed faithfully from the tabloids. He acknowledged
that Lewis Carroll had long been on his mind."
While we're on the topic of Lewis Carroll... why have VN's literary
scholars been so loath to address Nabokov's very serious interest in this
most influential of British writers? This ostrich-like behaviour is not
only embarrassing, it does Nabokov absolutely no favours at all.
Jo Morgan
Sydney
----- End forwarded message -----
EDNOTE. I seriously doubt whether VN had interest in or expectation of changing
laws. Also, there is quite a bit of literature on VN and Lewis Carroll.