A. Bouazza: "To the question about his choice, VN replied in the 1964 Playboy interview, reprinted in Strong Opinions (p. 26, 1st US edition): “The double rumble is, I think, very nasty, very suggestive. It is a hateful name for a hateful person. It is also a kingly name, but I did need a royal vibration for Humbert the Fierce and Humbert the Humble. Lends itself also to a number of puns.” In his Keys to Lolita (pp. 8-9), Proffer discusses briefly these names, and I remember an extensive note in Appel’s The Annotated Lolita regarding the name.

 

Jansy Mello: Wonderful mnemonic abilities, Abdel!. Thank you. So, Nabokov needed " a royal vibration for Humbert the Fierce [  ] Lends itself also to a number of puns". Humbert Humbert's "double rumble" itself is quite onomatopoetic and it confirms my curiosity about the connection between it and a collection of adumbrated words, such as "ombre" (shade/shadow) and "umber" (somber & dark clay color). What other apposites did Humbert deserve that were not mentioned in the novel? (Nabokov seems to have been also fond of appositive phrases, or so I gather)