Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

Describing his tussle with Clare Quilty (a playwright and pornographer whom Humbert murders for abducting Lolita from the Elphinstone hospital), Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) mentions the first years of 2000 A. D. when his book is being read in its published form and the obligatory scene in the Westerns of his elderly readers' childhood:

The name of the author of the Foreword to Humbert Humbert's manuscript, John Ray, Jr. (a character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955), and the narrator's double pseudonym bring to mind Rayon de Rayonne, a cycle of ten poems by Georgiy Ivanov (1894-1858).

In his Foreword to Humbert Humbert's manuscript John Ray, Jr. (a character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) mentions his modest work (“Do the Senses make Sense?”) wherein certain morbid states and perversions had been discussed:

In Canto Four of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN's novel Pale Fire, 1962) calls his collection Hebe's Cup "my final float in that damp carnival:"

Dim Gulf was my first book (free verse); Night Rote

Came next; then Hebe's Cup, my final float

In that damp carnival, for now I term

Everything "Poems," and no longer squirm.

Describing his quarrel with Lolita, Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955) compares himself to Mr. Hyde (a character in R. L. Stevenson's novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, 1886):

Describing his first road trip with Lolita across the USA, Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955) mentions the condition of his glands and ganglia:

At Silver Spur Court in Elphinstone (a little town in the Rockies where Lolita falls ill and is hospitalized) big Frank greets Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955) with the word "Howdy:"

I heard the sound of whistling lips nearing the half-opened door of my cabin, and then a thump upon it.

It was big Frank. He remained framed in the opened door, one hand on its jamb, leaning forward a little.

According to John Ray, Jr. (in VN's novel Lolita, 1962, the author of the Foreword to Humbert Humbert's manuscript), “Haze” only rhymes with the heroine’s real surname:

Describing the unkempt lawn of the Haze house in Ramsdale, Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955) mentions the flat stones where a sundial had once stood:

According to John Ray, Jr. (in VN's novel Lolita, 1962, the author of the Foreword to Humbert Humbert's manuscript), Mrs. “Richard F. Schiller” (Lolita's married name) died in childbed, giving birth to a stillborn girl, on Christmas Day 1952, in Gray Star, a settlement in the remotest Northwest: