We began class with viewing the opening scene of the Stanley Kubrick film version of Lolita, which opens where the book essentially ends: with Humbert Humbert(James Mason) killing Clare Quilty(Peter Sellers). Its been some time since I've seen the film in its entiriety, perhaps I should watch it again. I remember thinking at the time that it was a rather cold film(being directed by Kubrick this really didn't suprise me), but mordantly comic in a way very similar to the tone of much of the novel. Being me I find it interesting to contrast various filmic presentations; James Mason and Jeremy Irons, for example or Peter Sellars and Frank Langella(who's not as funny or bizarre as Sellars, he plays more for the sinister creepy aspects of Quilty). Maybe I will when I'm feeling more patient.
The rest of class people shared the discoveries they had made.
Connection of H.H. with Peter Pan(he's never really grown up)
Lo's dead father is Harold E. Haze(H.H. !) When Humbert marries Charlotte he gives his name as Edgar H. Humbert. Poe reference and more doubling.
Jared shared his discovery that HH's destroying lust has, by the end of the novel with its closing passage, metamorphised into genuine love. This is something I actually think is very accurate, and good to point out.
The huge amount of alliteration contained in the book(just listening to the alliterations it began to sound like Finnegans Wake).
Gray Hairstreaked butterfly--alluded to by the car doors opening on pg 97
Phineas Quimby--Quilty alias, and 19th century hypnotist.
And Kyle's mammoth, in-depth, investigation on Fast Day in New Hampshire and the places that ended up leading. I was really very suprised and impressed. Oh N. you sly old dog you!
And by next Tuesday, we must come with a good test question.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Thursday, September 24, 2009
More listening to Jeremy Irons as HH, which was quite enjoyable. If one was to request for a particular passage from it to be read, I think I'd request chapter 16 of part 1, wherein contains Charlotte's confession, HH's reaction and a Quilty reference, among other things. There are many other passages
Much of class today was spent detailing Clare Quilty(or "Cue")and his purpose in the novel. His last name, interestingly, bares resemblance to the French phrase Qu'il te? , meaning "Who is he?" This is the sort of reaction Quilty would provoke, in disgust, from a casual observer. Because he is, in no uncertain terms, a disgusting pervert. As is HH, of course. Really, Quilty is HH. without the poetry, all that is most vile and repugnant about HH distilled into living form. Which HH purges from himself when he kills Quilty? Interesting thought.... Well, since N. apparently wrote the death of Quilty before he wrote anything else, perhaps it does have a stronger significance for the rest of the novel. Perhaps I will explore this more later.
It was also brought up in class what appears to be an Actaeon reference in chapter 10, section 5 of Speak Memory, where N. while "hunting" for butterflies, comes across the coachman's daughter and a few other girls swimming naked in river. Ah ha!
Much of class today was spent detailing Clare Quilty(or "Cue")and his purpose in the novel. His last name, interestingly, bares resemblance to the French phrase Qu'il te? , meaning "Who is he?" This is the sort of reaction Quilty would provoke, in disgust, from a casual observer. Because he is, in no uncertain terms, a disgusting pervert. As is HH, of course. Really, Quilty is HH. without the poetry, all that is most vile and repugnant about HH distilled into living form. Which HH purges from himself when he kills Quilty? Interesting thought.... Well, since N. apparently wrote the death of Quilty before he wrote anything else, perhaps it does have a stronger significance for the rest of the novel. Perhaps I will explore this more later.
It was also brought up in class what appears to be an Actaeon reference in chapter 10, section 5 of Speak Memory, where N. while "hunting" for butterflies, comes across the coachman's daughter and a few other girls swimming naked in river. Ah ha!
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Class begun on a thoroughly sonorous note--Jeremy Irons reading Lolita, which I gotta say made me want to listen to the whole thing. He's got the perfect voice for it; very fitting that he played Humbert Humbert in the second film version.
It was suggested that a possible reason N. may have had for making the subject of his novel a pedophile(this is not what HH would describe himself as of course; he's only aroused by nymphets... uh huh) may be one that Shakespeare also had when composing Titus Andronicus: "What's the worst that can be imagined?". Shakes of course is working up--or down?--from Ovid's Metamorphoses , which contains a plethora of The Worst that Can Be Imagined. Why? Because the only why they can possibly be comprehended and borne is through art.
It was quite an Ovidian day; the names of Jean Farlow(one of Charlotte Haze's would-be artistic friends) are Cavall and Melampus. The former is the hound of King Arthur, the latter one of Actaeon's hounds; Actaeon who was torn to shreds by his own dogs after being transformed into a stag by the goddess Diana after he spied upon her bathing. The two dogs are mentioned in Lolita when HH and Charlotte and Jean are at Hourglass Lake, with Jean telling an anecdote about skinny-dipping. And is HH, who loathes dogs, a beast who'll be shredded?
Or is he Caliban, another eloquent "thing of darkness"? As N. has The Tempest runs through much of his work, it is a fair assumption. Similarly, if HH is Caliban, who's to say N. isn't Prospero? I'm having lot's of question marks aren't I?
It was suggested that a possible reason N. may have had for making the subject of his novel a pedophile(this is not what HH would describe himself as of course; he's only aroused by nymphets... uh huh) may be one that Shakespeare also had when composing Titus Andronicus: "What's the worst that can be imagined?". Shakes of course is working up--or down?--from Ovid's Metamorphoses , which contains a plethora of The Worst that Can Be Imagined. Why? Because the only why they can possibly be comprehended and borne is through art.
It was quite an Ovidian day; the names of Jean Farlow(one of Charlotte Haze's would-be artistic friends) are Cavall and Melampus. The former is the hound of King Arthur, the latter one of Actaeon's hounds; Actaeon who was torn to shreds by his own dogs after being transformed into a stag by the goddess Diana after he spied upon her bathing. The two dogs are mentioned in Lolita when HH and Charlotte and Jean are at Hourglass Lake, with Jean telling an anecdote about skinny-dipping. And is HH, who loathes dogs, a beast who'll be shredded?
Or is he Caliban, another eloquent "thing of darkness"? As N. has The Tempest runs through much of his work, it is a fair assumption. Similarly, if HH is Caliban, who's to say N. isn't Prospero? I'm having lot's of question marks aren't I?
Friday, September 18, 2009
I present here my measly attempt at annotation of a page(71 to be exact) from Lolita. I shall try.
"So Humbert the Cubus schemed and dreamed--and the red sun of desire and decision (the two things that create a live world)rose higher and higher, while upon a succession of balconies a succession of libertines, sparkling glass in hand, toasted the bliss of past and future nights. Then, figuratively speaking, I shattered the glass, and boldly imagined(for I was drunk on those visions by then and underrated the gentleness of my nature)how eventually I might blackmail--no, that is too strong a word--mauvemail big Haze into letting me consort with little Haze by gently threatening the poor doting Big Dove with desertion if she tried to bar me from playing with my legal stepdaughter. In a word, I was as helpless as Adam at the preview of early oriental history, miraged in his apple orchard."
Humbert the Cubus: The incubus is a demon that supposedly had sex with and/or impregnated women while they slept. HH designates himself as one.
red sun of desire and decision: the alliterative d's are noted, as well as the contributing idea of the sun beating down upon you and creating a haze(Haze), in which one sees hallucinatory visions, such as pairs of things...
succession of balconies--succession of libertines
mauvemail: mauve is a shade of light purple. Just what HH would choose to "pretty up" his intentions.
Adam--miraged in his apple orchard: reference to Genesis, obviously. Yet we also have the prescence of forbidden fruit(Lo) and the opportunities for obtaining it dazzling HH. There is also the suggestion of palindroming the paragraph--red sun of desire at the start, apples(often red)closing it.
That was perhaps an anemic effort, but I tried. And it dizzying, how much there really is to take note of.
"So Humbert the Cubus schemed and dreamed--and the red sun of desire and decision (the two things that create a live world)rose higher and higher, while upon a succession of balconies a succession of libertines, sparkling glass in hand, toasted the bliss of past and future nights. Then, figuratively speaking, I shattered the glass, and boldly imagined(for I was drunk on those visions by then and underrated the gentleness of my nature)how eventually I might blackmail--no, that is too strong a word--mauvemail big Haze into letting me consort with little Haze by gently threatening the poor doting Big Dove with desertion if she tried to bar me from playing with my legal stepdaughter. In a word, I was as helpless as Adam at the preview of early oriental history, miraged in his apple orchard."
Humbert the Cubus: The incubus is a demon that supposedly had sex with and/or impregnated women while they slept. HH designates himself as one.
red sun of desire and decision: the alliterative d's are noted, as well as the contributing idea of the sun beating down upon you and creating a haze(Haze), in which one sees hallucinatory visions, such as pairs of things...
succession of balconies--succession of libertines
mauvemail: mauve is a shade of light purple. Just what HH would choose to "pretty up" his intentions.
Adam--miraged in his apple orchard: reference to Genesis, obviously. Yet we also have the prescence of forbidden fruit(Lo) and the opportunities for obtaining it dazzling HH. There is also the suggestion of palindroming the paragraph--red sun of desire at the start, apples(often red)closing it.
That was perhaps an anemic effort, but I tried. And it dizzying, how much there really is to take note of.
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Today's class was spent essentially recapping the plot of Lolita, with all the intricate detail which results when one analyzes it. This is an assignment actually, which everyone forgot to do: to annotate a page from Lolita, selected purely at random if we so choose. This, while we are being technical and practical, ties in with the assignment to do a mid-term paper, 2 to 3 pages in length, discussing a segment from any book by N. Due some time in October.
From discussion and digression of Lolita's plot, we brought up connections outside of the novel which tie-in with it--ie. the film The Night of the Hunter, in which a mother marries a monster who imperils her children(and starring Shelley Winters, who also played Charlotte Haze in the Kubrick film version of Lolita)--and connections within the novel itself: in the class list, we have McFate, Aubrey. McFate is the sense of cosmic plotting H.H. detects throughout the novel. But than the name of the school he teaches at is Beardsley. If one takes the names "Aubrey" and "Beardsley" and puts them together, we come up with the name of an author and illustrator of erotic images(or so I gather from our being forbidden to look the pictures up).
And how there are several fairy tales at play in the book, in particular Sleeping Beauty, Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid and Bluebeard. Look especially at The Enchanted Hunters section.
And the notion of how N. has written, with this novel, a meta-fiction, in which the characters in a text know that they are characters. Examples include, but are not limited to, John Fowles The French Lieutenent's Woman and Cervantes' Don Quixote.
And we are all to send three sentences to Amanda in response to her very reasonable and pertinent question: Why a pedophile? Why choose to write about a pedophile?Because it is question that is worth asking: why should we read a novel about this highly immoral character? One is then directed to page 283, which Dr. Sexson refers to as the moral center of Lolita. And the scene in which Lo is playing tennis, which is an unsullied, epiphanic moment for H.H.
From discussion and digression of Lolita's plot, we brought up connections outside of the novel which tie-in with it--ie. the film The Night of the Hunter, in which a mother marries a monster who imperils her children(and starring Shelley Winters, who also played Charlotte Haze in the Kubrick film version of Lolita)--and connections within the novel itself: in the class list, we have McFate, Aubrey. McFate is the sense of cosmic plotting H.H. detects throughout the novel. But than the name of the school he teaches at is Beardsley. If one takes the names "Aubrey" and "Beardsley" and puts them together, we come up with the name of an author and illustrator of erotic images(or so I gather from our being forbidden to look the pictures up).
And how there are several fairy tales at play in the book, in particular Sleeping Beauty, Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid and Bluebeard. Look especially at The Enchanted Hunters section.
And the notion of how N. has written, with this novel, a meta-fiction, in which the characters in a text know that they are characters. Examples include, but are not limited to, John Fowles The French Lieutenent's Woman and Cervantes' Don Quixote.
And we are all to send three sentences to Amanda in response to her very reasonable and pertinent question: Why a pedophile? Why choose to write about a pedophile?Because it is question that is worth asking: why should we read a novel about this highly immoral character? One is then directed to page 283, which Dr. Sexson refers to as the moral center of Lolita. And the scene in which Lo is playing tennis, which is an unsullied, epiphanic moment for H.H.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
A vast deal of meaty piquant material covered today, just from the first sentance of Lolita. The foreward by John Ray Jr.(jr. jr. hee, hee) begins "Lolita, or the Confession of a White Widowed Male" . A parallel was then drawn between this, and the black widow--the hated venomous spider--, and a passage on page 49 on which Humbert Humbert says "I am like one of those inflated pale spiders you see in old gardens." I'd read the book before, and caught quite a few things, but this I had not. Curiouser and curiouser...
One of the things mentioned in class is the charge against N. that is occasionally brought up by those who are offended by the protagonist of Lolita: if he writes such a loathsome character, they say, than he must have been like this(ie. a psychotic pedophile)too. Well, even disregarding momentarily the biographical information that N. adored his wife and was apparently completely faithful to her all the fourty-some years of their marriage, it ought to be borne in mind that the real test of imagination is being able to create characters who are not like yourself. Shakespeare is a major instance of this, given all the horrible villains and murderers he penned. Does that mean Shakespeare was himself like Iago or Edmund or Macbeth? No; same goes for N. and many other major writers.
At one point in Speak Memory N. speaks about his favorite author, Serin, and all of his amazing virtues. But there's just one problem... Serin doesn't exist. N. made him up! Go figure.
And apparently Dmitri Nabokov, son of N., has cleared for the release of his father's final, unfinished novel The Original of Laura, which will be published in November. N.'s desire apparently was for the book not be published as it was, since he hadn't gotten it to the aesthetic point where he felt it should be, and asked for it to be burned. So is his son doing the right thing? Well, its a situation that has presented itself quite a few times in literary history. Kafka asked for his papers to be burned, and they weren't; Virginia Woolf requested in her suicide note that all of her remaining papers and journals be burned, but her husband Leonard kept them. If these wishes had been followed, there would be a great deal of these writers' work which we wouldn't have or know about. Intriguing dilemma.
And, paronomasa, which means word-play. Which N. did in abundance.
One of the things mentioned in class is the charge against N. that is occasionally brought up by those who are offended by the protagonist of Lolita: if he writes such a loathsome character, they say, than he must have been like this(ie. a psychotic pedophile)too. Well, even disregarding momentarily the biographical information that N. adored his wife and was apparently completely faithful to her all the fourty-some years of their marriage, it ought to be borne in mind that the real test of imagination is being able to create characters who are not like yourself. Shakespeare is a major instance of this, given all the horrible villains and murderers he penned. Does that mean Shakespeare was himself like Iago or Edmund or Macbeth? No; same goes for N. and many other major writers.
At one point in Speak Memory N. speaks about his favorite author, Serin, and all of his amazing virtues. But there's just one problem... Serin doesn't exist. N. made him up! Go figure.
And apparently Dmitri Nabokov, son of N., has cleared for the release of his father's final, unfinished novel The Original of Laura, which will be published in November. N.'s desire apparently was for the book not be published as it was, since he hadn't gotten it to the aesthetic point where he felt it should be, and asked for it to be burned. So is his son doing the right thing? Well, its a situation that has presented itself quite a few times in literary history. Kafka asked for his papers to be burned, and they weren't; Virginia Woolf requested in her suicide note that all of her remaining papers and journals be burned, but her husband Leonard kept them. If these wishes had been followed, there would be a great deal of these writers' work which we wouldn't have or know about. Intriguing dilemma.
And, paronomasa, which means word-play. Which N. did in abundance.
Commonplace
"Reverting to his professional state, he drove the Humberts to their residence and all the way Valeria talked, and Humbert the Terrible deliberated with Humbert the Small whether Humbert Humbert should kill her or her lover or both or neither."(Lolita, page 29)
Monday, September 14, 2009
I have been (re)reading Lolita as we were instructed to do over the weekend, but I thought I'd go ahead and post an entry on Speak Memory since we will be moving on to other works(yet one never truly "finishes" something; it is always there. Speak Memory is no different).
I was momentarily thrown when I reached chapter 15, since N. abruptly begins to address a specific 'you', as if in conversation, which he hasn't done really in the preceeding chapters, and which is sustained throughout chapter 15. However, I quickly came to realize that the 'you' he is addressing is his wife Vera; all the numerous references to the shared experiances with "our baby" and "our child". One gets the impression that he felt very deeply about her, about their young son. N. is sometimes dismissed, I've noticed, as being as being "only" a stylist and nothing more(we in the Major Authors course have perhaps already come to realize how misguided such a criticism is). But, chapter 15 in Speak Memory offers examples of how his intensely ornate and intricate way of putting things brings deep real emotion to the front and center. Instead of saying something banal like "I love my wife and our child very much.", N. gives this...
I was momentarily thrown when I reached chapter 15, since N. abruptly begins to address a specific 'you', as if in conversation, which he hasn't done really in the preceeding chapters, and which is sustained throughout chapter 15. However, I quickly came to realize that the 'you' he is addressing is his wife Vera; all the numerous references to the shared experiances with "our baby" and "our child". One gets the impression that he felt very deeply about her, about their young son. N. is sometimes dismissed, I've noticed, as being as being "only" a stylist and nothing more(we in the Major Authors course have perhaps already come to realize how misguided such a criticism is). But, chapter 15 in Speak Memory offers examples of how his intensely ornate and intricate way of putting things brings deep real emotion to the front and center. Instead of saying something banal like "I love my wife and our child very much.", N. gives this...
Commonplace
"Whenever I start thinking of my love of a person, I am in the habit of immediately drawing radii from my love--from my heart, from the tender nucleus of a personal matter--to monstrously remote points of the universe. Something impels me to measure the consciousness of my love against such unimaginable and incalculable things as the behavior of nebulae(whose very remoteness seems a form of insanity), the dreadfull pitfalls of eternity, the unknowledgeable beyond the unknown, the helplessness, the cold, the sickening involutions and interpenetrations of space and time.It is a pernicious habit, but I can do nothing about it...I have to have all space and all time participate in my emotion, in my mortal love, so that the edge of its mortality is taken off, thus helping me to fight the utter degradation, ridicule, and horror of having developed an infinity of sensation and thought within a finite existence." (pg.232, Speak Memory, chapter 15, section 1)
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