/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.20027539]

Avoided le edgy pedo meme book all through school. Finally read it in my 30s. Was not prepared. The staggering genius of it is at once oppressive and elating. Aesthetically immaculate line by line. Deleting one word would be like chiseling a chip off the pieta. How did he do it? Was it divine inspiration?

[Anonymous No.20027618]

>>20027539
Now read Ada or Ardor, just as good but without all the cultural baggage weighing it down.

[Anonymous No.20027641]

>>20027539
*tips fedora*

[Anonymous No.20027712]

>>20027539
Dude is it smut. I seriously will be too bothered to finish the book if it is glorifying loli stuff. It’s different if it’s like a bad thing like murder in crime and punishment. Give it to me straight bro please, no one can give me a straight answer

[Anonymous No.20027730]

>>20027539
>Deleting one word would be like chiseling a chip off the pieta
apologize to michelangelo

[Anonymous No.20027739]

>>20027618
>just as good
lol

[Anonymous No.20027750]

>>20027712
Dude, who cares? why bother with it if you're so uncomfortable with the topic? You don't have to read every book that people say is good, and I mean, it's not like this is Shakespeare or anything, so just skip it, bro.

[Anonymous No.20027772]

>>20027539
i was never scared to read it, matter of fact i read it while stroking most of the time

[Anonymous No.20027782]

Lolita is of course Nabokov's master work... You'd be hard pressed to find a more lyrically beautiful book. You should read the Enchanter if you want to see Lolita's primordial incarnation. The ending sequence of this one is stunningly beautiful as well... almost as if it were reaching out to it's future form.

The Luzhin Defence and Mary are both fine works, in his classical self-stylised 'Russian emigre' style. His collection of short stories is also quite good. I didn't particularly care for Pale Fire... it's ventures into overindulgence and pretentiousness, while for a definite effect here, didn't really work for me.

Nothing with Nabokov was divine inspiration of course. He had too much of the Jewish scientism in him. His work was dissection rather than unification, as partaken in his lepidoptery. That is why he was eclipsed by the true divine work of Dostoevsky, and relegated to stand in his great shadow.

[Anonymous No.20027803]

>>20027712
>It’s different if it’s like a bad thing
Its honestly too fast and too complex to pin down. the narrator, a morbidly-over-educated silver-tongued charmer is too perfect an instrument for the author. Gliding together through the hilarious, the tragic, the sweet, the erotic, the abject, and the divine. Its a tightrope act on a high wire that can't afford one misstep.
What surprised me (for a book of its age) was its capacity to shock has not depreciated with time. where a weaker author might attempt to disturb you with clumsy theatrics, Vlad distills horror from tenderness and empathy like a mischievous chemist.

[Anonymous No.20027805]

Nabokov is great. But please do read Laughter in the Dark too.

[Anonymous No.20027835]

>>20027782
Indeed, a smart bait, a Nabokovian one if ever there was one. Pretending to be an actual post but showing in form and content its true nature - this can be rather instructing to us all. Already the three-part structure, with the aesthetically repulsive reddit spacing, assaults your senses - an assault that actually stresses out the three-part structure of every good bait.

>part 1: The Lure
Agree with the OP, thus luring the reader in by stating some obvious platitude. Notice how the praise masterfully rises ("stunningly beautiful..." "as if it was reaching out its future form") as the post go on, making the reader assume it would climax in the next part. What could this anon possibly have to add on a book most of us love, after such an enthralling introduction?
>part 2: The Inversion
Anon now slides towards slightly disagreeable opinions, by not liking Pale Fire: notice the subtle introduction of local buzzwords ("pretentious"), seeping into the prose. The reader is now forced to keep reading in order to understand how such an agreeable poster (as assumed from part 1) would entertain such a disagreeable opinion (as shown in part 2).
>part 3: The Killing
Once he has lured his prey, anon is now in the best position to kill it: you, the reader, are now a captive butterfly on the table of this expert lepidopterist, who is ready to stab your heart with the nail of his next statement. This is the point where anon stings the reader's attention with the fang of some controversial topic, entirely unrelated to the thread and to what stated above. Calling the author a nigger or a jew, albeit subtly, almost always works, paralizing with venomous power the reader's capacity for further reasoning - especially if accompanied by some obscure philosophical statement ("dissection rather than unification") or puzzling generalization introduced without further arguing. Now that the prey is lured and paralized, anon can go for the kill, here fully accomplished in the comparison with Dostoevskij: the reader is at this point so confused by the inversion and by the mentioning of ethnic minorities that he will hardly notice what anon shall state in the last sentence, no matter how criminally idiotic it may sound.

[Anonymous No.20027863]

>>20027782
>be hard pressed to find a more lyrically beautiful book.
The instant I knew I loved this book is when humbert is tween-gazing at the park and he describes the park bench as his "rack of joy", and the realization hit me how uniquely perverse a pedophile's relationship to parks and public furniture is. So many excruciating hours spent lusting on that common altar.

>>20027805
Will do.

[Anonymous No.20028114]

>>20027782
trying to formulate nabbys approach to make sense of his distate for dosto is so scoffworthy. he just didnt like the dudes books.
>Nothing with Nabokov was divine inspiration of course
i dont see why.
>>20027863
>furniture
lolita does reveal its authors true perversion after all

[Anonymous No.20028131]

>>20027539

Only read halfway through it. It's a boring ass book. His writing is very good. It's almost as if he's writing poems but it's a novel. But other than that, nothing happens. Just a pedo wanting to relive his young days, a man unable to move forward with life and enjoy big mommy milkers.

[Anonymous No.20028140]

>>20027712
honestly if you can only see fiction in these dumbass quasi-sjw categories of "does it glorify [thing] or does it say [thing] bad" then it's a waste of time for you to read it. you'll only get more frustrated.

[Anonymous No.20028142]

>>20027712
No it's not, it wouldn't be so celebrated and praised if it was. Just read the fucking book if you want a proper answer to your question.

[Anonymous No.20028160]

>Nabby purposefully overwrites book with clunky, daft prose to capture the mindset of a pseud douchebag
>People think it’s beautiful and praise it

Every time.

[Anonymous No.20028188]

>>20028160
i don't see a big difference between his style there an in his other books. what's a nabokov novel you consider to NOT be "bad on purpose" and actually reflect his idea of good prose?

[Anonymous No.20028289]

>>20027712
It was never meant to glorify pedophilia and in numerous parts of the book the veil is lifted to reveal the messed up reality underneath. But literature especially is prone to interpretation and to be read to suit the readers sensibilities. It's written from Humbert's perspective, a man who tries to convince you he did nothing wrong and his language is so beautiful you can easily find yourself sympathizing with him. In that regard both survivors of CSA/grooming and pedophiles will tell you it's a brilliant book that captured their experiences.

I remember a few years back having a self-described pedo on another imageboard complain about how others see Dolores as an object of affection when throughout the whole book she "was a manipulative bitch" towards humbert. That stuck with me as through the years.

My overall point is that Nabokov's point about how easy it is for bad people to gain sympathy was lost on the masses.

Also the OP image is kinda funny in this discussion (pic rel is a quote from Nabokov on the book cover he wanted).

[Anonymous No.20028290]

>>20027539
Calm down its just a book.

[Anonymous No.20028293]

>>20027539
I wanna lick those feet

[Anonymous No.20028296]

>>20028131
>nothing happens.
Its just a careful portrait of a ridiculous coomer whose existence is near-constant suffering interspersed with rare moments of pure ecstasy.
If you couldn't get through it then I highly suggest you give the audio book performed by Jeremy irons a try. Irons does for humbert what bale does for patrick bateman. A lot of people overlook that the book is nearly a dark comedy.

[Anonymous No.20028306]

>>20027539
Anyone : *uses a minimum of 4 adjectives for every noun and randomly insert french words everywhere*
OP :
>The staggering genius of it is at once oppressive and elating. Aesthetically immaculate line by line. Deleting one word would be like chiseling a chip off the pieta. How did he do it? Was it divine inspiration?

I like Lolita, and the style is decent, but let’s not pretend it’s a timeless masterpiece.

[Anonymous No.20028311]

So what’s the big secret or twist of this book? Everyone treats it as some mystery to be solved but I didn’t get that at all

[Anonymous No.20028312]

>>20028160
This is what I originally thought, but then I realised that his other books are not that different. There is always the possibility that he’s actually mocking himself and partly self-inserting as Humbert, though.

[Anonymous No.20028316]

>>20028311
She got fugged in the ass

[Anonymous No.20028317]

>>20028311
Dolores runs off with a richfag Chaf an then hits the wall and marries an asshole Chad.
Incel Humbert cant handle it and goes ER.

[Anonymous No.20028393]

>>20027539
Nabokov had to have been an ephebophile at the very least.

[Anonymous No.20028397]

>>20028393
Based

[Anonymous No.20028433]

>>20028306
>I like Lolita, and the style is decent, but let’s not pretend it’s a timeless masterpiece.
Its literally a timeless masterpiece that transcends culture and creed. The breezy and playful prose complementing the painfully dire topic is the sort of happy-accident only a reckless old fetishist could pull off. Like Martin amis said, the downside to writing like this is that you have to be a genius to pull it off. I tried sinking my teeth into Joyce and then Faulker after Lolita and the prose felt so flabby by comparison, like dragging along some bloated corpse about to collapse under the gravity of its own serious self importance. I ended up reading Lolita a third time.

[Anonymous No.20028437]

best translation?

[Anonymous No.20028458]

>>20027835
My lord what an underrated post!

[Anonymous No.20028483]

>>20027539
>muh prose

Aesthetics are nothing without powerful themes, characters, etc behind them. This is why Nabokov will never be truly great. Sure he was a better pure writer than someone like Dostoyevsky, but Dostoyevsky is still the better writer because few authors have moved as many people as he did

[Anonymous No.20028511]

>>20028483
there are minor, paragraph-length appearances in lolita that are more memorable and hard-hitting than the sock puppets dosto spends an entire book fretting over

[Anonymous No.20028790]

>>20028511
Sounds like you just wished Lolita had a dark vs light theme and a clearly defined villain so you knew who to root for. Pretty weak shit dog

[Anonymous No.20028796]

>>20028790
Oops meant to quote:
>>20028483

[Anonymous No.20028803]

>>20027835
>>20027782
Samefag but excellent posts

[Anonymous No.20029633]

>>20027712
>”does it glorify…”
CRT did this. You are thinking in terms of internet cancel culture and SJW labels.

Just read it, stop being such a goddamn pussy.

[Anonymous No.20029841]

>>20027539
It seems quite often to turn out that an authors best work is not their most popular one, is this true for nabby? Is Lolita his best, is there even a consensus on what his best novel is?

[Anonymous No.20029848]

>>20027712
It doesn't even remotely qualify as smut

[Anonymous No.20029869]

>>20027835
The board and site cannot deserve such care in self-reply.
No fraction, nothing but all of a scale's numbers, such is my evaluation.

[Anonymous No.20029932]

>>20027539
Okay but have you read The Story of a Viennese Whore, as Told by Herself? To my understanding, it's far worse.

[Anonymous No.20029969]

>>20027782
>Unironically using the word "scientism"
>Praising the pulp fiction author Dosto
NGMI

[Anonymous No.20029974]

>>20028160
>Uses pseud mindset to paint a character portrait of a pseud
>Anon thinks that if, as a reader, you like this it makes you a pseud
Oof

[Anonymous No.20029996]

>>20028140
based

[Anonymous No.20031258]

>>20028433

I felt the same. I guess that Nabokov gas a greater metaphorical inventiveness, which is something that both Joyce and Faulkner lack.

[Anonymous No.20031314]

>>20028293
hahahahah i was looking for this one boys HAHA

[Anonymous No.20033196]

>>20028511

> there are minor, paragraph-length appearances in lolita that are more memorable and hard-hitting than the sock puppets dosto spends an entire book fretting over

I love this book. I was wondering if you could post some of your favorite excerpts, some of the paragraphs you were referring to. It’s a long time since I last read the book so it would be a pleasure to read some small gemstones from it.

[Anonymous No.20034095]

Bump

[Anonymous No.20034557]

>>20027539
is it pointless reading it translated? I am an esl and just bought it in my mother language (big annotated edition)

[Anonymous No.20034608]

>>20034557
What language?

[Anonymous No.20034659]

>>20034557
Not pointless, but you will obviously lose a lot of the poetry of his writing. Nabokov is a genius.

[Anonymous No.20034883]

>>20034608
>>20034659
Greek

[Anonymous No.20036259]

>>20028483
>>20028511
Reading these comparisons is always funny when you remember that nabokov thought that dostoevsky writing was shit and wrote a shit ton of paragraphs seething about him.