Reviews with content warning for Domestic abuse - Лолита

Reviews tagging 'Domestic abuse'

Лолита by Vladimir Nabokov

101 reviews

luis0n7i's review against another edition

4.25

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

manic_mike's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous dark emotional funny sad tense

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

kiyara's review against another edition

5.0

challenging dark emotional funny reflective sad slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This was a re-read for me. Lolita is still one of the best books I have ever read. However, I feel it is deeply misunderstood. Nabokov is not romanticising the relationship between a 12-year-old girl and a 37-year-old man, nor is he trying to justify it. In contrast, Nabokov uses irony and references to well-known cultural, literary, and aesthetic discourses to ridicule the predator. He fills the character of Humbert Humbert with parodied self-justification. This poses a challenge for the reader, who must make a continuous effort to see through Humbert's self-perceived worldview. If you manage to do so, this book is a real adventure!

Content Warnings

emilianeyer's review against another edition

2.0

dark emotional tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

colormeblue's review against another edition

5.0

dark sad tense medium-paced

this is a beautiful, sickening, captivating, darkly comedic depressive episode of a horror novel.

Content Warnings

enochthepumpkin's review against another edition

challenging dark medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

The prose in this is beautiful, but this is one of the most difficult reads I've ever experienced. Being inside Humbert's head makes you feel like an accessory to what he does, and the level to which he deludes himself to justify his actions is both insane and realistic. While absolutely not for everyone, it is a very unique and interesting examination of this man's horrific behavior and the ways that he, like many who do horrible things, tries to convince the reader (or, more truly, himself) that he is still a hero. I see people characterize this as a romance, though, and anyone who does that should be put on a list.

Content Warnings

kristalula's review against another edition

5.0

challenging dark funny sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

batwinggoth's review against another edition

2.0

dark sad tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Humbert is a terrible person who spends the entire book pushing off his own actions of abuse and instead blames Dolores (Lolita) as a vixen and nymphet who advanced on him. Whereas he lusted after her and groomed her,

married her mother, and then moved her from town town after her mother dies in a effort to avoid suspicion.

Halfway through the book,

Dolores starts to show what can be interpreted as discomfort as she starts to act out. Eventually she escapes him and as an adult attempts to reconnect once she's married.

Through the entire time he's a depressed mess in which I felt no sympathy and rather became bored by his whining complaints of

"his missing Lolita"

.

What an absolutely terrible man. The only thing I appreciated from this book was how it showed how such an abuser grooms children in small ways until they can get the child alone. A very real lesson for those unaware of the fact that most abusers are known to the abused prior to the offenses.

Content Warnings