title: A Reader's Guide to Nabokov's 'Lolita' (Studies in Russian and Slavic Literatures, Cultures, and History)
author: Julian Connolly
description: "The importance of this book lies in the way it succinctly summarizes critical viewpoints yet provides a fresh and accessible interpretation of the novel [Connolly] never claims to give a definitive reading of the book, only to try to help readers "grasp the full complexity and sweep of Nabokov's unique creation" (p.1), which he admirably achieves." (Jason Merrill, Michigan State University <i>The Russian Review</i>)
zlib_text: # About the Story
  
  
  
  
  
  Published in 1955, _Lolita_ became an instant sensation, establishing Vladimir
  Nabokov’s reputation as one of the great prose stylists of the twentieth
  century. It is an unforgettable and immaculate masterpiece on obsession.  
  
  
  
  
  
  Humbert Humbert, erstwhile college professor, aesthete and tortured romantic
  is a self-professed ‘nympholept.’ Lolita is the impossibly funny and
  rapturously beautiful story of Humbert’s total, catastrophic obsession with
  twelve-year-old Dolores ‘Lolita’ Haze. At once prim and predatory, Humbert
  will stop at nothing in his frenzy to possess his ‘nymphet’, first marrying
  her mother and then embarking with Lolita on a journey across the American
  landscape, through roadside diners and five-dollar-a-night motels.  
  
  
  
  
  
  Brimming with gloriously flamboyant word play, _Lolita_ displays the
  unparalleled prose style of a master of the English language in a story that
  also emerges as a transcendent satire on American consumerism.  
  
  
  
  
  
  Shockin