Lolita/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Adaptation Decay: Some have criticized Kubrick's version of giving undue screentime to Quilty.
    • Kubrick's film was largely disliked because film restrictions at the time prevented him from devoting more screen time to the illicit affair between Humbert and Lolita. Kubrick went on record and said that had he known he would've been so restricted, he never would've made the film.
  • Alternate Character Interpretation: Humbert Humbert and a lot of the other characters get a lot of these, especially in the derivative works.
  • Crowning Moment of Funny: Part 1, chapter 8; how Humbert's marriage with Valeria ends.
  • Death of the Author: As you can see by Misaimed Fandom, that is pretty common. It helps the book is entirely written from Humbert's point-of-view, and in that way the book is basically designated for debate.
  • Memetic Mutation:
    • The term nymphet became integrated in several languages as "seductive, petite young woman", not even necessarily on Dolores' age range, thanks to this book. This also resulted in a common misunderstanding that the nymphs of Greek Mythology were all seductive, when they were nothing more than natural entities not able to seduce any more than a beautiful, young, human female could.
    • The word loli, that derivates from the title, and everything eventually derivates from it (like the Lolicon sub-genre and Elegant Gothic Lolita fashion), have their existence to be thanked to Nabokov. Just like the term nymphet, of course, it doesn't always refer to younger teenagers, specifically.
  • Nightmare Fuel/Paranoia Fuel: Are you a parent with teen/tween? If you are, you will have nightmares about them being abused.
  • Misaimed Fandom: Vladimir Nabokov hoped his readers were smart enough to see through all of Humbert's attempts at gaining sympathy, and realize what a sick and twisted man he is. Not all of them were. Some people actually sympathize with Humbert. As quoted by another writer, Lolita is "not the corruption of an innocent child by a cunning adult, but the exploitation of a weak adult by a corrupt child".
  • Overshadowed by Controversy: The novel gets quite the flak for accurately depicting a pedophilic relationship. The accuracy, however, absolutely works in the favour of those against rather than those for such relationships - in fact, Humbert Humbert's and Lolita's relationship is depicted as twisted and deeply, deeply sick.
  • Purple Prose: To ridiculous levels -- sort of justified, since Hummy's trying to make himself seem more sympathetic. If anything, it just makes him creepier.
  • The Woobie: Lolita.
    • Charlotte Haze arguably qualifies as well.