Lolita by Vladamirs Nabokov

Vladamirs Nabokov’s novel titled Lolita explores the taboo topic of pedophilia and obsession. Humbert Humbert, the main character, has always had a strong attraction to young girls around the ages twelve to thirteen or nymphets as he likes to call him. He watches them play in the park, likes to look at pictures of Girl Scouts and enjoys watching them swim in the pool. Humbert reflecting on his life tries to justify his actions that have landed him in jail by writing them down in a manuscript. He writes to his readers about how he met Lolita, the twelve year old daughter of his landlady, and chronicles how he constantly fantasies about fondeling her body and eventually taking sexual action towards her. He also kidnaps her after her mother dies and often gives Lolita toys, magazines, clothes and money in exchange for sexual favors. Though out the entirety of the novel Humbert writes about how much stress and anxiety he experiences by attempting to hide his pedophilia and how fearful he is of his secret being found out.

Does Lolita give an accurate representation of the psychological disorder pedophilia? By looking at certain components of pedophilia sectioned off in this paper one can surmise that Lolita gives a fair rendition of the characteristics pedophilia can manifest itself in an individual but not necessarily a complete story of the disorder.

Onset and Course:

In Lolita Humbert Humbert describes the circumstances in which he believes his obsession with nymphets began. He describes a time when he was about thirteen and met his first love Annabel who was around the same age. So enraptured with each other, they tried to sneak off from their parents multiple times for sex. However they were so closely watched and so often int...

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... between low intelligence and pedophilia. There is no indication of associated problems in living despite the possible problems found in relationship deficits. The novel also never mentions anything about treatment of pedophilia and Humbert dies in prison, however, pedophiles in the federal system do receive treatment in the form of cognitive behavior therapy that can involve group talk sessions and aversive conditioning. The only substantial commonality Lolita seems to share with the actual description of pedophilia is a strong enduring sexual interest in prepubescent children. One possibility for this is that in the novel, Humbert Humbert is the narrator and consistently tries to downplay his disorder in order to evoke sympathy from his readers. This makes his rendition of events slightly unreliable. This makes it only a fair representation of pedophilia.