The Annotated Lolita: Revised and Updated (68 page)

“
I have only words to play with
,” moans H.H., and several readers have been tempted to call the ensuing wordplay “Joycean”—loosely enough, since “Carrollian” might do almost as well, given Nabokov’s fondness for auditory wordplay and portmanteau words, and the fact that the latter usage was coined by Carroll. The family line is nicely established on Sebastian. Knight’s neatest book shelf, where
Alice in Wonderland
and
Ulysses
stand side by side, along with works by some of Nabokov’s other favorite writers (Stevenson, Chekhov, Flaubert, Proust, Wells, and Shakespeare, who encloses the shelf at either end with
Hamlet
and
King Lear
[p. 41]). For Shakespeare, see
God or Shakespeare
.

metamorphosing
: see
not human, but nymphic
.

emeritus read to by a boy
: an echo of the opening of Eliot’s “Gerontion”: “Here I am, an old man in a dry month,/Being read to by a boy …” See
pastiches
.

shoat
: a young pig; a hog.

callypygean slave … onyx
: or
callipygian
; “having shapely buttocks.”
Onyx
is a variety of agate, a semiprecious stone. H.H. is no doubt here referring to
onyx marble
(alabaster). See
boat to Onyx or Eryx
.

gonadal glow
: a gonad is a sexual gland; an ovary or testis. H.H. is evoking the neon tubing on the nether region of a 1947 Wurlitzer jukebox, an expensive “collectible” in 1991.

canoeing, Coranting
: the latter is the participle of H.H.’s variant of
courant
, “a dance of Italian origin marked by quick running steps,” and also dialectal English for “romping” and “carousing.” H.H. is still in Volume C of the
Girl’s Encyclopedia
(see p. 92).

Roman law … girl may marry at twelve
: the legal opinions offered in this paragraph move from fact to fiction (see
Children … 1933
). The first is true, though the legal question and its history are far more complex than H.H. would suggest. See Corbett,
The Roman Law of Marriage
(1930), pp. 51–52.

adopted by the Church
: also true; see Bouscaren and Ellis,
Canon Law: A Text and Commentary
(1957), p. 513.

still preserved … in some of the United States
: only in ten states (Colorado, Florida, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Virginia, Idaho, Kansas, and Louisiana). See Vernier,
American Family Laws
(1931), pp. 115–117.

fifteen is lawful everywhere
: not in Alaska, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, or Wyoming, where the age is sixteen, or in New Hampshire or New Jersey, where it is eighteen. But there are exceptions granted if the girl is pregnant or if she is willing, over twelve, and the marriage has been consummated. Since none of these (save the consummation) apply to Lolita, it seems that H.H.’s confident legal scholarship has given way to dissembling. See Vernier,
ibid.
, pp. 116–118. Of course these laws pertain to H.H.’s day, and may have changed.

die Kleine
: German; the little one.

moue
: grimace, facial contraction.

sapphic diversions
: reference to the reputed lesbianism of the group associated with Sappho, Greek lyric poetess of Lesbos (c. 600
B.C.
).

Miranda twins
: in Lolita’s
class list
, (see
Beale
).

boat to Onyx or Eryx
: there are no such lakes.
Onyx
is often used for cameos, while
Eryx
refers to the ancient cult of Aphrodite (Venus) of Eryx, an Elymian settlement on a mountain above Drepana in western Sicily, built below their temple of Aphrodite (the goddess of love and beauty, to whom Lolita is often compared; “
Venus came and went
,” says H.H.; and the magazine picture of a surrealistic “
plaster replica of the Venus di Milo, half-buried in sand
” metaphorically projects Lolita’s life with him). See
Dr. Kitzler, Eryx, Miss.
, where scholarly H.H. obliquely informs the reader that the priestesses at the Temple of Eryx were prostitutes.

I would not talk to strangers
: see
Never Talk to Strangers
and
Do not talk to strangers
, where the phrase echoes. The advice still holds.

saturnalia
: the festival of Saturn in ancient Rome, celebrated with feasting and revelry; a licentious spectacle.

A fellow of my age
: Quilty (see
Quilty, Clare
); the “blood-red armchair” should alert the reader. H.H. stresses their similar ages; see
of my age … rosebud … mouth
.

Schwab’s drugstore
: an author’s error has been corrected (
a
instead of
o
in the 1958 edition). The Schwab’s chain drugstores in Hollywood (now defunct) were a meeting place for film people and young aspirants. In the thirties and forties several subsequent stars were discovered there, some—according to folklore—while eating sundaes or drinking sodas.

a fairytale vampire
: for the fairy-tale theme, see
Percy Elphinstone
.

le décòuvert
: French; the nude.

immortal daemon … child
: see
not human, but nymphic
.

Aunt Clare’s place
: by mentioning Quilty’s first name, H.H., a sly teaser, throws the reader something more than a hint. See
Quilty, Clare
for a summary of Quilty allusions.

hypothetical hospital
: “hypothetical” is the best word to use, since its name would be whatever H.H. chose to make it.

gay … Lepingville
: see
Lepingville … nineteenth century
. H.H.’s “lepping” is over; the town’s name and gaiety mark the fact that, as Part One ends, H.H. secures his capture.

swooners
: H.H.’s variant of the noun, its meaning expanded to include some garment that evokes a swoon. Teen-swooning, inspired by Frank Sinatra’s crooning, was much in the news in the forties.

pharisaic
: self-righteous and censorious; resembling the Pharisees, a sect of the ancient Jews famed for its strict observance of ceremonies, rites, and traditions.

earwitness
: a dictionary word (used as early as 1594) but amusing because no one ever says it.

nous connûmes
: Flaubert uses the verb
connaître
in the literary tense
passé simple
when in
Madame Bovary
(1857) he is describing her unhappy experiments with all kinds of diversions, especially her lovers and their activities together. For other allusions, see
le mot juste
,
Miss Emperor
, and
Never will Emma rally … timely tear
. Nabokov intends no allusion to Frédéric Moreau’s travels in
L’Education sentimentale
(1869); “Not the education of the senses,” he said, “a poor novel which I only vaguely remember.”
Bovary
is funned in
King, Queen, Knave
and “Floeberg” burlesqued briefly in
Ada
(p. 128). Although Kinbote synchronizes Gradus’s travels through space and time and the stages of Shade’s composition of the poem
Pale Fire
, he nevertheless complains when Shade similarly alternates two themes: “the synchronization device has been already worked to death by Flaubert and Joyce” (p. 196).

Chateaubriandesque trees
: the first European writers and painters who visited America were impressed by its great trees, and H.H. no doubt drew the image from
Atala
(1801), a separately published episode from
Le Génie du christianisme
(1802) by François-René de Chateaubriand
(1768–1848), whose arrival in America is mentioned in
Pale Fire
(p. 247). In the
Eugene Onegin
Commentary, Nabokov calls
René
, another episode from
Le Génie
, “a work of genius by the greatest French writer of his time” (Vol. III, p. 98). See
Charlotte
. Though unlabeled, there are many “Chateaubriandesque trees” in
Ada
’s Ardis Park, and by design, for Chateaubriand is to
Ada
what Poe and Mérimée are to
Lolita.
Van Veen reads Ada’s copy of
Atala
(p. 89), and
René
, with its “subtle perfume of incest” (
Onegin
Commentary, Vol. III, p. 100), is alluded to directly (pp. 131 and 133). Mlle. Larivière, the Veens’ grotesque governess, writes a novel and film scenario whose hero is named “René” (see pp. 198–199, 217, 249, and 424), and since “incest” and “insect” are anagrammatically linked (p. 85), a mosquito is named after Chateaubriand—Charles Chateaubriand, that is, “not related to the great poet and memoirist” (p. 106). For further discussion of Chateaubriand and
Ada
, see my article, “
Ada
Described,”
TriQuarterly
, No. 17 (Winter 1970). For another Chateaubriand allusion in
Lolita
, see
le montagnard émigré
.

non-Laodicean
: in Revelation 3:14–16, the Laodicean church is characterized as “lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold” in matters of religion.

madamic
: H.H.’s coinage, referring to the madam, or proprietress, of a brothel.

instars
: an insect or other anthropod in one of the forms assumed between molts. The pupa of a butterfly is an instar.

do you remember, Miranda
: an echo of the opening lines and refrain of “Tarantella” (1923), a poem by Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953); “Do you remember an Inn, / Miranda? / Do you remember an Inn?” See p. 185.

the nasal voices
: because “this book is being read, I assume, in the first years of 2000
A.D.
” (as H.H. says [p. 299]), readers not having had the benefit of a 1947–1952 adolescence may not be able to complete the names of the “invisibles” who serenaded her. “Rex” is a ringer, and “Sammy” refers to non-singer Sammy Kaye (1910–1087), whose very popular, very mediocre dance band featured a succession of lachrymose vocalists on hits such as 1947’s “I’m Laughing on the Outside (But Crying on the Inside),” a title that splendidly summarizes H.H.’s rhetorical mask. The other singers are Jo Stafford (date of birth a secret), Edwin Jack “Eddie” Fisher (1928–      ), Tony Bennett (born Anthony Benedetto: 1926–      ), Peggy Lee (born Norma Egstrom: 1920–      ), Guy Mitchell (1925–      ), and Patti Page (born Clara Ann Fowler: 1927–      ), whose most successful
recording, “The Tennessee Waltz” (1950), is commemorated in
Ada
with the mention of “a progressive poet in residence at Tennessee Waltz College” (p. 134). As Joyce says in
Finnegans Wake
, “Wipe your glosses with what you know.” But this information isn’t campy if you don’t know who these “invisibles” are, and that their sentimental songs of love and romance were very corny, and backed by ludicrously fulsome string arrangements. Because Nabokov often uses a kind of shorthand to eviscerate Lo’s popular culture, younger readers now need to be prepped; they actually believe that early fifties’ pop music was “soft” rock-and-roll—as on the TV show
Happy Days.

Study guide:
Your Hit Parade
, a series of record collections begun in 1988 by Time-Life Music, which will eventually cover every year of the forties and fifties. The disc for 1951 includes Patti Page’s “Detour,” Guy Mitchell’s “My Heart Cries for You,” and Tony Bennett’s “Because of You” and “Cold, Cold Heart.” The latter, an apostrophe to a cruel mistress, could be called a debased Petrarchan sonnet—just the kind of song H.H. would scorn. Play some of these hits while reading
Lolita
—as ironic descant, say, to the important
reunion scene
, where H.H. says that one of her songs was throbbing on the radio as they talked. For an illustrated survey of teen culture, see Time-Life’s volume,
This Fabulous Century: 1950–1960
(1970), especially for its facsimile pages from the sort of movie magazines that Lo and her pals consumed. The programmatic innocence that was proffered by these publications will come as a big surprise to younger readers, who expect scandal, and to aging scholars who have never before seen such stuff and only now can complete their education—really, if they want to understand the full reach of
Lolita.
“Patty,” an author’s error in the 1958 edition, has been changed to “Patti.”

Starasil
: an actual ointment.

trochaic lilt
: in prosody, a
trochee
is a foot of two syllables, the first stressed or half-stressed, and the second unstressed.

Huncan Dines
: the spoonerism hardly conceals Duncan Hines (1880–1959), author of such guidebooks as
Adventures in Good Eating, Lodging for a Night
, and
Duncan Hines’ Food Odyssey.

chère Dolorès
: French; dear Dolores—an insulting translation for bilingual readers.

comme … gentille
: French; as you know too well, my sweet one.