In this article we will talk about the most scandalous work of Vladimir Nabokov - the novel "Lolita". The summary of the book will be our main topic.
The work was originally written in English and published in 1955. Later, Nabokov himself translated it into Russian. The work is recognized as one of the best novels of the XX century. By the way, the first circulation of the novel was withdrawn from the publishing house, and the book is banned in France, England and several other countries due to pornographic content.
Lolita Summary
The main character of the novel, Humbert Humbert is 37 years old, he teaches French literature and has a strange penchant for girls from 9 to 14 years old, nymphet. An old childhood memory caused this desire and forever averted it from mature women.
The work is written as a confession novel, the author of which is Humbert, who is in prison. And the events that he describes took place in the summer of 1947. 10 years earlier, he lived in Paris and was married, but his wife left him and fled with her lover. Humbert himself decided after that to move to America. Here he takes a room for rent in the house of Madame Charlotte Haze, who has a twelve-year-old daughter who had Dolores - Law, or Lolita.
Marriage to Charlotte
The summary of Lolita is replete with descriptions of the passion that the protagonist for Lolita experiences. But then comes the moment when they decide to send the girl to a summer camp. At the same time, Charlotte, her mother, writes a letter to Humbert, in which he confesses his love and invites him to be not a tenant, but a roommate. The hero accepts this proposal and marries her, thinking that from now on nothing will interfere with his communication with Lolita.
But then it turns out that Charlotte decided to send Law to a boarding house, and then to Beardsley College. All of Humbert's hopes are crumbling in an instant. Once, when she and Charlotte went for a swim in a forest lake, Humbert almost decided to drown his wife. But his plans were hindered by a neighbor-artist who was watching them.
Soon Charlotte fell into the hands of Humbert's diary, where he describes his feelings for Lolita. A scandal is being played out. Humbert does not know what to do. Charlotte runs out of the apartment in anger and tears and accidentally gets hit by a car.
Life with Lolita
During all that happened, she was in the summer camp of Lolita. The summary describes how, after his wife’s funeral, Humbert takes the girl and tells her that her mother is in the hospital.
Humbert decides to move from one city to another with Lo. He brings the girl to the hotel; he suffers all night from lust and fear. And in the morning Lolita wakes up and seduces her stepfather herself. It turns out that she is not a virgin.
After this, Humbert tells Law the truth about her mother. The following year, they travel to America, living in hotels. As a result, the hero decides to take the girl to Beardsley to the east of the country, where she will study in a private gymnasium.
On the road again
January 1, 1949 celebrates its 14th birthday Lolita. The summary describes to us the changes that have occurred to her - she no longer looks like a nympho, in her vocabulary a lot of rudeness and curses. In addition, Law extorts money from Humbert and saves it. The hero suspects that the girl wants to escape from him.
In the summer of 1949, he takes Lolita away from the gymnasium, and their new journey begins. Humbert is tormented by thoughts and suspicions - it seems to him that Law is cheating on him. Somehow he notices a car following them. The hero cannot understand who this is - a private detective or Lolita's lover.
The escape
“Lolita” - a book (a summary is presented in the article) is rather ambiguous. It is very difficult to find heroes and villains, saints and sinners here, which confirms the next episode.
In Elphinstone, the girl is seriously ill, she is taken to the hospital. Humbolt's health soon worsens. Having recovered, the hero comes to the hospital for Lolita, but it turns out that on the eve of her "uncle" had already taken her.
Lolita disappears from the life of Humbert for three and a half years. At first he looked for Luo, then he nearly lost his mind, met the thirty-year-old Rita, who saved him. Then the hero worked for a year at Kantrip University. And in 1953 in New York, he receives a letter from Law. She reports that she is married and expecting a baby. With her husband, they are going to Alaska, but before that they need to pay debts, but there is absolutely no money.
History of lo
Humbert is looking for Lolita, who lives in a shack with a deaf husband, a war veteran. The girl says that she was abducted by a famous playwright, whom she met at the gymnasium. He brought her to the ranch, where drugs, drunkenness, perversions and orgies awaited her. Lolita refused to participate in this, after which she was thrown out into the street. From that moment on, hard days began, she interrupted penniless earnings, met her future husband, and so she ended up in this terrible place.
Humbert leaves Lolita money - income from the house that remained from her mother, and goes in search of the playwright.
Denouement
The Lolita novel is drawing to a close. The chapter summary describes how Humbert found the playwright and killed him after a hard fight.
The hero begins to write this confession in a hospital for the mentally ill, and then in prison, where he awaits the verdict of the court. However, Humbert did not wait for a decision, dying of a heart attack. And soon after him, Lolita dies during childbirth, her daughter also dies.