Why AP?

Hi guys, welcome back to my fourth post! In this post, I'm going to be discussing the reason that I think Lolita, though a pretty mature and disturbing book as a whole, would make a good book to use on an AP exam and why it is of sufficient "literary merit."

(Spoiler alert: March fourth's post, a.k.a. my final post, is going to bee about the meaning of Lolita as a whole; I'm putting it off to give myself more time to digest the book I've just finished).

Previously on Lolita, as you may or may not remember, Lolita finally escaped her stepfather with another man. After this, our crazy [in love] friend Humbert retraces his and Lolita's steps to literally all of the hundreds of hotels and motels the two of them stayed in to see if he can figure out her current whereabouts. That's in bold to stress how intent Humbert is on getting Lolita back and the lengths he'll go to do just that. As he does this, he figures out all the fake names Lolita's "captor" used to follow them and remain anonymous so Humbert didn't know he was doing it.

(Side note: even after finishing the book, it's STILL unclear to me why Lolita didn't just up and leave Humbert and go with him if he was going to do it anyway later...I guess I could understand caring about him and not wanting to leave at all, but why not leave sooner rather than later if she was going to anyway)?

Anyway... A pining Humbert writes poetry about Lolita and puts a want ad in the paper for her; he even hires a detective (this basically goes nowhere). He gets rid of her clothes and other possessions to try to get over her, but this doesn't help. For two years, Humbert begins a relationship with a woman named Rita, who is pretty intellectually dull compared to Humbert but sweet and caring towards him. After a long time has passed, Humbert receives a letter from a now married and pregnant Lolita requesting money because she and her new husband are struggling. Humbert, of course, tracks them down and at first plans on killing her husband, though this doesn't end up happening after he realizes that he isn't the man that "kidnapped" his stepdaughter. It doesn't take long for Humbert to realize he's still in love with her even though she's in her late teens and therefore isn't a nymphet anymore. This kind of surprised me, but I don't know what else I expected, so I guess it didn't surprise me that much. Lolita tells her father about a man named Quilty (her real "kidnapper") who she considered to be the love of her life, more so even than her own husband. Humbert begs Lolita to come away with him, and even though she doesn't, still gives her and her husband the money they need to live. Surprise, surprise: his next step is to track down Quilty and kill him with the gun he's been carrying around for years. Meanwhile, before describing Quilty and Humbert's encounter, Humbert realizes that he basically destroyed Lolita's childhood and never really cared about knowing her thoughts and feelings in spite of declaring himself in love with her (things us as readers have known all along and are probably relieved to hear him finally proclaim). Humbert revisits "the old Haze house" and finally arrives at Quilty's home, where they speak for a long time and Quilty defends himself and begs Humbert not to kill him, even though he eventually does. Thus, we finally figure out why Humbert is a murderer. Humbert wishes Lolita well in her life with her husband and baby, and he finishes the book leaving the reader with no doubt of his devotion for her.

So. Is this an AP worthy book? Absolutely. I think that this book addresses the concept of human connection that has been evident in all of the books we've read in our English class thus far. I looked up a bunch of practice Question 3 essay questions from the past, and Humbert would work for several of them: any question regarding a character with unusual traits or characteristics, someone whose past impacts their actions of the future, literally anything regarding love and/or what it does to others, etc. Lolita would work for several questions also: her intentional deception and the reasons behind it, coming of age, our surroundings influencing us, etc. The characters of Humbert and Lolita, and the situation they find themselves in, are fascinating and multi-faceted, which makes it easy to use either of them for almost any Question 3 essay question. Vladimir Nabokov (the author of Lolita) also stands out in my mind as an author different from anyone in his time and even today. Because Lolita was considered to be such a controversial book in its time and today, especially because it's been banned in so many places, Nabokov stands out as someone who was pushing boundaries and making people think. Plus, the language and prose in the book, as I've said a million times before and I'll say again, are absolutely beautiful and contribute to the complexity and manipulativeness of Humbert's character. All of these things absolutely give Lolita significant literary merit. However, I don't think this book should be added to the curriculum. Sure, it would help on an AP test if you have happened to have read the book, but this is a really heavy and disturbing book that's not for everyone and I found hard to get through at certain points. To sum up, I basically think that the book would be really helpful on an AP test if one decided to read it and the book certainly has literary merit, but it shouldn't necessarily be mandatory to read because of how disturbing and (at times) frightening it is.

Thanks so much for reading my fourth blog post! I'm all done the book now, and I hope all of those who were reading the book along with me overall enjoyed it as much as I did. See you guys on March 4 for my last post! :)