Finding Lolita – the inspiration behind the classic

Ever since I was a little girl, 'Lolita' fascinated me. I realize, as I write, that this might seem a bit of an odd sentence, but it's not. Not really.
People are fascinating, and I think Vladimir Nabokov would agree. He seemed to think so, too. In fact, I think that's what prompted him to write Lolita.
But that's as may be, there are a lot of stories out there about why and how Nabokov wrote this immortal masterpiece. And I don't know which is true, I suppose few people do, but I have heard a few stories as to where and how Lolita was born and I'll tell you those.

1. Monkey see, monkey do

This one is the most beautiful, I think, and a very very sad one. There is so much imagery in it, that it spoke to me, as a young writer.
In his book 'On a book entitled Lolita', Nabokov wrote this beautiful passage:

'As far as I can recall, the initial shiver of inspiration was somehow prompted by a newspaper story about an ape in the Jardin des Planetes, who, after months of coaxing by a scientist, produced the first, drawing ever charcoaled by an animal: the sketch showed the bars of the poor creature's cage.'

Isn't this just amazing? I thought so, too. I think this paragraph just goes to show how swiftly inspiration can strike, how many stories there are out there, how easy to see a voice, a character and a dilemma. It's incredible, they're literally everywhere.
This was my favorite one, although it's the one I can speak about the least. What can you say about it?
Nabokov said it all.

2. A maiden there lived...

Whom you may know by the name of Annabel Lee. Or Annabel Leigh?
As some of you may recall, the former is the name of a poem (and a beautiful young girl), written by horror master Edgar Allan Poe. The latter is the name of Humbert Humbert's childhood sweetheart.

I remember when I first read 'Annabel Lee', I was shocked at the similarities, I felt certain the two must be connected.
And the more I read through them, the more connections I found, the more in awe I was. I mean think about it, here's Poe's poem, in which two youths fall in love, despite aversion from her family. A story in which the speaker, the man, becomes obsessed with the object of his love and grows extremely possessive towards her.

And this maiden she lived with no other thought/ Than to love and be loved by me.

And a story in which the young woman dies, is killed by the envious angels, perhaps and leaves the man behind. Alone, but still obsessed.
Throughout the poem, there are hints at a very dark side of the speaker, like:

But we loved with a love that was more than love

This initially could come off as a declaration of love, a lover's exaggeration. But if you think about it, what is more than love? Doesn't that sound like suffocation, to you, like a sense of belonging and having someone that can be deeply hurting for the receiver of this “love”?

And here is this other story, Lolita, written more than a hundred years later, that continues that same tale. It is a new and improved version, if you will, for the speaker has been given a name – Humbert Humbert – and we see the deadly, horrendous consequences of his childhood infatuation with Annabel Leigh.

It seems that the speaker in the poem, or Humbert, if you will, never let go of his dead sweetheart, nursing his obsession of the little Annabel and looking to find her again. We can assume he is the victim of some stunted development, probably imposed by the childhood trauma of losing Annabel (who is taken away by her parents – duh – and later dies of typhus).
And in this state, he finds another Annabel. He meets the twelve-year old Dolores and tries to relive his love story with Annabel, casting her as a second version, as a pattern to fit the broken image in his head. Or perhaps, a way to get over Annabel.

I am convinced, however, that in a certain magic and fateful way Lolita began with Annabel.

And what happens next is history. Again, this is fantastic to me – the idea that after a hundred years, Nabokov came and decided yeah, I'll pick up where Poe left off is terribly poetic. Of course, of the two, Lolita is the more famous one, mainly due to its dark, taboo story – it is, after all, the tale of a 36 year old pedophile who becomes obsessed with a 12 year old girl. Poe's poem doesn't deal with such a hard topic. Which makes one wonder...why did Nabokov choose to tackle such a subject?

3. The Real Lolita?

A while back, I came across this most unnerving article about the 'real' Lolita. It was a very long, detailed piece, that told the harrowing story of twelve-year-old Sally Horner, who was abducted by a known child molester, in 1948. Well, she wasn't abducted in the violent way you might expect, but by words. A far more crueler way.

For short, she was trying to impress some classmates one day, who challenged her to steal a notebook. Sally, who had never done such a thing in her life, was mortified. But she wanted to impress the girls, so she went in the store, snatched the notebook and stuffed it in her bag, heading for the exit.
However, she never made it, because a tall, scary man stopped her, and told her he was an FBI agent, that she was arrested and would be sent to the reformatory. Then, he pretended to take pity on the girl, and changed his tune.
He told the crying, pleading girl that he would be merciful and let her go, if she would report to him from time to time. Unable to believe her luck, the little girl agreed and went on her way.

But the next day, the FBI agent showed up again, telling her the plan had changed and she now had to accompany him to Atlantic City, and to lie to her mother that she was going over the summer with a friend's family. Which she did.

Almost needless to say that the FBI agent was not an agent at all, but convicted child rapist, Frank LaSalle, who'd recently gotten out of prison. But this revelation came to Sally and her mother far too late. By that time, the girl was already gone away with this monster, on a cross-country journey, painfully resembling that of Humbert and Lolita.
They lived under fake names and as father and daughter, again, like in the novel.
Eventually, a neighbor, Ruth Janish became suspicious of the pair, doubting that LaSalle was Sally's father, after all. She tried to get to the truth, but Sally didn't really want to speak, for fear of repercussion. But, eventually, Janish got the truth out of the terrified girl and made her call her mother.
Sally got through to her family, who in turn called the real FBI and the little girl was saved. And LaSalle was arrested.
According to the article, this monster robbed Sally of almost two years of her life.

Had I done to Dolly, perhaps, what Frank LaSalle, a fifty-year-old mechanic, had done to eleven-year-old Sally Horner in 1948?
Humbert Humbert

I'm sorry if this got a bit dark. It's a dark story, and I suppose it's natural for it to have even darker origins. Again, I don't know if these were the actual inspirations for the book. Only Nabokov may know what was in his head. But I'd say they're pretty close.

Thank you for reading,

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