THERE’S A LOT more to Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) than Lolita. Born into extreme wealth in czarist Saint Petersburg, Nabokov fled Russia with his family in the wake of the Bolshevik Revolution. He published nine novels in Russian—his first language—before switching to English in the 1940s. Though his life was remarkable, and his other books like Pale Fire are considered classics, Nabokov’s name is synonymous with Lolita, the story of Humbert Humbert, a middle-aged pedophile who has sex with his twelve-year-old stepdaughter. Scandal erupted when Lolita was first published in 1955—and was banned in France, though not in America. Some found the book repugnant, immoral, or pornographic, but others saw humor in Lolita, reading it as a parody of American culture, melodramatic romance stories, and Freudian analysis. Today Lolita is just as edgy and unsettling as it was in 1955. How much do you know about “that book by Nabokov”? Take this quiz and find out.
1. In what language was Lolita originally written?
2. What is Lolita’s real name?
3. As the narrator Humbert Humbert writes his memoir from prison, he awaits trial for what crime?
4. What does Humbert Humbert call the young girls to whom he is so attracted?
5. Bonus question: What children’s story, whose author had a controversial obsession with young girls, did Nabokov translate into Russian?
6. What was Nabokov’s other profession?
ANSWERS
1. English. Lolita was first published in France, though, because at first no American publisher would touch it. It became a bestseller in 1955.
2. Dolores Haze.
3. Murder.
4. Nymphets.
5. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll.
6. Nabokov also taught entomology at Harvard and discovered several new species of butterfly, including “Nabokov’s wood nymph.”