Responding and Reflecting Blog Post #2

Book: Lolita
Lens: Feminist Lens


          Reading from the Feminist Lens is interesting because the book is written from Humbert's point of view. However, as I have continued to read I noticed that many of the female characters are not fleshed out or given much background in this book. Although the purpose of the book seems to shine light on the reality of pedophilia, the other "of-age" female characters in the book are not given a back story or insight to their thoughts and feelings beyond their initial introductions or brief interactions.
         Off the bat, I noted Humbert's views towards women as he begins telling his story. In the beginning he quotes, " I was, and still am, despite mes malheurs, an exceptionally handsome male... I could attain any adult female I chose" (25).  Humbert views these women are possessions and later describes his attraction to young girls as a "dangerous desire". By describing his illegal attraction for young girls as a "desire", in a way romanticizes and attempts to excuse his pedophilic behavior. He refers to these girls and women as things and does not really pay attention to their feelings in his actions. It also connects back to his lack of for these females.    Before Lolita is mentioned and he is speaking about Annabel. he mentions his relationships with her as a child. but then abruptly also mentions that she died from a sickness. The reason I bring this up is because I found it disturbing that he went into detail about their encounters and the way he felt about her, but then when she died he did not mention how he felt about it or how she died. She had just died and that was the end of that. Although she was the one who left, he also kind of "threw her away" and went about it like he could have easily found some else to replace her.
     When I was reading through this novel, I could relate it back to an Law & Order: SVU episode I saw once about a guy who was locked away in jail for many years after his 15-year old's GF's parents reported him to the police for being a sex offender. At the time of the incident, he was 18 and she was 15 but because he was locked away for so long he kept the image of her when she looked 15 in her head and when he got out of jail he looked for 15 year old girls who looked like her so he could kidnap them and have sex with them because his once 15 year old GF was now old when he got out jail. He did not want that. In both of these scenarios, the pedophiles had no thought for the child's life before their actions. They only look to fulfill their selfish needs and treat these women like possessions.

- Grecia



 

Why I Chose the Psychoanalytical Lens

Prathik Vemulapalli

Why I Chose the Psychoanalytical Lens

A. I thought the psychoanalytical lens would be particularly interesting for a variety of reasons. The main reason this topic interested me is that it is looking at the author instead of the writing or time. By looking at the author instead of just looking at obvious interpretations I believe that their are things we can see that the other him or herself might not even see. From my personal experience I have noticed that when me or others write we subconsciously let our personal opinions show even when we are trying to be honest. I wanted to see if the same could be said for the views of an author based on what he or she is writing. 

D. Another lens I was thinking of doing was the New Historicism lens. This is because while I personally believe writing is not as slanted as some believe I could see how the higher class would have more of an imprint on literature and it would be interesting to see if that effect could be seen in literature of past times and if it really was as biased as some see it to be.

WHY I CHOSE THIS LENS?

Hello readers,

    I chose to do the Feminist lens because it took an interesting perspective to a book that was about child abuse, regarding a female child. I believe that the author's intentions for writing this book would have been somewhat influenced by their views on women and gender roles. Keeping in mind, that the interactions in this book are typically an older male and a young girl, we can ask ourselves : Would the situation be different if the interaction was between an older female and a young boy? Considering the roles of females at the time this book was made or even now that people are reading, is an important element in interpreting the text. In addition, since the entire text is through the perspective of a male, it would be interesting to see how this character and how the author writes this male's view on female roles. Overall, I am excited to read the book and see what feminist take I can approach as I go and analyze each portion of the text.

- Grecia