sensuous images of enchantment givenway to sinister tones, and irony cuts intonself-indulgence.nConsider the long passage that introducesnthe reader to the almost mythicalnpower of nymphets. Humbert begins bynevoking an “enchanted island” in time,nsurrounded by “mirrory beaches and rosynrocks,” and inhabited by maidens betweennnine and fourteen whose beauty is irresistible.nAs he proceeds, however, itnbecomes clear from his own words thatnthis beauty is not only irresistible butnalso dangerous and reprehensible.nNymphets possess a “fey grace,” but theirncharm is “insidious” and “soul-shattering.”nTo love them, you have to be “annartist and a madman, a creature of infinitenmelancholy, with a bubble of hot poisonnin your loins and a super-voluptuous flamenpermanently aglow in your subtle spinen(oh, how you have to cringe and hide!).”nHere the imagery and even the syntax—nthe effect of the parenthesis, for examplen— clearly function as instruments ofnmoral judgment as well as means ton”aesthetic bliss”: “a bubble of hot poison”nis not an invitation to vicarious lechery.nSurely Humbert is not a “good” mannof the kind that one editor simplisticallynrequired, but his view of himself is hardlynjustificatory, and his presentation of Lolitanrefrains from dwelling upon her as a merenobject of desire. Indeed, the honesty withnwhich he portrays her adolescence compelsnhim to record his gradual recognitionnof the monstrosity of what he does tonher. Near the end of the novel, havingnunderstood that Lolita has abandoned himnforever—she has left Quilty and is morenor less contentedly married to a verynordinary fellow named Dick—Humbertnrecalls an earlier scene, during their affair,nwhen he caught her observing the normalnaffection between another father andndaughter: “I saw Lolita’s smile lose all itsnlight… It had become gradually clear tonmy conventional Lolita during our singularnand bestial cohabitation that evennthe most miserable of family lives wasnbetter than the parody of incest, which,nin the long run, was the best I couldnoffer the waif.”nJ. he story of the love between the mannwho wrote this and the “waif” he describesncannot be reduced to “the copulationnof cliches.” Pornography dehumanizesnbecause it incites us to think of mennand women as mere instruments of pleasure;nLolita steadfastly refuses the reductionismnof lust. DnSentimentality as Oppression and DeliverancenVladimir Nabokov: Pnin; Doubledayn& Co.; New York, 1957.nby Christopher Manionnlimofey Pavlovich Pnin, AssistantnProfessor of Russian at a college in NewnEngland, is as difficult to understand asnhis name is to pronounce. We come uponnhim sometime in 1954, on the way tongive a lecture in Cremona, only to findnthat he has boarded the wrong train.nThroughout the story we wondernwhether Pnin wasn’t born into the wrongnworld, slightly out of tune with himselfnas life brings him burdens and he bringsnothers a sense of the ridiculous, almost ancommonplace spoof of the madcap professor.nWaindell College is certainly a caricaturenof the ivied halls, complete with annartificial lake, portraits of campus contemporariesncarrying on with the likesnof Aristotle and Pasteur, and a Frenchndepartment head who can’t “do the parleyvoo”nbut opines that Chateaubriand wasnMr. Manion is a graduate from NotrenDame in the field of political theory.na famous chef.nPnin, an untenured Assistant Professornfor nine years, finds life painful: henmoves nearly every semester (for “sonicnreasons”), spends as much time as possiblenamong the musty old volumes innthe library, and gloats in the knowledgenthat the decreasing number of studentsnin his classes each year will allow himnmore time for research. Unquestionablynout of his element in America, he adaptsnby learning the English of FenimorenCooper, Edgar Poe, and thirty-one presidents.nDr. Hagen, his department head,nis his sole supporter in a sea of strangersnwho see him only as a comic figure; Pninnresponds with an excessive familiaritynwith the mother tongue, and we arentreated continually to his Pninisms:n”There is an old American saying thatnpeople who live in glass houses shouldnnot kill two birds with one stone.” Thensadness sinks deeper when we are toldnfrom the start that “as a teacher, Pninnwas far from being able to compete withnthose stupendous Russian ladies scatterednall over academic America, who, withoutnhaving any formal training at all, manage,nnnsomehow, by dint of intuition, loquacity,nand a kind of maternal bounce, to infusena magic knowledge of their difficult andnbeautiful tongue into a group of innocenteyednstudents in an atmosphere of MothernVolga songs, red caviar, and tea.”nA sad figure indeed. What no one atnWaindell knows (and which makes himnall the more worthy of our compassion)nis that he was once married to a Russiannwoman in Paris, who married him onlynbecause another man rejected her. Shenleft Pnin after the wedding, then reappearednto secure herself safe passage tonAmerica with Pnin, her legal spouse,nand her lover and next husband, a certainnDr. Wind, on the same ship. Liza—thatnwas her Russian name, though Pninncalled her Elise—was a student of RosettanStone, “one of the more destructivenpsychiatrists of the day,” and DoctornWind was so immured in group analysisnthat he considered even Siamese twinsnas a “group.”ntnin is a multilayered novel. At onenpoint, Liza visits Waindell to tell Pninnthat her son, Victor, will enter a nearbyn13nChronicles of Culturen