I asked a question about Nabokov's "Lolita" and it was removed. Why? Is the book still prohibited in States?

Question

Surely you have much more worse movies and TV than THAT. And they are not even well-written/performed.
Or is it some hate to Nabokov or foreigners in general?

I asked if she was a bad girl who slept around since childhood or he really seduced her and it made him... well, a person who seduces children accommodating, I used a real word to describe Humbert )

By the way, Shakespeare is violation guidelines, too. Titani
"Methought I was enamoured of an a///ss" is a violation... It is called "inappropriate speech".

You said that everyone could get this book from the library, so
why it is suddenly "censored" here? They can get "Midsummer night" too and see the word "a///ss"!!!

Answer 1

The censorship does get a bit silly sometimes. I've been kicked out of a chat room for typing the title of my favorite Roald Dahl book. I guess they have to stick to whatever rules they make though so people under 18 can participate.

As for the Lolita question, I think you have to ask yourself, if Lolita was a "bad girl," does that excuse Humbert's behavior? Also, Lolita is only portrayed through Humbert's words, so her past history and motivations are largely unknown to us. I think, in Humbert, Nabokov was trying to write a character that readers are tempted to like, even though most of us would find his actions unforgivable, so readers come to question themselves as judges of character and to consider how much people can be swayed by sympathy.

Answer 2

I'd have to see the question, but it certainly wasn't removed simply because it was about "Lolita." Neither, I'm sure, was it removed because "some hate Nabokov" (most probably wouldn't even know who he was) or "foreigners in general" (though there is some anti-foreign sentiment in the USA, the same can be said of every other country I've ever been to -and I've been to quite a few).
"Lolita", the book, is freely available in bookstores and libraries in the USA.
I certainly would like to see that question.

Well, if the word you used was "pedophile", we'll see if my answer now gets removed
But regarding your additional details, I'd say the answer to both your questions:
" . . .if she was a bad girl who slept around since childhood or he really seduced her and it made him... well, a person who seduces children . . . . ."

is yes.
But the BIG problem is the novel's "unreliable narrator", Humbert Humbert. How can we put much credit in HIS version of events?
Some have seen the whole story as symbolic - the totalitarian state raping individual freedom.
Some have seen it as ironic, but still about tyranny.
But if you take it only at "face-value", with no undertones (which I think would be a big mistake), I'd say that you would have to see Lolita as a "seductress" AND Humbert as a "seducer."

Rather a match made in heaven - or hell.


And I can't believe that the word "a s s" was censored - but it was. Yikes, I'd say Yahoo Answers is being one.

1ass
Pronunciation:
\ˈas\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
Middle English, from Old English assa, probably from Old Irish asan, from Latin asinus
Date:
before 12th century
1: any of several hardy gregarious African or Asian perissodactyl mammals (genus Equus) smaller than the horse and having long ears; especially : an African mammal (East asinus) that is the ancestor of the donkey
2sometimes vulgar : a stupid, obstinate, or perverse person —often compounded with a preceding adjective

Dear actormyk,
Humbert as the narrator in Lolita is a problem because we get to see the girl ONLY from his POV.
As a result, we can't really know for sure whether or not she "encouraged" his advances (in the movie, they certainly made it seem that way, but in the book, the reader would have to accept Humbert's version of events to reach that conclusion.)
Yes, Huckleberry Finn is a "naive" narrator, but Twain uses that very fact to give irony to Huck's observations. Here's a young, uneducated kid who's a LOT smarter than all those grown-ups around him.

Answer 3

I hope you read the book some time. Kubrick's film is an interesting adaption but the more recent one misses the point of the book entirely.

There is something undeniably tragic about Humbert. Barely into his teens, he is deeply smitten by a girl his own age who becomes ill and dies. The trauma stunts his emotional development. Nabokov isn't in any way endorsing paedophilia, but sharing his insight into the processes that produce these damaged individuals.

Nabokov's sympathy, and the reader's, rests overwhelmingly with Lolita, though.

The reader has the sense throughout Humbert's narrative that the man is delusional ... that he certainly perceives the perfectly natural ( and in a healthy society, innocent )exploration by a young teen of her emergent sexuality, as attempts at 'seduction'. Lolita's world (our world) is so distorted even she might see it that way, but Nabokov doesn't and nor does he encourage the reader to.

Even Humbert is occasionally unable to dupe himself. Remember, when he first tells her her mother is dead, they are alone in a hotel far from her home. She knows what he wants and tearfully rejects him and flees, only to return later that night because, as he observes, "where else could she go?". Read the book again and really think about it. This is not some tiresome moralising treatise ... it isn't really even about sex so much as about the damage that can be inflicted on a human psyche and the ways that cycle can be perpetuated.

Right near the end of the book I remember I broke down and sobbed at a passage where Humbert grasps, on some level, that he has ruined this girls life, even though for him what he felt was the only sort of 'love' he was capable of.

I think if we're going to resort to ecclesiastical references, rather than 'marriage made in hell', it might be more appropriate to reflect 'there but for the grace of God'. (Which I think is a nice sentiment even though I'm an atheist.)

Answer 4

I think that the United States has gone too far overboard in trying to protect its children from everything coming and going to the point that there are now alcohol-free New Years celebrations but restaurants where children can sit at the bar! Again, I think in order to protect some children, someone may not have liked the relationship that Lolita has with other men, especially at her age. I mean, if you think about it, the "catch" to Lolita is her age. That book would not be anything if Lolita were of an older, consenting age. I doubt that it has anything to do with an unreliable narrator because there have been plenty of books with unreliable or even naive narrators. Huck Finn says "Jim was powerful smart for a n*****." without realizing what he has said. The lesson we draw from it is that Jim is powerful smart, period and the color of his skin NOW doesn't matter, but it did back then when Huck considered Jim not much more than property. I think that the reason that Catcher in the Rye is banned so many places is because the narrator, Holden Caulfield, uses the "gd" word so much. But in his defense, Holden is little more than a mixed up teenager who is trying to impress us with how grown up he is by his ability to cuss. It's not like we ban all plays about a couple of mixed-up teenagers by Shakespeare.

Answer 5

If it was reported and removed, the Yahoo! Answers team should have sent you an email informing you that it was removed. In that email, they will give you instructions of appealing the decision. If you didn't receive an email, go to the Help section of this forum and ask how you can make an appeal there.

Lolita is about pædophilia, and in that much it is an inherently controversial work. However, it is also a great work of literature, and it is not banned in the US, nor should its discussion be banned in this forum. As long as your language and the nature of your question is respectable, you should be able to successfully appeal your question to the Yahoo! Answers team.

Good luck!

**Edit** I just read your additional details, and it sounds like you may need to tone down your language - and possibly even alter the nature of your question. That question may indeed be a bit on edge for a forum that is frequented by 11 and 12 year olds. If you ask who was the true initator of the realationship (instead of "did the girl sleep around"), you're asking essentially the same question, but in a more respectful way. Sound good?
.

Answer 6

well people of all ages use yahoo answers so maybe it was talking about something that was a bit....sensored??