![]() ![]() She acknowledged none of the bruises incurred along the way, nor did she reveal that she had been Humbert Humbert’s greatest champion from the start. ![]() “When a masterpiece like ‘Lolita’ enters the world, the only problem is finding a publisher,” Véra Nabokov replied. Meeting with little satisfaction, the reporter changed tack: “Did your husband ask your advice before publishing?” To that question, the answer was simple. Nabokov Is 38 Years Older Than the Nymphet Lolita”) or for the reporter who asked, in 1959, “Were you the model for anyone in ‘Lolita’?” She had typed the pages of “ The Gift” in which a character proposes a plot by which a man should marry a widow so as to seduce her daughter, “still quite a little girl-you know what I mean-when nothing is formed yet but already she has a way of walking that drives you out of your mind.” Which is not to say that she was remotely prepared for the headlines (“Mrs. She knew his early work to be full of Humbertian prototypes, or at least of middle-aged men who fidget under spells cast by underage girls. ![]() The tale of a forty-year-old seducer of pubescent girls began, “How can I come to terms with myself?” For many years, its author wrongly believed that he had destroyed it. She had met him in his earliest incarnation, well before the wintry night in Paris when her husband read aloud, to a few intimates, a short story from 1939, written in Russian. She covered more ground with Humbert Humbert than did any other woman, Lolita included. ![]()
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