I have sung the praise of my favorite book, Nabokov’s Lolita, time and time again. The impending fate of all the characters pulls me into the story even if I have read the book several times before, and Humbert Humbert’s musings coax you to the brink of wanting him to succeed at corrupting poor Dolly, and then firmly pulling you back into less morally challenged territory when Lolita’s predicament seeps through the pages in the form of tears staining the poor girl’s cheeks. Woah, longest sentence in ages!
Lolita will always be one of my top inspirations. Her retro ginghams and socks are perfectly complimented by her timeless persona: the girl we all were at a certain age, innocent yet at the brink of spawning that dreaded sex appeal, with the corruption of innocent young men lying just around the bend of every slim ankle. /sarcasm
Nabokov wrote a beautiful, romantic book on the feverish addiction of a perverted infatuation: a difficult feat to accomplish. And in Lolita he created a girl that is never really there as we only really see her through the lying eyes of HH, objectification at its finest/ugliest. But as I said: at the same time she is always there, in every girl. Because every girl is beautiful, just like every girl is ordinary. Most of the time, it’s the beholder that determines the part you play.
The french braiding, sweet white floral dress and bow adorned espadrilles SCREAM Lolita to me. And unlike Lolita, I am owning the image I project. I am the subject, I’m not the object. So this one’s for Dolly!
But to get to the important point I want to make:
Nabokov’s story raises interesting topics. Of course it is wrong that HH lusts after and corrupts a 12-14 year old girl. However, how different is this from our current youth culture? How is that so much more perverted than middle age moms lusting over Justin Bieber and Taylor Lautner, or sites like Perez Hilton ACHING to post crotch pictures of childstars like Miley Cyrus, or the entirety of tumblr fawning over our new, vastly underage it-girls Hailee Steinfeld, Elle Fanning and Chloe Moretz?
Truth is, youth equals beauty in our society. When we frown on people like Humbert Humbert, we should also recognize Links àa bit of him in ourselves: we all support that adoration for the uncorrupted by fainting over a gray hair, by accepting the fact that even the models who are used to play moms of teenagers in commercials look like fresh faced 25 year olds. Indirectly, we are all corrupting the youth of today by telling them that their time in the limelight is now, that girls are in their prime when they are still nubile and not yet overripe, that age and its signs are things to be ashamed of. We are all tiny little Humbert Humberts.
Whenever I visit tumblr or other blog’s inspiration posts, I am hit over the head with young boys and girls being presented as inspirational or even aspirational. Isn’t that slightly perverted as well?
THINK ABOUT IT
THE STYLING DUTCHMAN
