Stylistic Devices In Lolita Cues

The picture of persuasion Vladimir Nabokov paints throughout Lolita cues the reader through its language, stylistic devices of repetition, metaphor and alliteration. This passage is no exception as the readers is thrown into a pool of ambiguity, left to their own devices and the seduction of Humbert Humbert to discern what is right or wrong? Worthy of forgiveness? Is Charlotte’s death Humbert’s fault? There are no clear answers and this is precisely what makes good literature what makes Lo lee ta the demonic nymphet.
The passages weird interview which Humbert mentions is with the driver of the car who hit his wife and the offering of funeral payments he gives. His acceptance of the offer throws the ‘gentlemen’ off and foreshadows the way Humbert …show more content…
The use of alliteration ‘sun and shade and the wet and weak and the strong and the stone’, ‘hurrying housewife’ this rhythm almost musicality Nabokov creates when describing a most gruesome accident paints it as something much more beautiful. The abstract description distancing us the reader from the direct impact of the car crash. The repeated consonance soothes the reader into a relaxed almost docile state this along with the repeated structure of ‘and the’ not only stress Humbert’s eloquence but drive the reader towards a more forgiving interpretation of the event as opposed to some vulgar description of her bloody carcass where our reaction might be completely different. The alliteration further stresses each point as if convincing us in an argument it was not I but the wet and the weak.... Furthermore he blames fate this passage is subtly an absolving of guilt or at the very least of most of it, yet it is simultaneously true and helps cue us towards the empathetic gaze many of us are cultivated towards