Lolita in Light of Sontag's "Morality"
My experience reading Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita was a pleasant one, an aesthetic experience that, as Susan Sontag states, appealed to my consciousness. Sontag suggests that art is better understood as something that "enliven[s] our sensibility and consciousness" rather than as a blanket statement of moral code. In other words, genuine works of art operate within the aesthetic sphere of experience and do not aim at antagonizing consciousness or action. However, while my reading of Lolita was enjoyable and moral, it was not without its challenges. In fact, several times I had to wonder at the character of Humbert and his perspective and whether his thoughts and actions revealed anything to me about myself. In this paper I will examine the meaning of my experience reading Lolita in light of Sontag's assertions about morality and aesthetic pleasure and show why Nabokov's book may be viewed...
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