Levels Of Focalization And Narration In Lolita

Vladimir Nabokov is one of the most prestigious writers in the American literary world of the twentieth century. His language has a unique style and distinctive features. Born in Russia, he emigrated to the U.S. in1940 and began to use English for his literary creating, and thereafter published a great deal of poetry, fictions, essays, and literature reviews. Nabokov is recognized as one of the most distinguished American writers by critics. However, it is the novel Lolita, which was written in 1950s, that brought Nabokov global recognition and broad literary reputation.One of the striking achievements of Lolita is that as an immigrant writer, Nabokov successfully creates a realistic American social and cultural background for his novels, which most native American writers failed to surpass. However, to a great extent, this real sense is essential merely as the natural background and does not endow any realistic meaning in sociological aspect to Humbert's desire. Nabokov has always been a magician obsessed with manipulating illusions. Under his pen, Humbert and Lolita exist in reality and fancy at the same time.Like many other characters in Nabokov's works, Humbert is extremely an individualist artist in disguise. He is instinctively sensitive, imaginative, as well as paranoid and cruel. In the novel, he quotes a poet's expression,"The moral sense in mortals is the duty.We have to pay on the mortal sense of beauty"(Nabokov, Lolita 283). Of course, in Lolita, the so-called"aesthetic"is not only referred to poetic art, but also full of cruelty and guilt. As Humbert's object of desire, Lolita is nothing but a product of his consciousness, a fantasy he attempts to possess from the outside reality and time.Yet Lolita is not a simple character. Although Lolita's words are deliberately filtered by the first-person narrator Humbert, her scattered speech reveals that a secret remains in her inner world. Humbert is capable of restricting her body, but he can not control her mind. Lolita's independent existence as an individual can still be detected.Therefore, in the course of narration, Lolita is Humber's prey; while in the course of focalization, Humbert is a prisoner of Lolita. He is imprisoned by Lolita's so-called"nymphet charm,"or more exactly, he is killed by his own mental illusion. Lolita is a memoir in the first-person narration. However, Nabokov adopts a variety of narrative methods and focalization to constitute a multi-level narrative, instead of simply following the traditional way.Mieke Bal did in-depth research in the field of levels of narration and focalization. Based on her theory, this paper attempts to illustrate the features of levels of narration and focalization in Lolita and reveal the narrative effect through the analysis of narrative strategies in dealing with focalization in the narrative process, as well as point out the dual identities of Lolita. On the one hand, she is dependent as a product of Humbert's fantasy, while on the other hand she is an independent individual. Through the analysis on levels of focalization, it can be found that the narrator Humbert is the focalizer of the first level, while the character Humbert is the focalizer of the second level, whereas Lolita's focalization alone is absent. Placed in the position of being focalized, Lolita is highlighted as a product of the narrator's illusion, thus her independent identity becomes blurred. The structure of the narration is distinct and can be divided into two levels. The prisoner Humbert is the narrator of the first level as well as the novel's main narrator, therefore all the events and utterance must be brought forth through his narration. Lolita's narration is controlled due to its hypodiegetic nature. Lolita's narration is much more to be suppressed than be honestly recorded. The levels of focalization and narration suggest that on the one hand, Lolita is the prey in Humbert's focalization and the silent supporting actress in his narration; on the other hand, the independence of Lolita as an individual cannot be completely obliterated. His avoidance from Lolita's independent identity and his indulgence in his own illusion are factors that result in his tragedy.