A Father's Love

Note: I think James may have posted a relatively similar thing.

                In thinking about what to write for my final essay, it occurred to me that Humber has the same initials, H. H., as Lolita’s late father Harold Haze. Lolita has also lost her younger brother to illness. It was never mentioned how old Lolita was when her father passed away, and as far as I can recall there was no real mention of her father at all aside from when his death was spoken of. Lolita’s brother died when Lolita was a young child. Her father’s death could have occurred at any time from between the brother’s conception (though this seems unlikely) to just before Humbert appears (again, unlikely). Being that she never speaks of him one may assume that Lolita cannot remember her father and would only know him through stories and photographs if at all. There was also no mention of what sort of man Harold Haze was, which meant Lolita could have seen her father in nearly any man.

                That being said, when Humbert Humbert, another H. H., arrives at the Haze household, Lolita might never have wanted a sexual relationship but one of the father-daughter kind. All of the things which could be interpreted sexually change: Lolita grabbing Humbert’s hand in the car as she is yelled at by her mother is no longer a sexual advance but is now a child reaching out to whom she hopes could be like a gentle father for protection from her mother. When she runs upstairs and hugs him before leaving for camp, it was an example of a child’s unconditional love for their parent. Even when Lolita is older and realizes she is being the victim of abuse, she remains with him. And in the end she appears to harbor no hatred toward him.

                My thesis would have been something like “Due to her naivety and innocent nature as a child, Lolita had not realized Humbert’s intentions and looked to him not for a sexual relationship, but for a fatherly one in which she could trust him, feel protected by him and have the father-figure whom was absent throughout her childhood past.”