Nabokov's Nomadic Humor: Lolita

Wepler, Ryan

doi:10.1353/lit.2011.0045

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Of course, humour and horror, and comedy and tragedy can exist simultaneously, as Vladimir Nabokov's masterwork Lolita vividly illustrates. (Wepler, 2011) But this is not the genre of the sitcom paedophile, a defanged creature of the uncanny, whose function in the 'mistaken for a paedophile' humour of popular sitcoms such as Friends, extend beyond the grotesque body of this criminal figure towards beloved cultural characters of this era of American comic culture.…”

Section: Mr Zelner: [Looks Horrified]mentioning

confidence: 99%

Amusing Abusers and Humourless Survivors: Analysing the Role of Comedy in Media Representations of Sexual Violence

Lamont

2021

gmd

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This article reflects on the importance of comedy when considering media engagements with sexual abuse themes. This approach is informed by how closely the study of humour is rooted in the analysis of power relations, with comic theorists, both historical and contemporary, grounding the work.The comic figures of both the child sex (CS) abuser and the sexual violence survivor are first identified, before exploring what exactly about these tropes evoke laughter, and what this means for wider conceptions of interpersonal abuse and victimology. In analysing examples of CS abuser themed British and American comedy, animated adult comedies such as Family Guy (1999-present) and Monkey Dust (2003-2005) are considered in the context of early 2000s anxieties towards the suburban dirty old man and online child safety. In the case of the sexual violence survivor, Saturday Night Live’s 1993 ‘Is It Date Rape?’ sketch is considered within the context of 1990s anxieties regarding feminist campus politics, and is paralleled to the mid-2010s media panic surrounding British and American university students and trigger warnings through examples including The Simpson’s 2017 ‘Caper Chase’ episode and early to mid-2010s online academic polemics on the humourless feminist, such as Mark Fisher’s ‘Exiting The Vampire Castle’ (2013) and Jack Halberstam’s ‘You are Triggering Me!’ (2014). The article concludes by considering the changing consensuses for sexual violence themed humour in the Me Too era through the 2018 episode of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (2005-present) ‘Times Up For The Gang.’

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confidence: 99%

Amusing Abusers and Humourless Survivors: Analysing the Role of Comedy in Media Representations of Sexual Violence

Lamont

2021

gmd

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“…Of course, there is some social criticism, too. However, Nabokov's greatest achievement does not lie in his choice of paedophilia as a topic, but in his fascination for the English language and in literary style and figures of speech, including alliteration, parody, wordplay and irony for the purpose of humour (Torres-Nuñez, 2005;Wepler, 2011;Duckett, 2014). Similarly, Kubrick is also more interested in the art of film-making and innovation in film language (Biltereyst, 2015) and modes of expression than anything else (also exploiting the possibilities of audiovisual irony).…”

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Censoring Lolita’s sense of humor: when translation affects the audience’s perception

Zabalbeascoa¹

2021

Ideology, Censorship and Translation

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There are many reasons for taking an academic interest in both Nabokov's 1955 novel, Lolita, and its 1962 film adaptation by Kubrick. Not least of these is the interest per se of their work, in their quality (in both senses of the word) despite any controversy due to the theme chosen. Both works are growing in prestige. Their artists have a gift for provocation, but that alone is not enough for them to emerge as giants of literature and film-making. The point of interest here is the humorous nature of their work, and how that relates back to the nature of humour, and how all of this is relevant to translation studies, as illustrated in the examples presented. A useful measure for this venture is Adrian Lyne's own 1997 film version of Lolita, claiming as it does to be a more faithful rendering of the book than the 1962 one. Kubrick and Lyne both reflect much of Nabokov's novel, but only Kubrick's is (classified as) comedy. All other things being equal, mostly, this provides unique insight into the nature of humour (at least in comedy) and the benefits of translating it to be funny and, to fit the genre of comedy. We find that sex and taboo are alluded to by Kubrick in words and images, whereas Lyne is more visually explicit. The aim of this paper is to show a case study of how censorship, taboo and ideological misconceptions of an author's work can affect its perception by the public, so that it becomes unclear whether popular images of Lolita as a fictional character are a cause or a consequence of certain translations and new film versions such as Adrian Lyne's.

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Censoring Lolita's sense of humor: when translation affects the audience's perception

Zabalbeascoa

2016

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Nabokov's Nomadic Humor: Lolita

Cited by 3 publications

References 28 publications

Amusing Abusers and Humourless Survivors: Analysing the Role of Comedy in Media Representations of Sexual Violence

Amusing Abusers and Humourless Survivors: Analysing the Role of Comedy in Media Representations of Sexual Violence

Censoring Lolita’s sense of humor: when translation affects the audience’s perception

Censoring Lolita's sense of humor: when translation affects the audience's perception

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