How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Book.Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
The whole point is that the old link between the adult world and the child world has been completely severed nowadays by new customs and new laws […] After all, Lolita was only twelve, and no matter what concessions I made to time and place—even bearing in mind the crude behavior of American schoolchildren—I still was under the impression that whatever went on among those brash brats, went on at a later age, and in a different environment. (1.28.2)
Humbert struggles with the obvious unattractive qualities in children. He often reluctantly confesses that Lolita is just as ordinary as the rest.
Quote #8
And so we rolled East, I more devastated than braced with the satisfaction of my passion, and she glowing with health; her bi-iliac garland still as brief as a lad's, although she had added two inches to her stature and eight pounds to her weight. (2.3.19)
OK, time to get out your dictionary. Humbert's obsession with certain parts of Lolita's young body is downright disturbing.
Quote #9
She was only the faint violet whiff and dead leaf of the nymphet I had rolled myself upon with such cries in the past (2.29.67)
At only seventeen, Lolita has lost the bloom of youth. Shades of the nymphet can barely be discerned when Humbert visits a pregnant and married Lolita. But he still loves her. What does that suggest?