Books: Humming Along With Nabokov

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There are only two reasons for such a book: gossip and style. Lo's Diary fails both ways. It would be nice to read of Lo's nasty times with Filthy, but per Pera, the pair never had sex, and he didn't force her to make stag films, as Humbert had said. The real problem, though, is in the narrative voice. In Lolita, Humbert, an educated European, could wax satyric in language as elaborate as any poet's or pedant's. Lo, 11 when the tale begins, and no scholar, must be limited in word power and storytelling skills. Yet the book's prose style, while undistinguished, is far too precocious and knowing for even the brightest kid. Lo could no more have written Lo's Diary than Harry Potter could have written the Harry Potter books.

Without question, Lo's Diary should be published. But it needn't be read. This slip of a thing never emerges from the shadows that tower over it: those of Humbert--that predatory wretch condemned to sing so beautifully of his sin--and his grand, glowering creator. It will have utility only if it leads readers back to the immortal original. Choir, please turn to page 9 of The Annotated Lolita. All together now: "Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul..."

--By Richard Corliss