Controlling the Female Body: Obsession and Loss of Autonomy in Lolita and "Berenice"

Citation

Lee, Margaret Rachel (2022) Controlling the Female Body: Obsession and Loss of Autonomy in Lolita and "Berenice". Other, California Institute of Technology. doi:10.7907/e5xr-st45. https://resolver.caltech.edu/CaltechTHESIS:06012022-154934652

Abstract

[Introduction] Why are we so obsessed with the female body? From high school dress codes to impossible beauty standards in the media, society polices and sexualizes young women's bodies. Nabokov's Lolita, which follows the charming Humbert Humbert and his horrifying relationship with adolescent Lolita, explores this hyperfixation of female bodies, particularly young female bodies. Edgar Allan Poe clearly inspires Nabokov, from the confusing foreward, reminiscent of Poe's novel, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, to the character of Annabel Lee, the titular subject of one of Poe's most famous poems. Poe's short story "Berenice" introduces the idea of monomania and explores themes of bodily autonomy from a physical and a mental perspective. "Berenice" also explores how control and obsession over the female body can make a narrator unreliable. Nabokov extracts these ideas from Poe, expands on them, and explores how Humbert controls Lolita and strips her of her identity. This loss of bodily autonomy and agency is jarring to read, despite Nabokov's stylistic beauty, and encourages the reader to examine how media and society treat young women.

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