Unreliable Narration in Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita

The Chicago critic Wayne Booth in his book Rhetoric of Fiction first coined the terms reliable and unreliable narrator. These terms have been of notable importance in narratological (analysis of narratives) studies ever since Booth’s book was first published in 1961. Booth defines the reliable and unreliable narrator in the following way: “I have called a narrator reliable when he speaks for or acts in accordance with the norms of the work (which is to say the implied author’s norms), unreliable when he does not” (Booth 158-59). In other words, when a narrator expresses values and perceptions that strikingly diverge from those of the author, he is deemed to be an unreliable narrator (Olson 93). Once the narrator has been deemed unreliable, then the narrator’s unreliability will be consistent throughout the rest of the work (Booth 158).

When a narrator is deemed unreliable, there is conflict between the narrator’s presentation and the rest of the novel that makes readers suspect his sincerity and reliability. Readers often read between the lines and come to the conclusion that the narrator is either withholding the true version of the story or lacking the ability to tell the truth. There are three specific sources of unreliability according to Rimmon-Keenan they are the narrator’s limited knowledge, his or her personal involvement, and his or her questionable morals (100-101). Factors that could contribute to a narrator’s unreliability is that the narrator is young and inexperienced, old with failing memory, or has a low IQ. These are all cases of limited understanding and knowledge on the part of the narrator. When narrators are personally involved in the story, they tend to portray events or characters i...

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...has been proven and documented that Humbert is known to alter the truth and flat out lie when he is put into a tense situation in order to get himself out of trouble. Since a trial is usually used to decide whether a person is found guilty of his or her crimes it is only reasonable to believe that Humbert would lie in his narrative about his travels with Lolita in order to save and protect himself, thus cementing the fact that he cannot be trusted as a reliable narrator.

Works Cited

Booth, Wayne C. The Rhetoric of Fiction. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1961.

Nabokov, Vladimir. Lolita. New York: Random House, Inc., 1997. Print.

Olson, Greta. “Reconsidering Unreliability: Fallible and Untrustworthy Narrators”. Narrative. 11.1 (January 2003): p93.

Rimmon-Keenan, Shlomith. Narrative Fiction: Contemporary Poetics. London: Routledge, 1989.