In the novel Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, the narrator Humbert Humbert exercises the power of memory by attempting to manipulate time according to his devices and his desires. Aware that the nymphet stage that occurs in the lives of a number of girls only lasts between the ages of nine and fourteen, Humbert employs various techniques to struggle to cope with his unusual desire for these young girls who, he believes, possess a rare grace and charm that sets them apart from their peers. Annabel Lee becomes Humbert's prototype nymphet as well as childhood sweetheart when she dies of typhus at the age of twelve. She leaves the child Humbert with a plethora of unfulfilled sexual fantasies that he retains long after leaving his childhood behind. By acting out these fantasies twenty-five years later with the twelve-year-old nymphet Dolores Haze, Humbert creates a dilemma for himself because the only way to ensure his prolonged happiness is to stop time. Thus, Humbert condemns himself from the moment he combines the entity of Annabel Lee with the flesh and blood vessels of Dolores, while he tries in vain to preserve the ephemeral phenomenon that is "Annabel Haze, alias Dolores Lee, aka Loleeta” (Nabokov 167). .Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned"?Get the original essayIn her essay "Memory, Consciousness, and Time in Nabokov's Lolita," Olga Hasty compares Humbert to Orpheus, whom she calls “a great literary writer”. paradigm of mortal resistance to the passage of time” (231). Orpheus is a mythical poet whose love for Eurydice extends endlessly after her death, as does Humbert's love for Annabel Lee. At the beginning of the novel, Humbert describes his failed attempt at a sexual encounter with his childhood sweetheart: "I was on my knees, about to possess my darling, when two bearded bathers, the old man from the sea and his brother, arrived . out of the sea with ribald exclamations of encouragement, and four months later she died of typhus in Corfu” (Nabokov 13). This event has a lasting impact on Humbert, as he says that the shock of her death prevented any further romance during his youth. Humbert believes that this unrequited desire for Annabel Lee instills in him a lifelong desire for young girls, each of whom possesses unique qualities that remind him of his childhood love. The tragedy of Annabel Lee's premature death leaves Humbert with only his memories, and these memories prolong his love and desire: "Duration prolongs a particular event, but it also resists closure and a new experience, which would interrupt what continues” (Hasty 232). Like Orpheus, Humbert resists the passage of time by focusing on his loss. He prevents himself from moving beyond her death by evoking memories of her and fantasizing about their near sexual encounter. He will stay in this moment until these fantasies come true and the essence of Annabel Lee can be instilled into a new girl (Hasty 232). “That little girl, with her sea limbs and fiery tongue, haunted me ever since – until at last, twenty-four years later, I broke her spell by incarnating her into another” (Nabokov 15). This new girl of course ends up being the young nymphet Dolores Haze. Unlike his prolonged desire for Annabel Lee, Humbert's life with Dolores is one of repeated gratification. If Humbert's love for Annabel Lee resembles that of Orpheus for Eurydice, Humbert resembles Don Juan more during his stay with Dolores: "Because the moment of satisfaction is fleeting, Don Juan is pushed towards a romantic adventure after the other with women whose individuality is absorbed into the single list that brings her fame” (Hasty 232). Humbertdoesn't care about Dolores' unique traits; he only has a physical interest in the girl; as Winston notes, "in fact, he carefully avoided any recognition of his personality that might interfere with the satisfaction of his own physical and psychological needs" (425). Humbert's inability to view Dolores as an individual ultimately causes her to leave him for another, more caring man. The satisfaction that Don Juan derives from each sexual encounter diminishes with time; as the moment of satisfaction is more and more fleeting, he must satisfy his desires more and more frequently. The same pattern occurs with Humbert, as each sexual encounter with Dolores ends up becoming a temporary sustenance that only comforts him until he can obtain gratification again. Humbert desperately attempts to outrun time by traveling across the United States while exploiting his young nymphet. The passage of time is only evident in the changes that occur in Dolores' body as she grows (Hasty 235). Humbert recognizes these changes because he also recognizes that he loves Lolita the nymphet, rather than Dolores Haze the individual: “I knew I had fallen in love with Lolita forever; but I also knew that she would not always be Lolita” (Nabokov 65). Humbert thinks about ways to preserve his Lolita; he laments the fact that he never filmed her and, more upsetting, plans to have a child with her: "With patience and luck, I could get her to eventually produce a nymphet with my blood in her exquisite veins, a Lolita the Second, which be eight or nine circa 1960” (Nabokov 174). He then continues to reflect on this potential lineage by stating that he will “practice on Lolita the Third the art of being a grandfather” (Nabokov 174). By having a daughter who then has a daughter of her own, Humbert can make the passage of time inconsequential because he will produce a line of nymphets for himself, each of whom he can exploit because he has the original Lolita. After Dolores leaves Humbert he comes to recognize how precious the passage of time has been. He comes to view time not as a waste but rather "as an increase in both the length of time along the continuum over which the remembering individual can extend and the possibility that can arise from it" ( Hasty 235). He ultimately recognizes that it was unrealistic to imagine that his time with Lolita would last forever, and so the fact that several years have passed while he was with her becomes a blessing. However, the memories are not enough for Humbert. He tries again to find someone who can satisfy his desires. This time, he finds Rita, a very little girl in her twenties. Although he says his senses are only "very slightly heightened", he adopts her as his constant companion and bed companion for the next two years. Although he does not specify what qualities besides her kindness attract him, his physical descriptions of her make it clear that he likes her childish qualities: "The strangely prepubescent curves of her back, her rosy skin, her slow, languorous kisses on the columbine kept me from mischief” (Nabokov 259). At one point, Humbert takes Rita to one of the hotels he and Lolita stayed in during their trip to try to recapture the time he spent with the nymphet. However, as Lolita later tells him, "the past is the past" and his relationship with Rita is hopelessly far from satisfying his desire for the young girl (272). He discovers that now his memories of Lolita are almost as unsatisfying as his memories of Annabel Lee years earlier, and that the only way for him to be truly happy. 421-427