Lolita Podcast Trailer

Who is Lolita? The Nabokov literary classic has sparked infinite discussion in the 65 years since its release, but the cultural memory the book has left behind lives more in romance and fashion aesthetics than a cautionary tale about a deceptive predator and his young prey. Jamie Loftus wants to know how we got here, and this series traces Lolita -- the person, Dolores Haze -- from her literary origin to current status as a doomed icon.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Lolita, Light of My Life, Fire of my Loins. It's
one of the most recognizable introductions to one of the
most controversial works in American history, Vladimir Nabokov's novel Lolita.
This story and its titular character have been adapted, misinterpreted,
and twisted over the years by Hollywood, by music, by fashion,
by fans of the book, and occasionally by the author himself.

(00:24):
Lolita has gone from the tragic story of an abused
thirteen year old girl to a cultural narrative that frames
her as the seductress and to blame for what happens
to her. So how did this all happen? It is
a messy and frustrating story. My name's Jamie Loftus, and
I am a comedian, writer and creator and co host
of shows like My Year and Mensa and The Bechtel Cast.

(00:47):
I've been haunted by this book since it was recommended
to me in middle school by a children's author, and
with all the progress we've made in the last several
years of unpacking the baggage that comes with media from
the past, Lolita has kind of fallen by the wayside
in that conversation until now. On November twenty three, My
new show, Lolita Podcast, is going to start exploring how

(01:08):
a firmly anti pedophile book got twisted into the sexualized
image we think of when we hear Lolita's name. Today,
I'll be taking you through the source material and its
history as a banned book, to its movie and stage adaptations,
to the impact it's had on internet culture of music,
even the vocabulary our culture uses. It is a long

(01:29):
and mired history that I think is worth taking a
closer look at. I'll be talking with literary scholars, experts
on abuse, directors, writers, fans of the book, not fans
of the book, my listeners, and the women who have
played Lolita in all of the different adaptations to trace
how this story has been taken so far out of
context that it's become completely unrecognizable and at times actively harmful.

(01:53):
It is a very complicated and bizarre ride, because at
its core, this is a story about it all of
year old girl meaned Dolores, and I think that she's
gotten lost over the years, So we're going to get
to the bottom of it for her in Lolita Podcast
Monday's starting November twenty three on the I Heart Radio
app Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcast