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The Enchanter

Part of Vintage International

Author Vladimir Nabokov

Paperback

$17.00 US

Knopf | Vintage

5.15"W x 7.99"H x 0.31"D | 5 oz | 36 per carton

On sale Jul 20, 1991 | 144 Pages | 9780679728863

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The precursor to Nabokov's classic novel, Lolita. • A middle-aged man weds an unattractive widow in order to indulge his obsession with her daughter. • "A gem to be appreciated by any admirer of the most graceful and provocative literary craftsman." —Chicago Tribune

The unnamed protagonist of the story is, outwardly, a respectable and comfortable man; inside, he churns at the pubescent femininity of certain girls. Rare girls – one in a thousand – whose coltish grace and subconscious flirtatiousness betray, to his obsessed mind, a very special bud on the moist verge of its bloom.

Sitting on a park bench one day, he is tantalized by the fleeting form of just such a girl roller-skating on a gravel path. His desire to be near this beauty burns in him and drives him to begin a courtship of the child’s pitiful mother – a course that can end only in the disintegration of his life.

Over the years, the idea of The Enchanter grew; it changed; it developed “claws and wings.” By 1953 it was ready to furnish the basic theme of Lolita.

"The Enchanter is entertaining independent of its Lolita connection. It is arch, delicious and beautifully written." —Publishers Weekly

Vladimir Nabokov studied French and Russian literature at Trinity College, Cambridge, then lived in Berlin and Paris, writing prolifically in Russian under the pseudonym Sirin. In 1940, he left France for America, where he wrote some of his greatest works—Bend Sinister (1947), Lolita (1955), Pnin (1957), and Pale Fire (1962)—and translated his earlier Russian novels into English. He taught at Wellesley, Harvard, and Cornell. He died in Montreux, Switzerland, in 1977. View titles by Vladimir Nabokov

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"Nabokov writes prose the only way it should be written, that is, ecstatically." — John Updike

"Masterly ... brilliant." —V. S. Pritchett, The New York Review of Books

"A gem to be appreciated by any admirer of the most graceful and provocative literary craftsman." —Chicago Tribune

"One of the best books of the year ... [The Enchanter] displays the supple clarity of a master." —The Boston Globe

"Enchanting ... sleekly wrought." —Newsweek

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