Taibbi on Humbert (Sort of) TK Newsletter

Tue Aug 10 18:07:11 UTC 2021

I won't disagree with the notion here, although it is worth a discussion
but I will say he did not believe
in Freud's ego, id, etc........so I bet he would not like the phrase "alter
ego",,,,,,but 'the double" in literature...
that's another leaning......

On Tue, Aug 10, 2021 at 1:57 PM David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:

> Which Nabakov novel had the unfortunately “plain” daughter commit suicide
> after her blind date treats her badly one night?  Was that Shade’s daughter
> in Pale Fire?  Anyway, N treats the “Plain Jane’s” suicide as less than a
> tragedy. Maybe even inevitable for one so I’ll-fated as to be born a homely
> female.  My point being that I think it is a mistake to assume that Nabakov
> was at all “woke.”  I think he had his own dark predjudices towards women
> and gays and others less mentally gifted than himself.  So I think his
> Humbert might actually be his own humorous naughty alter ego, NOT someone
> to be morally vilified.
>
> David Morris
>
> On Tue, Aug 10, 2021 at 11:30 AM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> STOP MISUNDERSTANDING ME.......stop telling me what I am....argue
>> objectively.
>>
>> You have never been able to read me correctly......
>>
>> I LOVE LOLITA.....one of the greatest masterpieces of our time.......I did
>> not say I agreed with Wood who also thinks it a great slightly-flawed
>> masterpiece.
>>
>> On Tue, Aug 10, 2021 at 11:27 AM Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
>>
>> > So you don’t like Taibbi, as you don’t like so many progressive voices
>> who
>> > fail to simplify the world to CNN morality and Democratic party lies.
>> Not
>> > too surprising.
>> >   Unfortunately as a writer with clear bias you are indulging straw man
>> > logic, reading unexpressed thoughts into the words of the person being
>> > verbally flogged. Taibbi DOES NOT  say or even imply, " that he
>> (Humbert) is
>> >  *supposed* to be a likeable narrator…” He says "How can I like Humbert
>> > Humbert?". And he is saying this after many readings. This is not an
>> > attempt by Taibbi at a literary critique or essay on Nabokov or Lolita.
>> > Reflections on Lolita and Nabokov and  what makes an interesting
>> character
>> > are a personalized and internalized jumping-off point for a discussion
>> of
>> > media morality and cancel culture and how we treat character issues.
>> >   You don’t like Lolita but claim to revere Nabokov, I don’t like either
>> > and don’t feel required to do so to be literate. Taibbi does like the
>> > writer and Lolita which is only one of Nabokov’s works that have a
>> serious
>> > fascination with sex with children. Lolita drew the fascination of  the
>> > american letters community as an inquiry into character, into maleness,
>> > into manipulative games, and into language itself. It simultaneously
>> drew a
>> > huge crowd as something with the appearance of sophisticated eroticism,
>> > thus  enlarging the interest of the literati, and also drawing in a lot
>> of
>> > the playboy crowd and young men and women who wanted to be in the
>> know.  I
>> > would suggest part of Taibbi’s use of this work was to show both sides
>> of
>> > the drawing power of sex: first,  as a common ground of public
>> fascination,
>> > and second as a common ground of moral debate and how that fascination
>> has
>> > become so central to public morality while the planet burns, nations are
>> > starved, the treasury is looted, and insanely immoral wars are
>> propagated
>> > by the same media.
>> >   To me the heart of the article is the moral comparison between the
>> > questionable substance of the sex allegations against Cuomo versus the
>> much
>> > more devious and destructive isssue with Covid in nursing homes. He is
>> not
>> > negating  that groping and abusing power is behavior that cannot be
>> > tolerated, but asking why are far more violent and destructive actions
>> so
>> > easily tolerated?  Here he is talking about something in this weird
>> > political culture that is substantive and  worth writing about. The
>> essay
>> > was far more interesting  and nuanced than your petty attack.
>> >   In the end I think you only succed in illustrating Taibbi’s point
>> about
>> > the oversimplifications of cancel culture and skewed moral judgements.
>> > "Poor Matt”? His career as a writer is impressive because he is funny
>> > thoughtful and able to clarify complex realities. I doubt he qualifies
>> as
>> > poor in any sense.
>> >
>> >
>> > On Aug 10, 2021, at 5:05 AM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > Taibbi is as wrong as he has been lately about almost everything. Why is
>> > worth a discussion but not by me today--or probably ever.
>> > TRUTH: .....Humbert's evil is FINALLY being seen by more and more, not
>> what
>> > he writes......mention it
>> > in a room or zoom of women and good readers as I did in my film class
>> about
>> > a good movie influenced by Lolita (w the sexes reversed) .......read the
>> > early intellectuals who wrote of *Lolita* as *a love story*, even in
>> *The
>> > New Yorker.*.......Read the next generation of critical responses, such
>> as
>> > by the real good Michael Wood, who argues that the crucial scene where
>> > Humbert realizes he's a monster doesn't fully work. ......I will refute
>> > narcissitically as well. In my first reading, college, a freshman, but
>> not
>> > for a course, I had serious trouble liking Humbert from the get-go--she
>> is
>> > twelve!---thinking then as stupidly as Taibbi still thinks that he is
>> > supposed to be a likeable narrator....
>> >
>> > MT: "No story can survive an unlikeable narrator" ---has he not read
>> enough
>> > great literature or is he just naively stupid? *Journey to the End of
>> > Night, Cabot Wright Begins, American Psycho, Houllebecq and
>> more....*C'mon,
>> > why do we give Taibbi a pass with this stupidity? Because he once
>> pointed
>> > out the real unsaid
>> > in our world? ........Superficial literary twitter of common readers is
>> > full of folks saying, about almost any book...."I didn't like the
>> > character(s)".....so, it was a bad book or not worth
>> finishing......That's
>> > Matt's base of judgment it seems....
>> >
>> >
>> > "With Cuomo as with anyone else in the Internet age, the important issue
>> > isn’t right or wrong, but whether or not he’ll survive."
>> > Wrong, wrong. See everyone, every almost every woman reacting in real
>> > time......They are all over my twitter....
>> > 2 aides resigning with only their own pressure.....(to answer another
>> > overgeneralization of Taibbi's)
>> >
>> > AND don't get me started on another writer failing of so many who
>> criticize
>> > social media in his way---with generalizations based on THEIR social
>> > media.....
>> > In its very being, twitter is what you make it; how you curate it....all
>> > these "twitter takes; twitter says"  are simply wrong (unless he's
>> going to
>> > get TOTAL analytics which are still almost impossible to obtain WITH THE
>> > POSITIONS in the tweets known. I. E.. the nature of positive or negative
>> > responses need measured by their content. )....Everyone's twitter;
>> > everyone's Facebook is unique and is curated by one's notions of what
>> one
>> > wants to see/hear)
>> >
>> > More bullshit from Taibbi:
>> > "Morality in this sense has become a pass/fail exercise, with everyone
>> > divided into just two categories, viable and disgraced. Which of the two
>> > one lands in depends entirely on how high levels of public disgust and
>> > emotion reach at the peak of viral mania, versus how entrenched the
>> target
>> > is or isn’t. "
>> > Let's see, like General Kelley?..... Steve Bannon?....Sen Frankel?, who
>> > bowed out of the Senate for the good of the party, he said....The Dixie
>> > Chicks....lots of others.....
>> > his line blots out ANY acting on a principled morality, so damn
>> > self-justifyingly cynical; so loaded since, of course, almost every
>> famous
>> > person will fight to keep their fame/power/fortune...I say this is
>> hardly
>> > the "morality' of most people in this world, this country, of course,
>> but
>> > he isn't talking about them,  just generalizing falsely for his paid
>> > articles...
>> > Belated thought: look at his "relative" Glenn Greenwald, fully disgraced
>> > and still viable to refute his two simple-minded categories from another
>> > direction
>> >
>> > MT" It’s a quirk of literature that readers will cheer the Acapulco
>> > polysyllable dives of a child rapist but find the same style pompous in
>> the
>> > diary of an inoffensive emigre professor."... ....MORE WRONGNESS:
>> Humbert's
>> > pompousness is raised to the level of pedophilia self-deception while
>> > Pnin's is simply a way of living and being seen. H's charming
>> pompousness
>> > is part of the meaning; Pnin's charmlessness is part of his.
>> >
>> > MT "Nabokov, who famously despised the “literature of social intent,”
>> might
>> > have puzzled at the effectiveness of Humbert as a narrator but surely
>> > didn’t worry about it."
>> > MK: Where does he come off with this? Where is the allusion from N's
>> life
>> > or writing  to support this arrogant attempt to read N's baroque mind?
>> The
>> > mind of a hardly predictable genius?.."might have puzzled at"......Yeah,
>> > wrong....my understanding of Nabokov, the man who created and solved
>> chess
>> > puzzles and writing puzzles, is that the usual meaning of "might have
>> > puzzled at" has no traction....he worked without real worry about
>> getting
>> > his words, characterizations, right not, not NOT
>> > "puzzling [as if he wasn't sure; he who said in response to E. M.
>> Forster's
>> > remark that sometimes his characters took on a life of their own, NEVER
>> > his....they are like galley slaves rowing as I want them
>> to...[paraphrase
>> > but the metaphor is exact]....
>> >
>> > Poor Matt......who has lost his whole subject matter and has never
>> gotten
>> > literature, it is obvious....
>> >
>> > On Mon, Aug 9, 2021 at 9:59 AM Allan Balliett <allan.balliett at gmail.com
>> >
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> https://taibbi.substack.com/p/tk-newsletter-on-good-people-and?r=2pty3&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=email
>> > --
>> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>> >
>> > --
>> > Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> --
>> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>>
>