Quotes About Innocence

I grew, a happy, healthy child in a bright world of illustrated books, clean sand, orange trees, friendly dogs, sea vistas and smiling faces.

Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita.

At eight, he had once told his mother that he wanted to paint air.

Rope-skipping, hopscotch. That old woman in black who sat down next to me on my bench, on my rack of joy (a nymphet was groping under me for a lost marble), and asked if I had stomachache, the insolent hag. Ah, leave me alone in my pubescent park, in my mossy garden. Let them play around me forever. Never grow up.

A moment later I heard my sweetheart running up the stairs. My heart expanded with such force that it almost blotted me out. I hitched up the pants of my pajamas, flung the door open: and simultaneously Lolita arrived, in her Sunday frock, stamping, panting, and the she was in my arms, her innocent mouth melting under the ferocious pressure of dark male jaws, my palpitating darling!

The general impression is that fifteen year-old Dolly remains morbidly uninterested in sexual matters, or to be exact, represses her curiosity in order to save her ignorance and self-dignity.

In our hallway, ablaze with welcoming lights, my Lolita peeled off her sweater, shook her gemmed hair, stretched towards me two bare arms, raised one knee: "Carry me upstairs, please. I feel sort of romantic tonight." It may interest physiologists to learn, at this point, that I have the ability - a most singular case, I presume - of shedding torrents of tears throughout the other tempest.

I am just winking happy thoughts into a little tiddle cup.

Wanted, wanted: Dolores Haze. Hair: brown. Lips: scarlet Age: five thousand three hundred days.

photographs of girl-children; some gaudy moth or butterfly, still alive, safely pinned to the wall.

With your little claws, Lolita.

My Lolita had a way of raising her bent left knee at the ample and springy start of the service cycle when there would develop and hang in the sun for a second a vital web of balance between toed foot, pristine armpit, burnished arm and far back-flung racket, as she smiled up with gleaming teeth at the small globe suspended so high in the zenith of the powerful and graceful cosmos she had created for the express purpose of falling upon it with a clean resounding crack of her golden whip.

Dimly, I recall running up to his chair to show him a pretty pebble, which he slowly examined and then slowly put into his mouth.

For some reason, I kept seeing it—it trembled and silkily glowed on my damp retina—a radiant child of twelve, sitting on a threshold, pinging pebbles at an empty can.

I qualify it as pathetic. Pathetic--because despite the insatiable fire of my venereal appetite, I intended, with the most fervent force and foresight, to protect the purity of that twelve-year-old child.

So I tom-peeped across the hedges of years, into wan little windows. And when, by means of pitifully ardent, naively lascivious caresses, she of the noble nipple and massive thigh prepared me for the performance of my nightly duty, it was still a nymphet's scent that in despair I tried to pick up, as I bayed through the undergrowth of dark decaying forests.

Oh, said Haze, poor me should know, I went through that when I was a kid: boys twisting one's hair, hurting one's breasts, flipping one's skirt.

Lolita, luz da minha vida, fogo da minha virilidade. Meu pecado, minha alma. Lo-li-ta: A ponta da língua faz uma viagem de três passos pelo céu-da-boca abaixo e, no terceiro, bate nos dentes. Lo. Li. Ta. Pela manhã, um metro e trinta e dois a espichar dos soquetes; era Lo, apenas Lo. De calças práticas, era Lola. Na escola, era Dolly. Era Dolores na linha pontilhada onde assinava o nome. Mas nos meus braços era sempre Lolita.

under no circumstances would he [Humbert Humbert] have interfered with the innocence of a child, if there was the least risk of a row.

Lolita, luce della mia vita, fuoco dei miei lombi. Mio peccato, anima mia. Lo-li-ta: la punta della lingua compie un percorso di tre passi sul palato per battere, al terzo, contro i denti. Lo. Li. Ta. Era Lo, semplicemente Lo al mattino, ritta nel suo metro e quarantasette con un calzino solo. Era Lola in pantaloni. Era Dolly a scuola. Era Dolores sulla linea tratteggiata dei documenti. Ma tra le mie braccia era sempre Lolita.

I found Dolores Haze at the kitchen table, consuming a wedge of pie, with her eyes fixed on her script. They rose to meet mine with a kind of celestial vapidity.

Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She

Vladimir Nabokov

Lolita, luz de mi vida, fuego de mis entrañas. Pecado mío, alma mía. Lo-lita: la punta de la lengua emprende un viaje de tres pasos desde el borde del paladar para apoyarse, en el tercero, en el borde de los dientes. Lo.Li.Ta.