"...he (Humbert) wants her (Lolita), a living breathing human being, to become stationary, to give up her life for the still life he offers her in return." , Azar Nafisi
It's been too long since I read Vladimir Nabokov's to say anything of my own about it. I don't remember finding anything in it that spoke to me.
It was only when Azar Nafisi wrote about reading Lolita with a group of young women who met in her apartment in Teheran that I got a glimpse of what Nabokov's intentions might have been.
The book desciption on the Amazon page insists that "it is a meditation on love--love as outrage and hallucination, madness and transformation."
Nafisi, on the other hand, suggests that it is a portrait of a monster. A self-deluded monster, condemned by his own words. The fact that he seems to be portrayed sympathetically is a trick of first person narrative. Humbert is telling the story. It is in his own self-interest to make himself likeable. To justify his actions.
I wasn't savvy enough the first time around to pick up on this. If Lolita is one of those books you have thought you should read but couldn't quite go there, pick up Reading Lolita in Teheran first. I think Azar Nafisi provides a platform from which you can get a clearer picture.