Nabokov began to write Lolita in the late 1940s, completing it in 1954. Publishing difficulties in the USA, due to the novel's controversial subject matter, caused Nabokov to resort, through an intermediary, to the Olympia Press publishing house in Paris (well known for titles ranging from the highly literate to the somewhat dubious, in their “Traveller's Companion” series). Prompted by favourable interventions from influential literati (most notably Graham Greene), sizeable excerpts were published in the United States in June 1957 (in the Anchor Review: accompanied by what has since become the author's ever-present afterword – “On a Book Entitled Lolita”), and in 1958 Putnam's issued the first …
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Citation: Cornwell, Neil. "Lolita". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 30 June 2002 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=3904, accessed 23 November 2024.]
