Lolita vs. The Closed Circle

Nabokov, V. Lolita. etc.

Coe, Jonathan. The Closed Circle. etc.

First of all, Lolita is superb. Second, my interest waned about two thirds of the way through the book. I started reading Coe’s sequel to the The Rotter’s Club (RC) and it has won out.

The Closed Circle (CC) is not as vivid and magical as its predecessor, in my view. Why? Perhaps because so much of it relies on references to RC and the character development there. Benjamin T. is a difficult character to have as a protagonist because his main state is one of stasis/silence/boredom and this sometimes means lacklustre events or dialogue. Nonetheless, I’m enjoying CC more than Lolita because I can relate to its storyworld more easily. The characters are by and large “like us” and there is a likeable cadence of the events of their lives. It is, in a way, like watching Coronation Street.