Lolita Literary Devices

Definition of Hyperbole

Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements are usually quite obvious exaggerations intended to emphasize a point... read full definition

Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements are usually quite obvious exaggerations... read full definition

Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements... read full definition

Explanation and Analysis—Every Particle:

Throughout the novel, Humbert Humbert is often a highly unreliable narrator, describing events in a way that reflects his own perception, biases, and delusions. Often, he employs obvious hyperbole in his narration. When describing his adolescent relationship to a girl named Annabel Leigh, for example, Humbert writes:

All at once we were madly, clumsily, shamelessly, agonizingly in love with each other; hopelessly, I should add, because that frenzy of mutual possession might have been assuaged only by our actually imbibing and assimilating every particle of each other’s soul and flesh; but there we were, unable even to mate as slum children would have so easily found an opportunity to do.

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Explanation and Analysis—Nothing Louder:

Humbert employs hyperbole when recounting an evening spent at the Enchanted Hunters motor lodge, where he intended to drug and sexually assault his stepdaughter Lolita after abducting her from summer camp:

There is nothing louder than an American hotel; and, mind you, this was supposed to be a quiet, cozy, old-fashioned, homey place—“gracious living” and all that stuff. The clatter of the elevator’s gate—some twenty yards northeast of my head but as clearly perceived as if it were inside my left temple—alternated with the banging and booming of the machine’s various evolutions and lasted well beyond midnight.

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Lolita: Hyperbole 2 key examples

Definition of Hyperbole