Nabokov began working on Lolita in 1948, writing much of it during road trips across the United States with his wife Vera and his son Dmitri. Lolita was Nabokov's first book in English and he often said that it was his finest work, although he had so much difficulty with it during the revision process that he came very close to burning the draft in a garden incinerator (Vera stopped him). He began approaching publishers with it in 1954, but the manuscript was repeatedly rejected by US and British publishing houses due to its controversial content. In its rejection letter, a representative of Viking Press wrote, "We would all go to jail if the thing were published." … continued

Article by Kim Kovacs

In more recent years, contemporary novelists have employed embedded narratives as a way to inform, complicate, or expand their narratives, often using the novel-within-a-novel to interrogate the process of writing and the role of the author, in both playful and serious ways. No fewer than eight Booker Prize winners and nominees have employed this technique, which Gazelle Mba likens to a literary Matryoshka doll, the Russian nesting doll that reveals seemingly endless new surprises inside.

Here are just a few notable examples. … continued

Reading list by Norah Piehl

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From the Jacket

German pianist Hedda Schlagel's world collapsed when her fiancé, Fritz, vanished after being sent to an enemy alien camp in the United States during the Great War. Fifteen years later, in 1932, Hedda is stunned to see Fritz's name in a photograph of an American memorial for German seamen who died near Asheville, North Carolina. Determined to reclaim his body and bring closure to his ailing mother, Hedda travels to the US. Her quest takes a shocking turn when, rather than Fritz's body, his casket contains the remains of a woman who died under mysterious circumstances.

Reading Deeply with BookBrowse is a collection of articles curated to help you become a more skilled and thoughtful reader through topics such as symbolism, thematic elements, explorations of genre, literary criticism, the science of reading, and more.

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