Dear Don,

I've been reading Appel's Annotated Lolita. I find it less helpful than I had hoped (very helpful if you have no French). Appel allows that wicked VN to get away with murder (if VN told Appel that he hadn't read a story in which a character's name is Lolita, Appel passes this along as the truth). I am not so sanguine. He also passes over many VNisms that call for some explication.

Be all that as it may,  there is the small mistake of actresses I would like to correct. The actress who died in an airplane crash is not Marlene Dietrich, but Carole Lombard. (II chapter 8: " 'Somebody told me her [Lo's] mother was a celebrated actress killed in an airplane accident.' ")

Oh, that reminds me, Charlotte Haze's maiden name turns out to be something ordinary like Baxter - - sorry, Becker (I ch 19).  Nothing celtish about that, a lass.

Carolyn