Nabokov In America: On the Road to Lolita - Tapa dura

Fascinating. . . An evocative portrait of the novelist in the United States that's pungent with small, revealing Nabokovian details . . . Mr. Roper has succeeded in making a persuasive case for the essential role America played both in shaping Lolita and helping to configure the gyroscopic spin of Nabokov's later career. (Michiko Kakutani The New York Times)

Roper chronicles the two decades that Nabokov lived in the United States (the writer had long dreamed of "vulgar, far-flung America") and its powerful ramifications for Nabokov's work. Our reviewer, Daphne Mer­kin, called the book "a scholarly romp that should engage admirers of Nabokov. (The New York Times Book Review)

Nabokov in America is rewarding on all counts, as biography, as photo album (there are many pictures of people, Western landscapes and motels) and as appreciative criticism. Not least, Roper even avoids the arch style so often adopted by critics faintly trying to emulate their inimitable subject. (Washington Post)

A learned, intense, and yet approachable book . . . Roper provides a powerful argument for the role America played in shaping one of the 20th century's literary giants. (Boston Globe)

Compelling and oddly comic, this tale of the Nabokovs and their life in America is fascinating reading . . . Roper has done a crisp and inspired job exploring this momentous literary figure and his place as a strange piece of 20th-century Americana. (starred review Library Journal)

In this enjoyable new biography of his American years, [Roper] follows the author of Lolita and Pale Fire on a 20-year journey across America . . . A fresh look at Nabokov's writing and literary associations, including his contentious friendship with Edmund Wilson. It's a great read. (San Jose Mercury News)

Roper, rather stunningly, puts Nabokov, the Russian emigre, fully in America . . . One of the best of all biographical studies of the author. (Buffalo News, Editor's Choice)

In this fresh and engaging biography, biographer, novelist, and critic Roper traces the trajectory of his career, friendships, and family life, as well as his indefatigable passion for butterflies. Drawing judiciously on Brian Boyd's Vladimir Nabokov: The American Years (1991) and Stacy Schiff's biography of Vera Nabokov (1999), as well as the writer's correspondence, Roper illuminates such works as Pnin, Speak, Memory, and Pale Fire. (Kirkus Reviews)

Roper's biography is at once a general introduction and a dissertation on the Russian-born émigré's career and novels written in America . . . Through much original material (notes to publishers, letters to his wife, son Dimitri's memoir), Roper captures Nabokov's arrogance, his brilliance as a lecturer and translator, his passion and mastery of the Russian oeuvre, and his childlike happiness throughout his adult life . . . sure to satiate Nabokov fanatics. (Booklist)

The transposition of the highly Europeanized Russian Vladimir Nabokov to America, and his fruitful presence here, is a fascinating adventure that Robert Roper has the estimable chops to convey. I've read a lot of books about Nabokov but this is my favorite. (Thomas McGuane)