Good Readers and Good Liberals

Abstract

This article offers an interpretation of Vladimir Nabokov’s unique contribution to political theory as seen primarily through the lens of his novel Invitation to a Beheading. Although most frequently interpreted as an indictment of totalitarianism, the novel depicts a form of cruelty practiced not only by totalitarians, but also by the rulers and citizens of milder political orders, including liberalism. The novel suggests that such cruelty is more insidious than that familiar to readers of dystopian novels precisely because of its universality. This article demonstrates that Nabokov’s contribution to liberalism may be found in the surprising coherence between his aesthetic principles and his art, both of which critique the imposition of “general ideas” on either persons or books. What emerges is a picture of aesthetic liberalism in which Nabokov’s model for the ideal liberal citizen is neither the sensitive artist nor the apolitical aesthete, but rather the careful reader.