Ray, you remember, is the dolt who prefaces Humbert’s confession.
[A]t at least 12% of American adult males—a “conservative” estimate according to Dr. Blanche Schwarzmann (verbal communication)—enjoy yearly, in one way or another, the special experience “H.H.” describes with such despair… [H]ad our demented diarist gone, in the fatal summer of 1947, to a competent psychopathologist, there would have been no disaster… He is abnormal. He is not a gentleman. …
As a case history, [this] will become, no doubt, a classic in psychiatric circles. Above all, there is the ethical impact [this should have; it warns] us of dangerous trends; [it points] out potent evils. [It] should make all of us—parents, social workers, educators—apply ourselves with still greater vigilance and vision to the task of bringing up a better generation in a safer world.