The Real Lolita: The Kidnapping of Sally Horner and the Novel That Scandalized the World

by Sarah Weinman

Vladimir Nabokov opened up a newspaper somewhere near Afton, Wyoming, and chanced upon an Associated Press story. Perhaps the newspaper Nabokov read was the New York Times, which carried the wire report of Sally Horner’s death on page twelve of their early edition. Maybe it was a local daily, which splashed the sensational news on or near the front page. Wherever Nabokov read the report, he took notes on one of his ninety-four surviving Lolita index cards. The handwritten card reads as follows: 20.viii.52 Woodbine, N.J. – Sally Horner, 15-year-old Camden, N.J. Girl who spent 21 months as the captive of a middle-aged morals offender a few years ago, was killed in a highway mishap early Monday . . . Sally vanished from her Camden home in 1948 and wasn’t heard from again until 1950 when she told a hararing [sic] story of spending 21 months as the cross-country slave of Frank La Salle, 52. LaSalle [sic], a mechanic, was arrested in San Jose, Cal . . . he pleaded guilty to (two) charges of kidnaping and was sentenced to 30 to 35 years in prison. He was branded a “moral leper” by the sentencing judge. Here, in this note card, is proof that Nabokov knew of the Sally Horner case. It is proof that her story captured his attention and that her real-life ordeal was inspiration for Dolores Haze’s fictional plight.