Though not the bloody smears of a rapist and murderer, Nabokov's fingerprints are indeed all over his fiction. For example, there exists a connection between Humbert the Perverse and Nabokov the Collector. A rabid butterfly collector, Nabokov adored these creatures that he found beautiful, rare and frail. He then killed, preserved, cataloged and literally, pinned them down. Calculating control mixed with overwhelming emotion can be found in other aspects of Nabokov's life, as well as his work.
Literature is Love.
Now we can continue. Nabokov was as capable of calculation as he was romance. But rather than be torn between these two disparate aspects of his personality, he flitted easily from one to the other and often married them with great success. This combination of art and strategy is key to not only understanding Nabokov's body of work, but the workings of the man himself. Memories and dreams also play a large part in many of Nabokov's writings.