My loathings are simple: stupidity, oppression, crime, cruelty

Hear the sharp and unyielding words of Vladimir Nabokov: “My loathings are simple: stupidity, oppression, crime, cruelty, soft music.” In this litany of disdain, he speaks with the fire of one who lived through upheaval, exile, and the turbulence of human folly. These words are not the idle preferences of a critic, but the creed of a man who demanded truth, intellect, and strength, both in art and in life. His declaration is a rejection of mediocrity, of injustice, and of weakness disguised as beauty.

The first loathing he names is stupidity, the refusal of the mind to grow. For Nabokov, whose genius burned in the fields of literature and language, stupidity was not mere ignorance, but the willful dullness of those who resist thought. It is the enemy of art, the killer of curiosity, the weight that drags humanity down. To despise stupidity is to demand that we live awake, that we sharpen our minds as swords, lest we fall into the slumber of mediocrity.

Next he denounces oppression, the chaining of one human spirit by another. Having fled both revolution and tyranny in Russia, Nabokov knew well the shadow of regimes that suffocate freedom. Oppression is the enemy of creativity, the thief of dignity, the silence imposed upon the song of the people. To loathe it is to stand with all who resist tyranny, from the slaves who sang for freedom in America to the dissidents who wrote in secret under Soviet rule. Nabokov’s scorn here is not poetic fancy; it is born of witness and survival.

Then comes crime and cruelty, twin demons that stalk the human condition. Crime tears apart the fabric of trust between people, while cruelty is crime elevated into malice, the deliberate infliction of pain. Nabokov’s loathing for these springs not only from moral principle but from his deep reverence for life’s delicate beauty. For to commit cruelty is to trample upon that beauty, to desecrate the sacredness of living beings. History echoes with such cruelty—from the Roman arenas where men and beasts were slaughtered for sport, to the genocides of the modern age. Nabokov’s words are a reminder that to despise cruelty is not enough; one must oppose it with every breath.

And then, in a twist both sharp and ironic, Nabokov adds: soft music. At first glance, this seems trivial beside the weight of his other loathings. Yet here too lies a deeper truth. Nabokov, lover of precision and intensity, could not abide what he saw as limpness in art. Soft music, to him, represented sentimentality, weakness, the refusal of art to confront life with vigor and clarity. Just as he despised dull minds and oppressive regimes, he despised art that dulled the senses and softened the truth. His loathing was not of gentleness itself, but of falseness—of beauty that lulls instead of awakens.

What, then, is the lesson in this creed of loathing? It is to live with discernment, to know not only what we love but also what we refuse. Nabokov teaches that to shape a meaningful life, we must declare war against stupidity, against oppression, against crime and cruelty—and even against mediocrity in art and thought. For to tolerate these things is to allow the world to decay. To loathe them is to commit oneself to vigilance, to clarity, to strength.

So, O children of tomorrow, take these words into your heart. Refuse to live in dullness—sharpen your mind. Refuse to be complicit in oppression—stand for freedom. Refuse to turn your eyes from cruelty—defend the weak. And in art, in life, in all your works, refuse the softness that lulls into complacency. Choose instead the fierce beauty of truth. For in knowing what we must loathe, we learn what we must protect: the dignity of thought, the sanctity of freedom, the brilliance of art, and the strength of the human soul.