I had always thought that wringing one's hands was a fictional gesture - the obscure outcome, perhaps, of some medieval ritual; but as I took to the woods, for a spell of despair and desperate meditation, this was the gesture {"look, Lord, at these chains!"} that would have come nearest to the mute expression of my mood.
In this excerpt from Vladimir Nabokov's "Lolita," the narrator reflects on the gesture of wringing one's hands, initially considering it a fictional or outdated act. However, during a moment of deep despair and contemplation in the woods, he finds that this gesture symbolically represents the heaviness of his emotions and his feelings of being trapped.
The phrase "look, Lord, at these chains" underscores the narrator's sense of entrapment and anguish. This poignant imagery conveys not only his sorrow but also a longing for divine acknowledgment of his plight, revealing the depth of his internal struggle and the weight of his circumstances.
