Dr. Zhivago

Dr. Zhivago by Boris Pasternak

It is not the author’s fault that a book written by a Russian about Russians is littered with so many Russians that all have complex Russian names.  Such is usually the main complaint about this classic.  I even remember reading a “Peanuts” cartoon where Charlie Brown and company commented on such an unfortunate factor as it related to this book.  Once one gets past this, many claim that there’s a beautiful story to be told, and many hail it as “The Novel of the Century”.  Even the movie was supposedly outstanding (I haven’t seen it).

Maybe it’s because I read the book 60 years after it was published, or maybe it’s because I don’t read many Russian authors, but I found myself a bit empty after reading this.  It certainly didn’t go in the direction that I was expecting, and the story really left me empty. Perhaps that was the point. When telling a story about Russians during the most turbulent point of Russian history, I’m sure there were an awful lot of people that found themselves uplifted from whatever normalcy they were accustomed to, and were never able to return to any sort of routine that they once knew.

The book succeeds in illustrating the bleak life of Russia during the first few decades of the twentieth century. Our protagonist is Yury Andreyevich Zhivago.  He’s referred to as “Yury”, “Yury Andreyevish” and “Zhivago” as well as a couple of nicknames.  Being the lead character, it’s not too daunting to keep up will all of these monikers. However, when EVERY character in this novel has several different names, it can be a bit too much.

Anyway, Yury marries childhood friend Tonia, yet fate pushes him in many different areas of Russia during the revolution, and he soon finds himself working side by side with another childhood friend, Larissa (or ‘Lara’). Lara is married as well, but due to her circumstances, Yury and Lara soon fall in love. Had they lived in some sort of normal existence, this infatuation could easily have been cooled over time, but 1917 Russia is anything but a normal existence.

You might be thinking at some point that this is essentially a “love-triangle” novel, but I’m not sure I would even classify it as such. In fact, it’s the personal lives of these characters that left me wanting more. I never really felt things moved as they should, and there too many things that were unresolved at the end of the story. As I mentioned, this may have been the point.  Since lives during this tumultuous time were so chaotic, why paint a nice happy picture at the end where everything gets neatly folded and put away in its proper place?

I think that was my main problem. I expected more of a story and less of a history lesson. Speaking of “history lesson”, I also confess that there are many aspects of this novel that are confusing unless one has a fair knowledge of the times and place. Being that the author is Russian, and that the book was written in 1957, he probably felt this was unnecessary, and he was probably right.  Since these events now took place 100 years prior to when I read the book (2017), I would bet many readers can’t adequately comprehend some of the situations and turmoil.  I wish the author could have spent a bit more time explaining why things were the way they were. He also never lets his readers know how much time has passed between key events. True, one can figure this out – but maybe, again, only if one has knowledge of the history.

I’ve also read that the author is mainly a poet. Interesting because although Zhivago is a doctor, he’s also a poet as well.  Poetry doesn’t pay many bills when your country is embedded in a revolution, so this hobby of Zhivago is usually only mentioned in passing.  However, the end of the book does contain “Poems of Zhivago”.  To be honest, I didn’t read them.  I was too relieved to be done with, what I thought, was a fairly disappointing story.  Perhaps some of these poems may have tied up a few loose ends that never seemed to get resolved?  I don’t know, and sadly don’t really care.

I should also point out that I’m of the minority of the opinion here.  Most people really loved this book (more, it seemed, loved the movie), so if you stumbled across this review and feel dissuaded to try the book, I should point you to the many positive reviews as well.  Give the book about 100 pages before you give up. Make sure you go through the pages slowly. And make sure that you give yourself enough time to digest all the complex vowel-less last names.