Doctor Zhivago (Vintage International)
First published in Italy in 1957 amid international controversy, Doctor Zhivago is the story of the life and loves of a poet/physician during the turmoil of the Russian Revolution. Taking his family from Moscow to what he hopes will be shelter in the Ural Mountains, Zhivago finds himself instead embroiled in the battle between the Whites and the Reds. Set against this backdrop of cruelty and strife is Zhivago's love for the tender and beautiful Lara, the very embodiment of the pain and chaos of those cataclysmic times. Pevear and Volokhonsky masterfully restore the spirit of Pasternak's original—his style, rhythms, voicings, and tone—in this beautiful translation of a classic of world literature.
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Community Reviews
“Doctor Zhivago” by Boris Pasternak has been celebrated as one of the most important works in Russian literature and a staple worth mentioning in many literary canons. For me, this book only cemented that, save for “Crime and Punishment,” Russian literature does nothing for me. The majority of the Russian compendium of literature is resoundingly depressing and unnerving. “Doctor Zhivago” fits perfectly with that description.
The only redeeming qualities I could find in the book are the sweeping and painstaking detail Pasternak applies to covering this period of Russian history and how no beauty survives a world hell-bent on words. It’s just sad that even that modicum of meaning is suffocated under the malady of words that could have been cut by eighty percent.
This tome reads like a sprawling telanovella in words that will never end. It also reeks of the author’s apparent disposition to degrade any importance and symbolism behind love and relationships. This book was a real slog to get through. Sometimes you finish things and you’re better for it. But I can say, unequivocally, that not a single part of my life has improved for reading this book.
