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Boris Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago is a novel as famous for its impact on geopolitics during the Cold War as for its literary value. It was published in Italy in translation (1957) before publication in Russian by the CIA in 1958. The plan was to sell the book at a book fair and smuggle copies back to the Soviet Union in the luggage of fair attendees! Then, Pasternak won the Nobel Prize for Literature, and all hell broke loose. Eventually, he had to refuse the prize and suffered persecution at the hands of Soviet authorities. Only the intercession of Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru saved Pasternak from expulsion from Russia.
Doctor Zhivago was soon made into a successful movie directed by David Lean, starring Omar Sharif and Julie Christie. The book’s history has become an essential part of the novel itself. The novel is long, complex, confusing and mixes history with several love stories, character studies, and a story of domination and abuse. The beginning, especially the first two chapters, is very disorienting, with many characters and actions taking place that appear unrelated and random. Pasternak makes it difficult to get drawn into the book from the outset. Many have criticized it for having unlikely coincidences, such as Zhivago’s repeated encounters with Lara near the frontlines and at parties. Vladimir Nabokov said it was “a sorry thing, clumsy, trivial, and melodramatic…