От Кибирова до Пушкина

3. Since 1945 Mr Pasternak was known to be working on a novel; this he completed in 1952–53: the result was a work of some 800 pages, entitled Doktor Zhivago. It is known that he regards this book as his most important work, and thinks of it, in his modesty, as a justification (as if such were needed) of his literary career. So far it has proved impossible to publish this work in the Soviet Union; however, at Mr Pasternak’s request, Doktor Zhivago was published in November, 1957, in an Italian translation, by Feltrinelli in Milan. Five editions of this Italian version have already appeared, and an English, a French, and a German translation of the novel are expected to come out this year. The world-wide interest which Doktor Zhivago has aroused is due, in my opinion, in large part to the qualities of the author’s prose (which is in the great tradition of the Russian nineteenth century novel), to the deep sincerity and truthfulness with which he has described life in Russia during the crucial and dramatic years 1900–1929 (the book has an epilogue concerned with the period of the Second World War)(, and to the human and spiritual values to which this novel bears an eloquent and moving testimony. The last section of the book contains twenty-five poems (ten of which were published in the Soviet literary journal Znamya, vol. 4, 1954, pp. 92–95): several of them bear witness to the author’s Christian beliefs, and deserve, in my opinion, to be numbered among the finest works of religious poetry.

Dimitry Obolensky