Doctor Zhivago, the Novel

Last fall my EFL students read a simplified version of Doctor Zhivago and then we saw the movie. Our discussions were quite lively and it was interesting to delve into Russian history and literature. Thus I decided to read the novel this summer.

Both the movie and the graded reader leave out quite a bit from this hefty classic. I enjoyed getting every detail and event. A thoughtfully written novel is one of my favorite ways to come to know history. This novel, published in 1960, gives readers a close up at the enthusiasm, chaos, and violence surrounding the Russian Revolution.

Yes, the names are long and everyone's got a nickname, but I got a sense of who's who without a chart, maybe because I saw the movie first.

Most of the Russian literature, I've read has taken place before the Revolution, while Doctor Zhivago takes place before, during and after. What a time that was! Pasternak's novel reminds me of Dickens because not only do readers see the hero's journey, but we see so much of what happens throughout the society. I found that fascinating. So many people had so many struggles and tragedies.

The hero is Yurii . At the beginning of the story he's a young boy who witnesses his father's suicide. He's adopted by relatives and marries his cousin Tonia, a lovely, smart woman. The sort of girl people think he should marry. (And he does agree.)

As a young man in Moscow and later after the revolution when Yurii's out in the Ural Mountains, his path crosses that of Lara, an enigmatic, alluring, albeit troubled woman. Her father died when she was young and her mother becomes beholden to Komarovsky, a rich, powerful man who wants Lara when she's in high school. Lara picks up on her mother's implicit message that she should do what she needs to for the family. This action defines Lara making her feel a guilt she never completely overcomes. It taints her marriage to Pasha, an intelligent, innocent promising student she meets in university.

All the characters cross paths and influence each other as they strive to make sense of the confusion of the revolution that steamrolls over so many Russians back then. Pasternak constructs a masterful story full of drama and insight.

If you're not sure about reading the book, try the film or the BBC miniseries.

Persuasion by Jane Austen

Once again, true love triumphs over adversity.

It's difficult for me to be objective about Austen. I struggle to filter my reactions to her unfamiliar language, her unfamiliar time and class based society, and my aversion to Harlequin romance type sagas. All of that poses obstacles to my unfettered enjoyment of her prose.

On an intellectual level, the eighteenth century English preoccupation with class and breeding that is so central to Austen's tales captures my interest even while it engenders a certain amount of disdain.

And yet, on an emotional level, I can't help myself. I like her happy endings, her accounts of triumphal love.

So, I'm off to read yet another . . .

Guest blogger: Bridget

North and South

I’m half way through the four episodes of Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South produced by the BBC. Darker than Downton Abbey or an Austen adaptation, North and South is set in a mill town in northern England during the Industrial Revolution. Margaret Hale moves with her parents from the countryside in the south because her father, a vicar, won’t sign a paper stating he believes in the Common Prayer. So they’re uprooted to the sooty, depressing North.

They encounter Mr. Thornton, a strict factory owner, takes lessons from Mr. Hale. Margeret befriends a working class family, headed by a union organizer, preferring them to the snooty Thorntons. The series provides great visuals of work in the factories with cotton floating through the air like snow that chokes and sickens the workers. Though philosophic and ethical adversaries Mr. Thornton admires Margaret and proposes to her. He’s flatly refused. It’s not hard to guess how that relationship will fare, but I am intrigued and wonder about the workers.

It’s a fascinating drama capturing life in the Industrial Revolution.

Gaskell wrote the lighter Cranston, which I read and reviewed last fall.