Doctor Zhivago: The Russian Revolution Essay Example

Within less than a decade more than 15 million Russian men, women, and children had met their demise from war. Brothers turn against each other in one of the bloodiest civil wars in human history that would have drastic effects depending on the winner. The Russian revolution would set the stones in place for one of the most powerful countries ever to exist. In the early 1900s issues in Russia were more than plentiful with extreme poverty and starvation running rampant in the country and a lack of supplies for the military. Instability is soaring among the citizens of the empire causing the Czar to secede his throne and set up a provisional government. This caused a rift in the people between the Mensheviks (capitalists) and the Bolsheviks (communists) who would stand triumphant at the end of the civil war and create the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. It would be one of the most oppressive countries ever which attempted to destroy individuality and refused to allow people to express themselves. Doctor Zhivago is the perfect representation of this because it is created by a Russian in the Soviet Union who wasn’t able to get his book published in his own country because of their independent-minded stance on the October revolution. Allusion and symbolism serve as great importance to any story, but in Doctor Zhivago, they hold greater significance with the main character being symbolic of the author, Boris Pasternak, with his lover represented as Lara, his fall from wealth in the revolution, them both being renowned poets disliked by the Soviets, and their simple refusal to turn their backs on their beloved Russia.

First, Lara is very clearly represented in the story as Pasternak’s lover in real life due to the many similarities they share. The first similarity that they share is that Olga and Lara are both women who’ve had children with other men before they met Pasternak and Zhivago. His incorporation of her in the story is important because it lays the groundwork for the link between Pasternak and Zhivago. Another similarity between the two of them is that they share many similarities with both of them having blonde hair and blue eyes. Thus it is important because Pasternak wrote this character to be as similar as his real-life lover so that he could show that Zhivago is a representation of himself. However, this would not be the only similarity that it showed throughout the story with even their situations being similar.

In addition to sharing lovers, Zhivago and Pasternak share a very strong connection with how their lives got flipped on their heads by the Russian revolution. Yuri Zhivago had a fairly wealthy upbringing in the story after being adopted by the Gromeko’s who were very wealthy and respected as doctors. When Zhivago had returned from WW1 the Russian revolution had just begun and he was met by the shock that many other families lived in his house while he was out fighting in World War 1. Also, similar to Zhivago the author, Pasternak, is from a wealthy family before the revolution but they all fled excluding him because he believed he could find inspiration from the war. Unfortunately, he would never be able to publish his works in Russia that he had been inspired to create because of the revolutionary war and of the new censorship laws.

Subsequently, a similarity that proves that Zhivago is representative of Pasternak was that Zhivago is also a poet who the states disliked by the state because his works pushed individuality. This is a way for Pasternak to show what he is dealing with when it comes to censorship in his country to the rest of the world. The first time it’s shown Zhivago and Pasternak sharing their interest in poetry is when he gets told by Tonya that he was published in a newspaper about young poets. Consequently, it would begin to set him up to be in the same position as Pasternak because there would be a strong amount of animosity between the Soviet government and Zhivago about his poem's expression of individuality. Similar to how Pasternak couldn’t publish his work in Russia because of what it represented Zhivago is informed that the party would always have a target for him due to the uniqueness the poems showed. Therefore, this similarity would be further highlighted by when Pasternak won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1958 but couldn’t accept it because the Soviet government would revoke his citizenship.

Finally, the last similarity between Zhivago and Pasternak was that they both loved Russia too much to turn their backs on it. When the movie wraps up Lara and Victor flee Russia to get away from the government but Yuri refuses to leave. Lara stated that it was because he was unwilling to leave Russia and its people behind. This is very similar to Pasternak because he would never leave the U.S.S.R.  for anything. For example, he showed on several occasions with the first of which being when his family was originally leaving Russia while he stayed behind. There is a second time that Pasternak was offered a chance to flee Russia because of his Nobel Prize, but rejected it because he wouldn’t be allowed back into Russia. All of this is tied together to prove that Pasternak designed Yuri in the image of himself to get his story out there for everyone to see.

In conclusion, Boris Pasternak immortalized himself through Yuri Zhivago in Doctor Zhivago with their lives being fairly similar to one another. Firstly, Lara is a clear representation of his lover Olga Ivinskaya with both of them having children with other men and having a similar appearance overall. Another reason why Zhivago is symbolic of Pasternak is that they were both fairly wealthy before the revolution but were dropped down to the level of the other people. The third piece of evidence is that they were both fairly well-known poets in their world and were hated by the Soviets because their poems represented individuality. The final reason is that neither of them was unwilling to turn their backs on the country that birthed them choosing to stay in Russia when allowed to escape from it. In a short period, Russia lost more than 15 million people through conflicts that would shape the world for the rest of history.