"What were leaky roofs and cold hands and gray days and rock as compared with such riches of freedom and aloneness," Elliott Merrick writes of raising his family on a farm in Vermont in the 1930s. In a series of essays, Merrick recalls the labor and reward of forging an existence out in wilderness, the work and pleasure of living off the land, not just living on it. He characterizes the spectrum of personalities inhabiting his corner of Vermont, philosophizes on the nature of the writer's craft and the nature of nature itself, and lovingly reminisces about his children's younger years. All the while he maintains his affection for and devotion to the sometimes breathlessly severe, sometimes sweetly mild, always overwhelmingly beautiful landscape.
Merrick effortlessly describes moonlit nights spent cross-country skiing, lakes and streams and waterfalls, verdant summers flavored by blackberries and raspberries. He also acknowledges the harsh frosts and never-ending overcast days. Whatever he writes of takes little to imagine; he penetrates to the essential aspects of a blustery autumn day or the fleeting leap of a doe, his rendering easy and accurate, infused with a pervasive sense of actuality.
Perhaps one of Merrick's most penetrating insights involves his Thoreauvian sense of immediacy, his ability to recognize the present and embrace it. "Into my mind comes the realization that here I am, now, out of all time and all space, here in this place. And I say to myself, This is my house. My woman. A baby. Two babies. Simple things like that." Indeed simplicity, for Merrick as for Thoreau, is a chief virtue.
Merrick at one point recalls a canoe trip he and his wife took. He meditates on the balance between old and new, the sleekly engineered boat gliding on the untouched river of the ancients. He rejoices in accepting the best of both worlds. "And here it is again, the wild and the civilized side by side, and we in the middle, picking and choosing a little of each." In this he almost goes beyond Thoreau, reconciling a deep admiration for the natural world with a balanced appreciation for modern advancements.
Merrick refuses to idolize the past, asserting that the present has all of history's benefits along with improvements of its own, making it the best time yet in which to live. Merrick's refreshing enthusiasm for the here and now illuminates his work, transmitting to the reader an anticipation and a longing for the exhilarating balance he finds in life.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Thursday, August 09, 2007
The Art of War by Sun Tzu
Like Machiavelli with The Prince, Sun Tzu wrote a manual containing instructions for matters of state, only the latter lived one thousand years earlier and half the world away. Sun Tzu's writing pleased the king of his province in 500 B.C. China, and the treatise continues to be revered for its military wisdom today. I heard a guest on a radio program mention it, and so I decided I should read it myself.
"[T]he general is skillful in attack whose opponent does not know what to defend; and he is skillful in defense whose opponent does not know what to attack," declares Sun Tzu. He makes it clear that deception is the key to winning a war; keeping the enemy confused the primary goal. Furthermore, Sun Tzu encourages leaders to keep their subordinates guessing too, by concealing plans from all but a select few and thereby preserving their veil of secrecy from the spies that inevitably creep into the ranks of troops.
For Sun Tzu, flexibility is paramount. "According as circumstances are favorable, one should modify one's plans." A leader should base his movements on his enemy's actions, watching him sedulously and responding appropriately. When attacking, Sun Tzu advises targeting the opponent's weakest point. "Military tactics are like unto water, for water in its natural course runs away from high places and hastens downwards. So in war, the way to avoid what is strong is to strike what is weak. Water shapes its course according to the ground over which it flows; the soldier works out his victory in relation to the foe whom he is facing."
Though Sun Tzu's enthusiasm for war dominates the work, he counsels cautious circumspection in inciting conflict. "[A] kingdom that has once been destroyed can never come again into being; nor can the dead ever be brought back to life." He recognizes that war is irrevocable and urges leaders to refrain from waging wars merely out of personal spite. For where deception reigns virtuous can only be hardship and turmoil, ceaseless unrest.
"[T]he general is skillful in attack whose opponent does not know what to defend; and he is skillful in defense whose opponent does not know what to attack," declares Sun Tzu. He makes it clear that deception is the key to winning a war; keeping the enemy confused the primary goal. Furthermore, Sun Tzu encourages leaders to keep their subordinates guessing too, by concealing plans from all but a select few and thereby preserving their veil of secrecy from the spies that inevitably creep into the ranks of troops.
For Sun Tzu, flexibility is paramount. "According as circumstances are favorable, one should modify one's plans." A leader should base his movements on his enemy's actions, watching him sedulously and responding appropriately. When attacking, Sun Tzu advises targeting the opponent's weakest point. "Military tactics are like unto water, for water in its natural course runs away from high places and hastens downwards. So in war, the way to avoid what is strong is to strike what is weak. Water shapes its course according to the ground over which it flows; the soldier works out his victory in relation to the foe whom he is facing."
Though Sun Tzu's enthusiasm for war dominates the work, he counsels cautious circumspection in inciting conflict. "[A] kingdom that has once been destroyed can never come again into being; nor can the dead ever be brought back to life." He recognizes that war is irrevocable and urges leaders to refrain from waging wars merely out of personal spite. For where deception reigns virtuous can only be hardship and turmoil, ceaseless unrest.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Reading Like a Writer by Francine Prose
Read the classics to learn how to write well – doesn’t everyone already know this? Apparently not, for the aptly-named Prose makes sure her namesake is quite clear on the subject: "You will do yourself a disservice if you confine your reading to the rising star whose six-figure, two-book contract might seem to indicate where your own work should be heading." Really? Mass-market American tastes shouldn't necessarily be consulted for examples of brilliant writing?
I don't mean to be so sarcastic. Prose's treatise on developing an eye and an ear for writing is spot-on. She, after all, was once a "bookish sixteen-year-old" who idolized Austen and the Brontës, unaware not only that "no one wrote that way anymore," but also that "no one lived that way any longer." Prose liberally quotes her favorite authors, deconstructing their techniques to determine what good writing is and how it is formed. By focusing on the basic elements of a novel or story, she manages a comprehensive examination of what constitutes a literary masterpiece.
Prose constantly discounts venerated rules of composition: “There are many occasions in literature in which telling is more effective than showing.” On the assumption that fictional conversation should not attempt to mimic the real: “Then why is so much written dialogue less colorful and interesting that what we can overhear daily in the Internet café, the mall, and on the subway?” She encourages adhering to some general guidelines but gleefully appends them with masterly exceptions.
Her observations are accurate and insightful. “[D]ialogue usually contains as much or even more subtext than it does text…One mark of bad written dialogue is that it is only doing one thing, at most, at once.” Elsewhere she notes, “A well-chosen detail can tell us more about a character - his social and economic status, his hopes and dreams, his visions of himself – than a long explanatory passage.”
Prose dutifully follows her axioms with appropriate examples culled from classic works. These excerpts illuminate her points, making the book practical and understandable. She realizes the limitations of such instruction though, admitting, “Beauty, in a sentence, is ultimately as difficult to quantify or describe as beauty in a painting or in a human face.” She concludes that the only way to determine whether one has produced a rose or a weed is to spend time in rose gardens.
The book is engaging and profitable, like taking a good English class from a seasoned and passionate teacher. Prose rightly maintains that writing cannot be learned in the vacuum of a classroom; there is no substitute for the real thing. All writers, from the aspiring to the established, would do well to realize that they are only “the dot at the end of the long, glorious, complex sentence in which literature has been written.”
I don't mean to be so sarcastic. Prose's treatise on developing an eye and an ear for writing is spot-on. She, after all, was once a "bookish sixteen-year-old" who idolized Austen and the Brontës, unaware not only that "no one wrote that way anymore," but also that "no one lived that way any longer." Prose liberally quotes her favorite authors, deconstructing their techniques to determine what good writing is and how it is formed. By focusing on the basic elements of a novel or story, she manages a comprehensive examination of what constitutes a literary masterpiece.
Prose constantly discounts venerated rules of composition: “There are many occasions in literature in which telling is more effective than showing.” On the assumption that fictional conversation should not attempt to mimic the real: “Then why is so much written dialogue less colorful and interesting that what we can overhear daily in the Internet café, the mall, and on the subway?” She encourages adhering to some general guidelines but gleefully appends them with masterly exceptions.
Her observations are accurate and insightful. “[D]ialogue usually contains as much or even more subtext than it does text…One mark of bad written dialogue is that it is only doing one thing, at most, at once.” Elsewhere she notes, “A well-chosen detail can tell us more about a character - his social and economic status, his hopes and dreams, his visions of himself – than a long explanatory passage.”
Prose dutifully follows her axioms with appropriate examples culled from classic works. These excerpts illuminate her points, making the book practical and understandable. She realizes the limitations of such instruction though, admitting, “Beauty, in a sentence, is ultimately as difficult to quantify or describe as beauty in a painting or in a human face.” She concludes that the only way to determine whether one has produced a rose or a weed is to spend time in rose gardens.
The book is engaging and profitable, like taking a good English class from a seasoned and passionate teacher. Prose rightly maintains that writing cannot be learned in the vacuum of a classroom; there is no substitute for the real thing. All writers, from the aspiring to the established, would do well to realize that they are only “the dot at the end of the long, glorious, complex sentence in which literature has been written.”
Friday, June 15, 2007
The Best American Short Stories 2006 Edited by Ann Patchett
As I perused this collection, persistent questions tapped on my shoulder: Why do I read? Why do authors write? Why did they write these stories? Why were these stories included in this book? Unfortunately, "Why?" may be the only question in the world that can never be definitively, indisputably answered. We make partial attempts at settling the issue, but unresolved elements always remain. Nonetheless, Ann Patchett ventures her opinion of the matter of the short story and its purpose in her introduction. "I haven't been able to shake the notion that short story writers are famous people and that short stories are life-altering things. I believe it is human nature to try and persuade others that our most passionately held beliefs are true so that they too can know the joy of our deepest convictions."
Evaluating the book in that light, I think the purpose of this collection centers around inspiring compassion for others. While this is sometimes manifested in benign portraits of lonely senior citizens, bemused immigrants, and tragic marriages, at other times it seems merely a vehicle for gaining widespread acceptance of the practices of the most outlandish members of society. Homosexuality and all manner of promiscuity are boldly, kindly, even pedestrianly presented, as if such liasons were not only permissable but laudable, just another facet of a diverse civilization.
The unifying theme that these stories evoke is a continuation of the American motif of isolation. The individual is triumphed at the expense of the community. The gay military man unable to reach out to the needy family of a deployed solider nor commit to his "partner;" the sex-surfeited girl stringing along her smitten boyfriend; the aloof lesbian whose only human connections are fleeting, physical, and base - the individuals are worlds unto themselves, deceiving even their closest companions as to the true nature of their relationships, unable to foster meaningful interactions, nor engage in fully honest discourse. Here we have only ourselves; father, mother, sister, brother, husband, wife, friend - all are peripheral appendages with whom complete sincerity and verity, with whom selfless love, is tragically impossible. The stories form a paean to self.
So what are Ann Patchett's "deepest convictions" - that the individual is to be prized above all else? That the individual should pursue whatever feels right inside him, regardless of extraneous considerations? How should we apply these "life-altering" stories - Become more self-absorbed and self-obsessed than we already are? Accept whatever society foists on us as social norms?
Literature, like life, is vacuous, redundant, without a clear and defined purpose. Saying these short stories are worth reading is like saying one's aim in life is to just "be." The pursuit of truth and beauty is admirable only if it ends fruitfully. To get meat, hunt a deer. To find truth and beauty, seek the One who holds them, whose very being is composed of them.
Evaluating the book in that light, I think the purpose of this collection centers around inspiring compassion for others. While this is sometimes manifested in benign portraits of lonely senior citizens, bemused immigrants, and tragic marriages, at other times it seems merely a vehicle for gaining widespread acceptance of the practices of the most outlandish members of society. Homosexuality and all manner of promiscuity are boldly, kindly, even pedestrianly presented, as if such liasons were not only permissable but laudable, just another facet of a diverse civilization.
The unifying theme that these stories evoke is a continuation of the American motif of isolation. The individual is triumphed at the expense of the community. The gay military man unable to reach out to the needy family of a deployed solider nor commit to his "partner;" the sex-surfeited girl stringing along her smitten boyfriend; the aloof lesbian whose only human connections are fleeting, physical, and base - the individuals are worlds unto themselves, deceiving even their closest companions as to the true nature of their relationships, unable to foster meaningful interactions, nor engage in fully honest discourse. Here we have only ourselves; father, mother, sister, brother, husband, wife, friend - all are peripheral appendages with whom complete sincerity and verity, with whom selfless love, is tragically impossible. The stories form a paean to self.
So what are Ann Patchett's "deepest convictions" - that the individual is to be prized above all else? That the individual should pursue whatever feels right inside him, regardless of extraneous considerations? How should we apply these "life-altering" stories - Become more self-absorbed and self-obsessed than we already are? Accept whatever society foists on us as social norms?
Literature, like life, is vacuous, redundant, without a clear and defined purpose. Saying these short stories are worth reading is like saying one's aim in life is to just "be." The pursuit of truth and beauty is admirable only if it ends fruitfully. To get meat, hunt a deer. To find truth and beauty, seek the One who holds them, whose very being is composed of them.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne
Unbelievably lengthy, exceedingly verbose, purposefully tedious, Tristram Shandy was one of those books whose Introduction was infinitely more fruitful than the text itself. Peter Conrad, in his introductory remarks, extols Sterne's novel for its daring innovation, unconventional liberties, and subversive wit, meanwhile praising other prominent authors of the eighteenth century, making a thoughtful summary of their respective contributions to the novel form. He makes an excellent case for the merits of this book. While Sterne's originality holds, undoubtedly, historical literary importance, experienced at the present time it lacks immediacy, and ultimately, relevancy.
Ostensibly an autobiography, the book purports to be the "life and opinions" of the eponymous character, though little of either makes an appearance. Tristram famously does not appear himself until well into the narrative, a fact he readily admits is singular: "I am...almost into the middle of my third volume - and no farther than to my first day's life." What, then, constitutes the bulk of the novel? In a word, digressions. Tristram chronicles the inane conversations of his father, uncle, and neighbors, meandering along not only their rabbit paths, but taking liberal detours of his own. He freely addresses the reader at times, leaves blank pages, provides accompanying graphics, and wantonly flits from topic to topic, desperately trying to maintain an accurate chronology but coming nowhere near. Like an attention-challenged child who tries to behave but cannot for the life of him sit still, Sterne's spastic narrator never stays on one subject for long, himself least of all.
What sort of person Tristram truly is remains unanswered, though the haphazard sketches he produces of the personalities that peopled his childhood make it evident he was not raised without some degree of eccentricity. His uncle, an emasculate war veteran, and his father, a would-be ivory tower intellectual, volley with the pompous curate and bumbling parish doctor over antiquated obscurities and the more mundane happenings of the household. Though Tristram's father blathers nonsense most of the time, opining about his treasured pet theories involving medieval minutiae like how one's name affects one's life and the physical location of the soul, occasionally he makes an acute observation. Speaking of auxiliary verbs, he avers, "Now, by the right use and application of these...there is no one idea can enter [Tristram's] brain...but a magazine of conceptions and conclusions may be drawn forth from it. - Didst thou ever see a white bear...Would I had seen a white bear...If I should...If I should never..."
Little of what passes for the life of Tristram Shandy is of any consequence to anyone, and Sterne is well aware of this. Inquiring about an anecdote Tristram's father had just told, his mother asks, "[W]hat is all this story about?" The curate replies, "A cock and a bull - And one of the best of its kind, I ever heard." And there the book ends.
Ostensibly an autobiography, the book purports to be the "life and opinions" of the eponymous character, though little of either makes an appearance. Tristram famously does not appear himself until well into the narrative, a fact he readily admits is singular: "I am...almost into the middle of my third volume - and no farther than to my first day's life." What, then, constitutes the bulk of the novel? In a word, digressions. Tristram chronicles the inane conversations of his father, uncle, and neighbors, meandering along not only their rabbit paths, but taking liberal detours of his own. He freely addresses the reader at times, leaves blank pages, provides accompanying graphics, and wantonly flits from topic to topic, desperately trying to maintain an accurate chronology but coming nowhere near. Like an attention-challenged child who tries to behave but cannot for the life of him sit still, Sterne's spastic narrator never stays on one subject for long, himself least of all.
What sort of person Tristram truly is remains unanswered, though the haphazard sketches he produces of the personalities that peopled his childhood make it evident he was not raised without some degree of eccentricity. His uncle, an emasculate war veteran, and his father, a would-be ivory tower intellectual, volley with the pompous curate and bumbling parish doctor over antiquated obscurities and the more mundane happenings of the household. Though Tristram's father blathers nonsense most of the time, opining about his treasured pet theories involving medieval minutiae like how one's name affects one's life and the physical location of the soul, occasionally he makes an acute observation. Speaking of auxiliary verbs, he avers, "Now, by the right use and application of these...there is no one idea can enter [Tristram's] brain...but a magazine of conceptions and conclusions may be drawn forth from it. - Didst thou ever see a white bear...Would I had seen a white bear...If I should...If I should never..."
Little of what passes for the life of Tristram Shandy is of any consequence to anyone, and Sterne is well aware of this. Inquiring about an anecdote Tristram's father had just told, his mother asks, "[W]hat is all this story about?" The curate replies, "A cock and a bull - And one of the best of its kind, I ever heard." And there the book ends.
Monday, June 04, 2007
Pere Goriot by Honore de Balzac
Balzac designates Goriot "Pere," father, because the man devotes all he has to his two daughters. They define his amorphous existence, creating the sharp edge of poverty that he lives on in his old age. Though Goriot bestows upon the girls enormous dowries to ensure they are able to marry whomever they want and desires in return only love and a place in their homes, they deny him both. Nevertheless, he procures money for them whenever they plead for the sums their mercenary husbands refuse to grant them. Goriot is only too happy to suffer in miserable squalor if it adds to his daughters' comfort. One day, though, the debts become too much for him to bear. Goriot collapses into a fatal illness, and eventually dies, attended by neither of those whom he had loved so much.
Goriot's privation for the sake of his daughters forces him to live in a boardinghouse, along with varying examples of Parisian life in 1819. One fellow boarder, Eugene Rastignac, a poor law student from the country, befriends him when he discovers Goriot's daughters occupy the lofty sphere of society he desperately wants to inhabit. Eugene becomes increasingly enmeshed in their affairs, at the end burying Goriot when his daughters refuse to.
Eugene develops a profound respect for Goriot's unwavering affection toward his children, viewing him as the prototype of a father. Eugene is disgusted by the ignominious end the man comes to. "Great souls cannot stay long in this world. How, indeed, should noble feelings exist in harmony with a petty, paltry, and superficial society?" Eugene charges society with killing Goriot, finally declaring war on it to avenge the man's death.
Society, Parisian society certainly, with its values, may share some of the blame in the tragedy of Goriot. Materialism, hedonism, the unscrupulous clawing to the top of the heap - the world Goriot's girls inhabited did not triumph unselfish filial duty. But Goriot should have instilled in them the morals and beliefs that would have allowed them to stand tall amidst such pettiness. Giving them all they wanted was not loving them perfectly, not doing what was best for them. Permitting them to marry mercenaries directly contradicted the purpose of the large dowries. Scrambling to find money every time they asked for it only reinforced their remorseless greed.
Eugene refuses to accept the path society would have him take, declining to marry the young, naive heiress who adores him, but to whom he is indifferent. Instead, he aligns himself with Goriot's more compassionate, contrite daughter. As she is still married, it is not the most moral choice, but it is infinitely noble in his, and Balzac's, eyes. Why greed and disrespect for one's parents are sins in Balzac's world, but adultery is not, is unclear.
Goriot's privation for the sake of his daughters forces him to live in a boardinghouse, along with varying examples of Parisian life in 1819. One fellow boarder, Eugene Rastignac, a poor law student from the country, befriends him when he discovers Goriot's daughters occupy the lofty sphere of society he desperately wants to inhabit. Eugene becomes increasingly enmeshed in their affairs, at the end burying Goriot when his daughters refuse to.
Eugene develops a profound respect for Goriot's unwavering affection toward his children, viewing him as the prototype of a father. Eugene is disgusted by the ignominious end the man comes to. "Great souls cannot stay long in this world. How, indeed, should noble feelings exist in harmony with a petty, paltry, and superficial society?" Eugene charges society with killing Goriot, finally declaring war on it to avenge the man's death.
Society, Parisian society certainly, with its values, may share some of the blame in the tragedy of Goriot. Materialism, hedonism, the unscrupulous clawing to the top of the heap - the world Goriot's girls inhabited did not triumph unselfish filial duty. But Goriot should have instilled in them the morals and beliefs that would have allowed them to stand tall amidst such pettiness. Giving them all they wanted was not loving them perfectly, not doing what was best for them. Permitting them to marry mercenaries directly contradicted the purpose of the large dowries. Scrambling to find money every time they asked for it only reinforced their remorseless greed.
Eugene refuses to accept the path society would have him take, declining to marry the young, naive heiress who adores him, but to whom he is indifferent. Instead, he aligns himself with Goriot's more compassionate, contrite daughter. As she is still married, it is not the most moral choice, but it is infinitely noble in his, and Balzac's, eyes. Why greed and disrespect for one's parents are sins in Balzac's world, but adultery is not, is unclear.
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
The misguided romance between Dr. Zhivago and Lara is central to this book, and it parallels the Russians' fatal infatuation with socialism that forms the background of the story. Zhivago and Lara come of age and begin their own families separately during the early 20th century, while Marxism is gaining traction and the revolt against landed aristocracy and the Czarist regime rages. In a caprice of war, the two are thrown together more than once, kindling an ongoing affair. But just as war throws them together, it also tears them apart, and they both eventually come to ignobly solitary ends.
Doctor Zhivago is a comprehensive, loftily toned novel that tries hard to be a worthy heir to the legacy of Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, et al. However, try as it might, it never quite reaches such heights. Neither Zhivago's appending poetry, which is highly praised in the novel, nor the narrative of the book itself come across as anything but pretentious and self-centered imitations. The characters certainly discuss the masters of Russian literature often enough, but that only sharpens the contrast between their fictional predecessors and them.
Pasternak repeatedly falls into telling rather than showing. When describing a conversation between Zhivago and his uncle, Pasternak says he had never "heard views as penetrating, apt, or inspiring," but these remarkable comments never make an appearance. Pasternak has too much confidence in the profundity of his protagonist. Zhivago writes "Playing at People, a Gloomy Diary or Journal Consisting of Prose, Verse, and What-have-you, Inspired by the Realization that Half the People Have Stopped Being Themselves and Are Acting Unknown Parts," a title whose self-amused attempt at witticism would be at home in these modern incarnations of narcissism, blogs.
But perhaps it would not be wise to blame Pasternak for his shortcomings and mistake "the spirit of the times" for personal inadequacy, as Lara's husband does. As socialist thought slowly permeated every aspect of their lives, it alienated them from each other. "We began to be idiotically pompous with each other," Lara explains to Zhivago, "you felt you had to be clever in a certain way about certain world-important themes." Unable to communicate accurately and thus believing he no longer has his wife’s esteem, Lara's husband joins the army and throws himself headlong into the revolution, effectually abandoning her.
Lara attributes the break-up of her marriage largely to the advent of Communism. To some extent, she is justified. The book chronicles the brutality of socialism, the incongruity between its sweet promises and its bitter actuality. Without a free market, people starve physically, and also intellectually and spiritually. Communist thought enthralled Russians, from the radicals at the universities to the impoverished peasants. Just as Russians deserted their traditions, their native values, so Zhivago betrayed his constant, devoted wife for Lara. The affair gives him no peace or satisfaction, just wrenching guilt and an addled conscience.
Pasternak seems to say that Zhivago, like Lara's husband, would never have strayed had he not been subjected to the insensibility and turmoil of the revolution. Morals became as muddled as politics then. Zhivago feels helpless, powerless, facing unassailable history. "He realized he was a pygmy before the monstrous machine of the future."
Doctor Zhivago is a comprehensive, loftily toned novel that tries hard to be a worthy heir to the legacy of Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, et al. However, try as it might, it never quite reaches such heights. Neither Zhivago's appending poetry, which is highly praised in the novel, nor the narrative of the book itself come across as anything but pretentious and self-centered imitations. The characters certainly discuss the masters of Russian literature often enough, but that only sharpens the contrast between their fictional predecessors and them.
Pasternak repeatedly falls into telling rather than showing. When describing a conversation between Zhivago and his uncle, Pasternak says he had never "heard views as penetrating, apt, or inspiring," but these remarkable comments never make an appearance. Pasternak has too much confidence in the profundity of his protagonist. Zhivago writes "Playing at People, a Gloomy Diary or Journal Consisting of Prose, Verse, and What-have-you, Inspired by the Realization that Half the People Have Stopped Being Themselves and Are Acting Unknown Parts," a title whose self-amused attempt at witticism would be at home in these modern incarnations of narcissism, blogs.
But perhaps it would not be wise to blame Pasternak for his shortcomings and mistake "the spirit of the times" for personal inadequacy, as Lara's husband does. As socialist thought slowly permeated every aspect of their lives, it alienated them from each other. "We began to be idiotically pompous with each other," Lara explains to Zhivago, "you felt you had to be clever in a certain way about certain world-important themes." Unable to communicate accurately and thus believing he no longer has his wife’s esteem, Lara's husband joins the army and throws himself headlong into the revolution, effectually abandoning her.
Lara attributes the break-up of her marriage largely to the advent of Communism. To some extent, she is justified. The book chronicles the brutality of socialism, the incongruity between its sweet promises and its bitter actuality. Without a free market, people starve physically, and also intellectually and spiritually. Communist thought enthralled Russians, from the radicals at the universities to the impoverished peasants. Just as Russians deserted their traditions, their native values, so Zhivago betrayed his constant, devoted wife for Lara. The affair gives him no peace or satisfaction, just wrenching guilt and an addled conscience.
Pasternak seems to say that Zhivago, like Lara's husband, would never have strayed had he not been subjected to the insensibility and turmoil of the revolution. Morals became as muddled as politics then. Zhivago feels helpless, powerless, facing unassailable history. "He realized he was a pygmy before the monstrous machine of the future."
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