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Lesson for Liberals: Doctor Zhivago
So excited to be here! By way of an introduction, I’m starting a Sunday evening book club.
Something unheard-of, something unprecedented is approaching. Before it overtakes us, here is my wish for you. When it comes, God grant that we do not lose each other and do not lose our souls.
This excerpt comes from the most recent, and in my opinion the best, English translation of Boris Pasternak’s epic novel Doctor Zhivago. Pasternak was a poet and that is clear in many passages, but he also portrays in terrifying prose the gritty, gruesome reality of life in Russia during and after the First World War when communism supplanted a people’s entire mode of existence.
While I would recommend this literary work to anyone (because it changed my life and set me on the course I am now on), I believe that it has particular value for a class of people we know well: the seemingly well-meaning, socialism-idealizing liberals. The open secret of my life is that I was a Democrat at the start of college. I soon soured on the party and on the principles of progressivism and I’ve never really looked back. So, I know how a lot of liberals think, or tell themselves that what they’re doing is thinking. And if they took the few evenings it would require to read Doctor Zhivago, I believe it could change their lives too. I’ll offer a few examples.
The title character Yury Zhivago is conscripted into the Red Army during the Russian Civil War. He is forced to stay in their camp, divided from the people he loves.
Despite the absence of fetters, chains, and guards, the doctor was forced to submit to his unfreedom.
While this might be too subtle for the casually Marxist left-winger, I think every human being shudders a bit at the word “unfreedom.” It’s not a word in any dictionary, but we all know what it means. And the idea that a person can be unfree without chains only makes it that much more frightening. Liberty takes centuries to preserve and seconds to steal.
Then untruth came to the Russian land. The main trouble, the root of the future evil, was loss of faith in the value of one’s own opinion. People imagined that the time when they followed the urgings of their moral sense was gone, that now they had to sing the general tune and live by foreign notions imposed on everyone. The dominion of the ready-made phrase began to grow—first monarchistic, then revolutionary. This social delusion was all-enveloping, contagious.
If we’re talking about ready-made phrases, I would hope that “Yes, we can” would pop into our readers’ heads, not necessarily from any sense of self-awareness, but more because it’s hard-wired into their nervous system now from believing so fervently in it.
The ban on private enterprise was lifted, and free trade was permitted within strict limits. Deals were done on the scale of commodity circulation among junkmen in a flea market. The dwarf scope of it encouraged speculation and led to abuse. The petty scrambling of the dealers produced nothing new, it added nothing material to the city’s desolation. Fortunes were made by pointlessly selling the same things ten times over.
Even aspiring wealth redistributors have to understand this devastating and absurd result of subverting the economy, disrupting the market, and spending years making “profits” a dirty word to where people no longer understand it.
And finally, not to deprive you or our nannying friends of a glimpse of the central love story, here is how Lara thinks of Yury:
She wanted, with his help, to break free, if only for a short time, into the fresh air, out of the abyss of sufferings that entangled her, to experience, as she once had, the happiness of liberation.
Pasternak uses the language of freedom throughout the novel. The point he makes is that love and a personal, private existence are more powerful life-giving forces than the cold, cruel mechanisms of the state, even and especially when the state claims to be benevolent. We should be thankful we don’t live in a Soviet society and we should be wary of people touting the same supposed ideals of enforced egalitarianism.
So, here’s my question for our club: What work of fiction (not all Ayn Rand, please) would you recommend for those with more collectivizing tendencies? Are there enough works of fiction out there?
Published in General
I think fiction can enlighten people in non-political ways and it works for both men and women.
Agreed. Great fiction has a way of sneaking by a person’s defenses.
It’s not a coincidence that I’ve ended up on Ricochet with Diane Ellis after studying Russian together. There’s something about the literature of a people who never experienced life free from an autocrat.
Let me turn the question around. As someone with such a strong interest in Russian literature and (I presume) culture, what stories might help Russians to rekindle all that Soviet domination stamped out of them? From the outside, Russians seem like a people who have succumbed to despair and cynicism.
Fiction should be a last resort.
Have them read actual works by Those Who have actually experienced it: “The Gulag Archipelago” by Solzenitsyn to name One. If actual experiences, reality, don’t change minds nothing will.
Perhaps suggest a “vacation” to North Korea to “Witness” their ideas.
Perhaps slightly off topic, but still in the ballpark is Vonnegut’s Harrison Bergeron. That’s the one I always think of when the socialist left starts making their benevolent plans. (I still wonder how the guy who wrote one of the most libertarian-leaning stories in history became such a left-wing fanatic at the end… Go figure.)
We’ve got a lot of dystopian lit going on here, but we’ve forgotten the quintessential tract: Zamyatin’s “We.” It’s a very quick read by Russian novel standards and was openly the inspiration for Orwell and Huxley.
Lord of the Flies was mentioned. There’s an interesting counterpoint to this book, written at about the same time: Robert Heinlein’s “Tunnel in the Sky,” in which a group of adolescents are stranded on a faraway planet and actually establish a functioning society.
I’ve watched MGM’s production of Doctor Zhivago many times over the years. As the first movie my parents took me to (I was 3?), its lessons are probably deeply embedded in my mind. (I’m sure my parents never thought they’d make it to Intermission. I’m told I was silent to the end, then cheered “Again!”). Pasha telling Zhivago “the private life is dead in Russia” stands out in my mind, alongside Zhivago’s hopeless acquiescence to the “more just” partition and ruin of his family’s home. I’m moved by your comment that “love and a personal, private existence are more powerful life-giving forces than the cold, cruel mechanisms of the state”. As the statist agenda advances and more of what was once personal becomes politicized, I become more interested in the liberating difference between public rhetoric and the actual private lives people lead. It’s our last refuge. Book: Kang Chol-Hwan’s The Aquariums of Pyongyang; moving account of a childhood spent in a North Korean labor camp. When I read it, a liberal friend had to ask me “What’s a Gulag?” We have a long way to go.
Fantastic question! Here’s the funny thing: Russians know their own literature. They are known for being able to quote whole passages of Pushkin. Can any random person on the street here recite the whole “To Be or Not to Be” soliloquy? They were censored under tsars and then more fiercely under soviet regimes, but they had a good network of underground publishing. Their literature is very important to them.
And I think the trend of controversial lit is continuing. Have you heard of the best-selling Nightwatch series by Sergei Lukyanenko? They’re full of twists and turns and are profoundly Russian in spirit. But they criticize the current upside-down state of capitalism there now.
I am torn as to whether fiction could actually change my world view or political philosophy. Appeals to emotion, while they may tug on the heart-strings, have never made me challenge my own fundamental beliefs. ·Dec 4 at 4:51pm
Case in point from my life: When I read “Jane Eyre” as a fifteen-year-old I fundamentally changed my belief in babysitting being boring.
I read that short story in middle school and to this day, vividly remember the image of the ballerina in chains. Great choice.
Have them read actual works by Those Who have actually experienced it: “The Gulag Archipelago” by Solzenitsyn to name One. If actual experiences, reality, don’t change minds nothing will.
On that note, I would suggest anything written by the tenacious Natan Sharansky.
I loved the Wilt referenceby D Perez. Besides the essential message, the book is absolutely hilarious.
Per the post , I think Witness is an important book about being an American when given a choice. Crowds and Power by Cannetti is very instructive as it goes to the combined force of the people and their psyche, the way they respond en masse is very different from the individual. It also has numerous chapters how bad things can go for societies when they start down the wrong path.
Lastly, there is Cultural Amnesia. This wonderful book by Clive James contains over a hundred profiles of a vast range of people and why they matter. Some are political, some not, but all are important and the author’s ability to use them as mileposts and directional signals to greater trends and bigger events is remarkable. All have contributed to our world as we know it today, still struggling to extend freedom while confused by morality and relativism.
And I think the trend of controversial lit is continuing. Have you heard of the best-selling Nightwatch series by Sergei Lukyanenko? They’re full of twists and turns and are profoundly Russian in spirit. But they criticize the current upside-down state of capitalism there now. ·Dec 4 at 6:55pm
I’m surprised no one has mentioned Chekhov.
Jimmy Carter:
Have them read actual works by Those Who have actually experienced it: “The Gulag Archipelago” by Solzenitsyn to name One. If actual experiences, reality, don’t change minds nothing will.
Another unsolicited non-fiction book to add to the list:
How We Survived Communism & Even Laughed by Slavenka Drakulic
Powerful, life-changing book. And it made me weep at parts.
Have them read actual works by Those Who have actually experienced it: “The Gulag Archipelago” by Solzenitsyn to name One. If actual experiences, reality, don’t change minds nothing will.
Perhaps suggest a “vacation” to North Korea to “Witness” their ideas. · Dec 4 at 5:51pm
Edited on Dec 04 at 05:52 pm
Jimmy, I respectfully disagree. Many years ago I made it through nearly two volumes of The Gulag Archipelago solely by gritting my teeth and taking my medicine. On the other hand, Solzenitsyn’s novel One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich brought the grim reality of the gulag home to me via a gripping narrative that I found impossible to put down.
If I could I would novelize medical textbooks. Facts are more easily remembered when connected to emotions and, for me, stories do the trick.
I believe that the novel to which Mr. Caleb Taylor refers is C. S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength, and I agree with him that it is a damning indictment of “advanced”, that is, progressive thinking.
I wish that I knew more of the fiction of G. K. Chesterton, for I feel almost certain that he touches on this subject somewhere in that body of work.
In both Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien (the Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings) there is salvation from the approaching scythe of “social science”, i. e., progressivism, and the march of the totalitarian socialist state through attention to the simple things of ordinary life, such as the the focus of the inhabitants of the Shire.
Sadly, none of these will work on Liberals. People on the left, even those who believe in Collectivism as a religion, are convinced that they are the freedom-loving people and the Right wants to install a theocracy and church-state control of everyone’s choices. I know lefties who’ve read Dostoyevsky, Kundera, even Solzhenitsyn and discovered nothing to change their worldview. If you believe Obama is too compromising with Republicans, and that the most hyperbolic criticism of Bush-Cheney was just speaking truth to power, you also believe your side is good and true and has the best interests of freedom and Democracy at it’s heart.
Alan Furst conveys a keen appreciation of what proceeds from the totalitarian state. I heartily recommend Night Soldiers and the following stories in his series. You will learn much good history from them and also will experience the feelings of people caught up in the time when two great totalitarian systems collided with each other and with the rest of the world.
If I could I would novelize medical textbooks. Facts are more easily remembered when connected to emotions and, for me, stories do the trick.
There’s an astounding amount of cognitive neuroscience that agrees with you about that, including Daniel T Willingham on page 51 in the section called Why Do Students Forget Everything I Say? in his book Why Don’t Students Like School?
A somewhat off-beat choice: From Here to Eternity. Prewitt and Maggio in the stockade. Milton Anthony Ward and Fatso. I haven’t seen the movie since I was very young, but I doubt that it can equal the novel.
One thing to think about: Many leftists and liberals believe that political & personal freedom can be separated from economic freedom.
Any ideas for novels or nonfiction works that challenge this specific point?
Lara, I mean Maura, I always loved the symbolism of the frozen house in Dr. Zhivago. This is the end result of a society that has turned completely away from Gd. Everything that is Good in this world is frozen and lifeless. Yet, we can light the fire and bring back The Good, The True, The Beautiful, and even Love. Have fun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X-Q4nmYqc4&feature=BFa&list=AVGxdCwVVULXeT20OA-OqyE7JOAsnWgMnW&lf=list_related
There’s an astounding amount of cognitive neuroscience that agrees with you about that, including Daniel T Willingham on page 51 in the section called Why Do Students Forget Everything I Say? in his book Why Don’t Students Like School? ·Dec 4 at 8:09pm
Back in the 1970s I read The Memory Book, by Harry Lorayne and Jerry Lucas (a version is still in print) and it changed my life. The book teaches techniques to imbue dry facts with emotional meaning by creating ridiculous associations as mnemonic tools.
Some day I may just post the lyrics of a song I invented to remember how to work-up a patient with acute renal insufficiency. For now, I’ll simply provide the title, “How do You Solve a Problem With Urea.” And, yes, it is sung to the tune of the Sound of Music classic with the oh-so similar name.
Okay, this is nonfiction, but I’m compelled to put in a plug for Life and Death in Shanghai, Nien Cheng’s memoir of surviving China’s Cultural Revolution. I had read it in college and was caught up in Cheng’s ability to capture the physical & psychological toll of capricious & totalitarian rule.
Pseudodionysius: If I could I would novelize medical textbooks. Facts are more easily remembered when connected to emotions and, for me, stories do the trick.
There’s an astounding amount of cognitive neuroscience that agrees with you about that, including Daniel T Willingham on page 51 in the section called Why Do Students Forget Everything I Say? in his book Why Don’t Students Like School? ·Dec 4 at 8:09pm
I just bought the book last week on Kindle! Harry mentions that its actually a very old technique used by the ancients and medievals (Simonides and Aquinas being the most famous exemplars in the periods mentioned) and its actually quite fun to use, though I’m taking no chances and am burning up the track at Lumosity trying to game my way into memory bliss.
Some day I may just post the lyrics of a song I invented to remember how to work-up a patient with acute renal insufficiency. For now, I’ll simply provide the title, “How do You Solve a Problem With Urea.” And, yes, it is sung to the tune of the Sound of Music classic with the oh-so similar name
I’ve mislaid the passage in Oliver Sacks’ MD’s Musicophilia (and there’s likely a few other books that cover it) but there’s discussion of music’s affect on the brain that I really have to get back to.
If I could I would novelize medical textbooks. Facts are more easily remembered when connected to emotions and, for me, stories do the trick.
Have you ever read The Medical Detectives?
It’s not really a textbook, just a collection of true short stories about doctors solving medical mysteries, but boy, do some of ’em stick with you, even if you never thought of going to medical school. I believe the TV series House was loosely based on The Medical Detectives.
And I would love to hear “How Do You Solve a Problem with Urea?” I have a weakness for parody songs, having turned “That’s Amore!” into a song about identifying Moray eels (“That’s a Moray!”) and “My Brown-Eyed Girl” into a song about cheesemaking (the girl in question being a cow), among others. But more than that, our Aged Relative died of renal failure, and it would have been very handy to have a ditty in our heads to remember how to take care of him.
I’m now in the middle of “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress” by Robert Heinlein, and at this point would recommend it.
In both Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien (the Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings) there is salvation from the approaching scythe of “social science”, i. e., progressivism, and the march of the totalitarian socialist state through attention to the simple things of ordinary life, such as the the focus of the inhabitants of the Shire.
Well, Middle Earth is an interesting case, isn’t it? Because it’s just as easy to read that approaching scythe as being a totalitarian state fueled by industrial revolution and commerce.
Middle Earth was beloved by hippies as a symbol of everything we had lost in a plastic, post-industrial world, and Tolkien’s fiction is looked on by many as environmentalist (heck, trees come to life and destroy a wizard’s industrial pursuits in LOTR).
I know several deeply leftist folks who love Middle Earth, and wouldn’t know what you were trying to say if you said Sauron and Saruman represented progressivism and social science.
Yes, this often happens. I wonder, though, if their perspective isn’t changed, is it at least broadened and deepened? Is one of the qualities of great literature to make us a little less sure of our opinions, whatever they may be? To make us think, “And yet…”?
My favorites: Vasily Grossman’s Life and Fate and Solzhenitsyn’s In the First Circle.
I know these Pevear-Volokhonsky translations are highly regarded. So I was very interested to read this essay by Gary Saul Morson in Commentary (from 2010). I don’t know Russian, but I respect Morson. I’d be curious to know what you think Maura.