Boris Pasternak: A Literary Biography

by Christopher Barnes

Overview

This authoritative new biography of the Russian poet and prose writer Boris Pasternak is the first part of a two-volume set, covering the period 1890-1928. Drawing on archives and many eyewitness accounts, Barnes' study sheds light on currently unexplored aspects of Pasternak's character and family background, and his artistic, social and historical environment. He combines biographical investigation with detailed textual analysis of translated quotations in verse and prose to reveal the source of Pasternak's extraordinary writings. The book examines a wide range of topics that include his musical enthusiasm and relations with Scriabin, his philosophical studies, his activities in World War I and his response to the 1917 revolutions, and his stance as a liberal artistic intellectual in the 1920s.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521520720
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	02/12/2004
Series:	Boris Pasternak: A Literary Biography
Edition description:	Pbk ed.
Pages:	528
Product dimensions:	5.80(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.30(d)

Table of Contents

1. The crisis of the lyric; 2. Time of plague; 3. New love and second birth; 4. A prisoner of the time; 5. Congress, consensus and confrontation; 6. Peredelkino and the purges; 7. Prose, obscurity and Hamlet; 8. Word War and evacuation; 9. Christopol translation; 10. War and peace in Moscow; 11. 'From immortality's archive' - birth of a novel; 12. Faustian pursuits in life and letters; 13. The darkness before dawn; 14. Creations of the Thaw; 14. The skies clear … and darken; 16. The printing and the prize; 17. 'Other new goals': the final year; Notes, Bibliography; Index of works by Pasternak; General index.

Editorial Reviews

"Barnes's biography brings us as close as we are likely to come to this awkward, sometimes mysterious, sometimes transparently foolish man." Sunday Times

"In this extraordinary book, Barnes does for Boris Pasternak what Joseph Frank, in his brilliant multivolume study, did for Fyodor Dostoevsky—i.e., combine meticulous scholarship with a broad understanding of the times and weave both into an enthralling account of the writer's life and works." Choice

"Barnes' accomplishment is an artistic achievement, illuminating Pasternak as the author might himself have enjoyed, relating the ineffable forces of art and history as experienced by Zhivago and Pasternak himself. Highly recommended for all academic collections." Choice

"...this volume is far more than a standard literary biography. Barnes' accomplishment is an artistic achievement..." Choice

"After this study, no other biography with the right mixture of intellectual, social and creative skills is likely to appear for a very long time, and few new revelations about Pasternak's life can be expected." Donald Reyfield, Times Literary Supplement

"...very informative and scrupulously detailed..." Rimvydas Silbajoris, World Literature Today

"...sure to be vital importance to Pasternak scholars and of tremendous interest to nonspecialists for a long time to come." Karen Evans-Romaine, Slavic Review

"With the completion of volume 2, Christopher Barnes has produced the definitive biography of Boris Pasternak. This is essential reading for all scholars of twentienth-century Russian literature." Rimgaila Salys, Russian Review

"Barnes's biography is a exemplary contribution to the scholarship on the twentieth-century Russian poets, and will interest all devotees of modern literature." Slavic and East European Journal

From the Publisher