Dickens/Pasternak

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Dickens/Pasternak

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1margad
Sep 23, 2007, 7:24 pm

Both A Tale of Two Cities and Doctor Zhivago are novels about revolutions sparked by conditions of desperate poverty and injustice which rapidly degenerated into bloodbaths.

A Tale of Two Cities is a novel of the French Revolution. Charles Dickens published it in serialized form in 1859, about 60 years after the Revolution. In the novel’s opening paragraphs, he makes it clear he believed conditions in the England of his own time resembled those in pre-revolutionary France. The novel warns of the disastrous results of allowing injustice and poverty to fester until people become so desperate they feel their only hope lies in violence. Dickens hoped to stimulate reforms that would avert a similar crisis in England, and his novels were so influential, it can easily be argued that he succeeded.

Doctor Zhivago is a novel of the Russian Revolution. Boris Pasternak began writing it in 1945, less than 30 years after the Revolution, which he lived through himself. Like Charles Darnay in A Tale of Two Cities, Zhivago is a descendant of aristocrats who works for a living and consciously rejects the economic injustice of his forebears’ way of life. Like Dickens, Pasternak writes as a reformer, but instead of drawing parallels between present and past, he tries to show how a movement that began in idealism developed, through the violence of the Revolution, into a society as unjust and stifling as the one it replaced.

Despite its archaic prose style, A Tale of Two Cities is the easier novel to read. A master of plot, Dickens carries the reader from one scene of high suspense to another. Though the French Revolution was within living memory at the time he wrote, Dickens did not live through it himself. This more distant perspective may have freed him to craft a more purely fictional story within the framework of historical events.

Doctor Zhivago, by contrast, offers a highly textured portrayal of life, extended over a much longer period, which often slows for passages of close (often beautifully poetic) observation and philosophical reflection. Where the characters in Dickens’ novel are vivid types, if not stereotypes, Pasternak’s are more subtly and, in general, realistically portrayed. Pasternak is more concerned with politics and philosophy than plot, so his story often seems episodic and meandering. In using Zhivago as a mouthpiece for his own views and perceptions, he introduces a different sort of artificiality in the form of lengthy, essay-like monologues in which his characters expound their ideas about politics and life.

Despite enormous differences of style and tone, the novels are more alike than different. Both expose the nature of violent revolution, which according to both authors inevitably betrays any idealism in its origins because of the blind and brutalizing nature of violence itself.

2lriley
Modifié : Sep 25, 2007, 8:37 pm

I've been thinking a bit about this Margad. Dickens unfortunately though is one of my holes. I've never read him. It made me think though of Hugo's Les Miserables--though to be honest I hated that book. It also made me think of Emile Zola's The Debacle--though there's some disimilarity. I am a big fan of Zola's though. The debacle ends with a harrowing description of Paris burning during the Commune--it's inhabitants being lined up and shot by firing squad.

The Pasternak novel I've read and thought it quite good. Again I think of other comparisons such as his fellow Russian--well Ukrainian anyway Mikhail Bulgakov's The White guard or even moving on to another country--Germany around the same time with Alfred Doblin's 2 volume set November 1918 which consists of A people betrayed and Karl and Rosa or to the Spain of the 1930's seething with a revolutionary atmosphere--Ramon Sender's Seven Red Sundays or you could try Miguel Delibes The stuff of heroes. And it also reminds me of an contemporary American writer Madison Smartt Bell who has written a trilogy of epic Novels about the Toussaint Louverture Haitian rebellion of the late 18th century--they are All souls' rising, Master of the Crossroads and The stone that the builder refused.

3margad
Sep 26, 2007, 2:46 pm

I'm reading Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita right now. It's so different stylistically that it's hard to compare it to either Zhivago or Tale of Two Cities, but it's a more sprightly read than Zhivago which, for me, dragged in many sections. I think Zhivago requires closer attention than I was really willing to devote to it. The Master and Margarita is filled with dark humor, and I suspect that if I were a Muscovite during the period in which it was written, I would find it hysterically and subversively funny. Since I'm not, Zhivago's serious and straightforward approach gave me more insight into the period.

What did you dislike about Les Miserables? It's probably more akin to Dickens than to Pasternak, with its emphasis on plot development. I always like a thread of suspense in a novel, though not at the expense of character development.

Thanks for recommending Bell's trilogy. The Haitian rebellion would make for an interesting comparison.

4lriley
Modifié : Sep 26, 2007, 8:48 pm

the Master and Margarita is a very good read--kind of an earlier bit of magical realism. Bulgakov's White Guard is a fairly straightforward look at the initial stages of the Bolshevik revolution and though a novel it more or less reads as an eyewitness account of street battles taking place in Kiev at that time. It is my favorite work of his--at least the ones I've read and I think though quite a bit shorter that it compares in many respects to Pasternak's epic novel.

I think my problem with Hugo has to do with his overly emotional style. Taking into consideration that it is a 19th century classic and the world of differences between then and now I also have a major problem with his characterizations. Jean Valjean--the eternal do gooder always finding himself as victim of the law and the merciless Javert. We're talking it seems to me about composites more than believable characters. Some authors even today have this problem. People falling on one side of the good/evil divide or the other. I'm mostly interested--in books that I read but even in life as it presents itself --in the grayer areas of human thought and behavior. Ayn Rand who was a Hugo admirer was particularly exceptional at developing characters who never ever once would doubt themselves or their ambitions. Characters with her were either purely good and believed all the things she herself did or they were very bad and irredeemable. Now I'm not sure that Dickens falls quite into the same trap or that he might even offset it with a sense of humor. I suspect that there is some humor in Dickens but as I've said I haven't read him though I do have that book.

Funnily enough though it brings to mind Dostoyevsky--I've always liked his villians much more than his heroes. His heroes are gormless do gooders. His villians tend to be much more complex--much more real to me.

5margad
Sep 28, 2007, 12:40 am

Very insightful, lriley. I read Hugo when I was quite young - a teenager or in my very early twenties, I think, and not as sensitive to the kind of stereotyping you picked up, though now that you mention it, I see what you mean.

I don't think you would feel the same way about Dickens, though his characters are not as complex as Pasternak's. In fact, one of the major characters in A Tale of Two Cities, around whom the plot turns, is a disreputable ne'er-do-well who makes an extraordinary and heroic decision. So although some of his characters do seem oversimplified, one of the major themes running through all his books is that people who may appear worthless are redeemable (or perhaps even saintly) and people who seem like fine, upstanding citizens may have feet of clay.

Yes, there is quite a lot of humor in Dickens, though A Tale of Two Cities is less humorous than many of his novels. Most of the comic relief in that one is provided by a lower-class, thieving grave-robber who is not quite as rotten to the core as he seems. Before I reread it this summer (for the first time in many years), I had a vivid memory of a man in a Dickens novel who was perpetually aggravated by the pious wife he accused of "floppin' agin" him, i.e. getting on her knees to pray that God would thwart his various illegal endeavors. I had forgotten he belonged to Tale of Two Cities, and it was a delight to run into him again.

I'll have to add White Guard to my reading list. While I'm enjoying The Master and Margarita, I think I would learn more from a more straightforward approach to the subject matter.

Yes to your assessment of Dostoyevsky, too, although I have a soft spot for Prince Mishkyn (Myshkin?) in The Idiot. (For a chuckle, take a look at what comes up on the Touchstone for this one!) My favorite, as a rather gormless college student, was Dmitri Karamazov. Whatever his many faults, excessive caution and hesitance were not among them. He certainly knew how to get himself into a juicy mess!

6lriley
Sep 28, 2007, 8:18 am

Well I'll have to see if I can get to A tale of two cities in the near future. I probably haven't read as much Dostoyevsky as you. Looking at my list I've read The brothers Karamazov, The Possessed, Notes from the Underground and The Double. I liked the first three and wasn't that keen on the last. I like his villians the best though in all his works--almost cheer them on. J. M. Coetzee's The master of Petersburg was based somewhat on the Possessed. Have you read that one?

7margad
Sep 28, 2007, 8:44 pm

I've read The Brothers Karamozov, The Possessed, The Idiot, and Crime and Punishment. So, same number of Dostoyevskys, but not all the same ones. I went on a Dostoyevsky binge in my twenties, and have reread all but the Possessed, which didn't really grab me, once or twice since then. Haven't read any Coetzee, though I've seen some reviews recently praising his work.

8lriley
Sep 28, 2007, 10:07 pm

I really like Coetzee and when he won the Nobel a few years ago I thought it an excellent choice. Like a lot of writers though he has some that are better than others. Though some might not agree--Master of Petersburg IMO is one of his better ones. I looked at some of the reviews of the book on LT and some of them are very very good.

Looking at 19th century writers Zola is probably the one I like the most. I've only read Flaubert once--Sentimental education--that was good--should read more of him also. The major Russian authors such as Dostoyevsky--Tolstoy call for a real investment of time and energy. After reading War and Peace I've been afraid of reading Tolstoy ever since. 2000 and some pages!!

9margad
Sep 30, 2007, 12:21 am

I wasn't crazy about Flaubert. I've read his classic, Madame Bovary, but I couldn't identify with or even really like his protagonist. Reading a novel is like spending time with the people in it, and who really wants to spend a lot of time with someone we don't like? Although it's fun to spend time with some characters we probably wouldn't much enjoy in real life. Like Dmitri Karamazov. But he had a zest for life and a largeness of spirit that was missing, I thought, in Emma Bovary.

What are Coetzee's characters like? The reviews I've read of his work made me think they might be on the thoughtful but sluggish and depressive side. I'm too much like that myself to want to aggravate the tendency by reading about similar characters.

10lriley
Modifié : Sep 30, 2007, 6:25 am

Great points you make Margad about characterization. I agree fully--maybe a better way of explaining why I don't like this one or that one. Though I have to say that bad people at least in literature tend to tweak my interest more than the very good.

Saying that many of Coetzee's characters tend towards do-goodism. My favorite novel of his is Waiting for the Barbarians. It has been a while since I've read that-probably over 10 years. Off the top of my head it revolves around a kind of local sherrif who runs afoul of a new dictatorship--a lot of it can be seen in the light of Coetzee's dislike for South Africa's apartheid government at that time. The racism of that regime was a big issue for him. Life and times of Michael K follows a homeless man--I'm thinking he's black also handicapped in some way--I'm a little foggy on it now--he is trying to stay out of the way of violence which is erupting all around him. It was Coetzee's first Booker prize. The Master of Petersburg more or less tells the story of Dostoyevsky's stepson who disappeared--was murdered by an anarchist/nihilist cell led by one Nechaev which was the base from which Dostoyevsky wrote The Possessed. Age of Iron follows a middleaged 50ish well to do lady attempting to protect her maid and her family from the apartheid regime--ruining her own life in the process. Foe is the retelling of the Daniel DeFoe story about a sailor stranded on a desert island. Disgrace Coetzee's second Booker prize revolves around a university professor who gets sacked for his part in a sexual harrassment scandal. Later on his own daughter is raped and he's left to confront his own demons--juxtaposing his own past of looking at women in terms of sexual objects against this new reality. Elizabeth Costello is seen by some as being a female version of Coetzee himself. She is a novelist--though Australian with a liberal background who we see doing lecture tours--she can be very cranky and opinionated. The British writer Paul West--actually West has lived in Ithaca NY for quite some time now (kind of my neck of the woods) makes his appearance at one of her lectures in which she rails at The very rich hours of Count von Stauffenberg and its portrayal of ultimate evil--West silently sits through the lecture seemingly unperturbed--a small madonna like smile on his face. I should say that book put West on my map. I checked out his Stauffenberg and it is a great great book--the ghost of Stauffenberg retelling his attempt on Hitler's life and the aftermath effect on his family and all the other plotters. It gets very ugly.

11margad
Modifié : Oct 1, 2007, 1:41 am

The one that grabs me in your list is actually West's. Questions of moral choice at the extreme edges, like this, offer the kind of reading that makes me feel I am tackling something of real use in the world. We tend to assume that violence is justified in the interest of ending a great moral evil. But when and to what extent can it truly succeed in ending such evil? And does it unleash equal or greater evil in the course of ending whatever evils it does end? Hard questions to answer when push comes to shove.

You compare the novel to Hamlet in your review - an apt comparison. It's a cliché by now that Hamlet was paralyzed by doubt, and what amazes me is that so many make the assumption that the play is a portrayal of a man flawed by an inability to act decisively. But surely a man should hesitate to murder another on the word of an apparition who might be only a figment of his imagination. Von Stauffenberg had much better cause to act than Hamlet did!

12lriley
Oct 1, 2007, 4:39 am

I've actually read West's Stauffenberg twice and have read several other of his books. I think it is a great great book--but the second half of it is horrific and though I'd recommend it to anybody I'd feel the need to caution people about it. After the assassination attemt goes bad it gets very very ugly real fast. On learning of Hitler's survival betrayal follows betrayal. Stauffenberg is executed by one of the betrayers and it is only at that moment we come to realize that the book is being narrated by his ghost who continues to narrate the events--the persecution of his and his wife's families including their small children--the rigged trials, the tortures and executions of the others plotters, despite how many many of them attempt to scurry out of the limelight is told in very graphic detail and West is an extremely talented writer--though sometimes he can be difficult. Hitler is shown in those last pages as a fullfledged bloodthirsty demonic entity--along with a few other of his ghoulish cohorts. Probably not a popular viewpoint but my own particular one tends to think of him and the Stalin's as megalomaniacs--or all too human. Why we should be cautionary about who we choose for leaders and to be careful about not being swept into things because they sound good or true at the time. The current adventure in Iraq infuriates me. I'm not too sure West doesn't agree but here...you'd think not. He is in control. Things do turn out better in the end though. Closest thing I could compare it to would be Curzio Malaparte's Kaputt which chronicled World War II on the Eastern front in similarly graphic terms that can have an almost direct emotional impact on the reader.

13Jargoneer
Oct 1, 2007, 5:56 am

West has used real events a few times to explore moral issues, usually ending up in a sordid or extreme environment (Hitler, Jack the Ripper, Wyatt Earp, etc). I agree that he can be a difficult novelist, his love of language can sometimes result a over-convoluted style. (The best fictional portrayal of Hitler is probably no longer in the written word but in the excellent film "Downfall" - it's an incredible production that doesn't show Hitler and his cohorts as demons but the products of their human failings).

I don't know if you heard but West suffered a serious stroke in 2003, he wrote an interesting article about it recently in The American Scholar, Mem, Mem, Mem

14lriley
Oct 1, 2007, 8:42 am

We could I suppose call them demonic human beings jargoneer but they are an end result of human conditions and share the same biology as the rest of human kind. I'm a bit on the agnostic side in any case so the idea that these types are sent into the world to destroy mankind doesn't hold a lot of water with me. Paranoiacs have managed to seize power throughout history. They've also managed at times to pass off their weird world visions on a population when the conditions were right for them. Interesting that Malaparte in his Kaputt refers to the WWII German population in the whole several times as krankenvolk--a sick people--or as if they were infected with some virus making them mentally ill.

It seems we've gotten away from Dickens and Pasternak a bit--though Zhivago and the people of his time were getting their first taste of the same kind of repression.

On West I didn't know he had a stroke. He can be overwordy--and his sentence structures at times can get you reaching for the aspirin bottle. A lot of it is built upon a characters almost internal monologue with himself and sometimes his narrators are a bit eccentric like in Rat man of Paris. If I remember correctly he had a daughter or son who is autistic in some way and I think that may in some way inform his work.

15margad
Oct 1, 2007, 9:39 pm

"It seems we've gotten away from Dickens and Pasternak a bit..." Not to worry - half the fun (maybe even 75%) is extending an initial comparison with yet more. It's amazing to see how books leapfrog along to yet more books. Part of the magic of the comparison.

Thank you for the link to Mem, Mem, Mem, jargoneer - I subscribe to The American Scholar from time to time when I'm feeling flush, and have never regretted it. Always seems to be full of good stuff. I enjoyed his wife's intro, especially her remark that he seems happier during his recovery from the stroke than he did before. Isn't life astonishing!

If Stauffenberg gets too horrific toward the end, one can always set the book aside. The only book I've ever really regretted reading was Silence of the Lambs, in which the mayhem seemed gratuitous and purposeless, having very little to do with the world as we know it. Reading about violence in books is generally a different matter (at least for me) than watching it in movies, which I try to avoid. The written word is a more reflective medium, which invites us to consider the question "why?" whereas movies too often merely feed us an experience to passively take in. Although I've been watching Ken Burns' The War series, and finding it extremely reflective and thought-provoking.

I am in hearty agreement with the point both of you make that Hitler was a human being, not a demon. It concerns me when anyone is demonized, because it becomes too easy, then, to make the case for just killing him, wiping the blood off our hands, and going about our business. And if we can justify killing one human being, who can we not, ultimately, justify killing? It seems to me this is the root of the problem that led us into Iraq. The administration wanted the oil (and who among us are not partly to blame for this, given our society's dependence on oil), and it was all too easy to tuck that little motivation away in their unconscious minds and persuade themselves, instead, that they were liberating a people from an inhuman dictator and his demonic minions. Like Hitler, of course, Saddam Hussein contributed to the ease with which he could be viewed this way.

Though it sounds as though West may come out on the pro-demonizing-and-killing side of things, it doesn't sound as though Stauffenberg makes a simple, open-and-shut case. It's possible West was suggesting that the attempt to kill Hitler had a counterproductive effect, pushing Hitler deeper into his madness. But I will have to read the book.

16lriley
Oct 2, 2007, 2:35 am

I don't know Margad on the West thing about demonizing Hitler. There was no doubt that Hitler was not only evil but a very strange person as well moreso than maybe Stalin or Mao or even Pol Pot. I think this is where West was going. It is a very sad book--the deeper you get into it the deeper the impact. The scenes that Hitler sets up towards the end go much further than simple revenge. His rage is apparent but also depravity even moreso though it seems to be fear driven by the knowledge that his own end is imminent. The above are human emotions--he is not getting direction from any external force in the book. We all have had our moments of fear and rage. Depravity is much less easily defined--but a simple definition harming another human being or living creature for some kind of obscene pleasure and rationalizing it as good. Leauging it with other emotions just increases the effect. Hitler is out of control in his rage as his kingdom is falling apart. What we see from him in the second half is the chaos of a very abnormal brain as its world collapses.

17margad
Oct 2, 2007, 8:14 pm

Sounds interesting. Definitely one for my reading list.

18lriley
Modifié : Oct 3, 2007, 5:22 pm

A characteristic of West's is a kind of hallucinatory prose. This is evident in the first chapters and it can be difficult when he's in that mode to keep your bearings. He's a very literary writer with a bit of James Joyce in him. The hallucinatory language is a lot less evident later on as the book moves along. There are portraits of many of the plotters and probably the majority do not come off too well. Stauffenberg and his whole family do--especially one brother. As sad and horrible as it can get the one thing that really redeemed it for me was knowing something more about some of these people some of who seem like actually not only good Germans but good people and patriots who risked everything and have more or less disappeared down the dark hole of history.

19margad
Oct 3, 2007, 4:49 pm

Yes, that's why I want to read it. I'm expecting to have trouble with his prose style, as it sounds rather too embroidered for my taste. What I'll be after is the moral complexity of his portraiture. It is so important, I think, to appreciate that "bad" people may be reacting to their own suffering and "good" people are often tortured by guilt. If we are to make this world a better place, we can't do it by simply condemning "bad" people and adulating "good" people. We have to work on looking at people in their fullness and building relationships that honor that complexity.