Enlarge
#gallery http://daily.stanford.edu/image/full/8042
Maggie Skortcheva

Ivan Tolstoi speaks at a symposium commemorating the 50th anniversary of the publication of Boris Pasternak’s classic. Prof. of Slavic Literature Lazar Fleishman said the event helped cement Stanford’s reputation as “the foremost world center of Pasternak studies.”

An international symposium on Boris Pasternak’s novel “Doctor Zhivago” took place this weekend to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the famous publication.

The conference’s events included speakers from international universities, an exhibition of rare Pasternak manuscripts from the Hoover Institution and an “Evening of Recollections” by the poet’s nephew Nicolas Pasternak Slater and Russian artist and writer Olga Andreyev Carlisle.

“‘Doctor Zhivago’ has played and is continuing to play a most important role in the intellectual and cultural life of our times,” said Slavic Literature Prof. Lazar Fleishman, who has planned numerous international discussions of the life and work of the Soviet novelist.

Pasternak was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1958, in large part due to “Doctor Zhivago,” which tells the story of one man’s life during the chaos of the 1917 Russian Revolution. The Soviet government forced the novelist to decline the honor, however, and the book was not published in the Soviet Union until 1988.

Stanford boasts an impressive array of Pasternak materials. In honor of the novel’s anniversary, the Hoover Institution put on display some rare documents from the Pasternak collection in the Hoover Tower Rotunda exhibit. The first segment of the Pasternak Family Papers digital archive, which includes more than 1,000 digital images of Pasternak family documents and several drafts of his most famous novel, has also been made available in the Hoover Archives reading room.

“The Hoover Institution archives presently house the largest collection of Boris Pasternak papers in the world,” Fleishman said. “This conference is taking place at Stanford to underscore the fact that our campus and the Hoover Institution became the foremost world center of Pasternak studies.”

The highlight of the symposium was the “Evening of Recollections,” which took place Friday in Tresidder Union. Pasternak Slater and Andreyev Carlisle spoke of their experiences with the Soviet author in the years leading up to his death in 1960.

Pasternak Slater discussed his famous uncle’s concerns while he was writing the novel and how his family was affected when the Soviet government and public openly criticized his work.

“His sisters, who would try to defend Pasternak, came out of press conferences with tears streaming down their faces,” Pasternak Slater said. “I clearly remember the strain it had on my mother.”

“The press described him as being worse than a pig,” he added, “because pigs don’t foul their own sties.”

“Doctor Zhivago” also affected Pasternak Slater’s own life, the author’s nephew said. In 1958, Pasternak Slater attempted to participate in a student exchange program with Oxford University, but he said Soviet authorities denied his visa application because of his connection to the author.

“This gives a new glance at the past and enables us to relive the dramatic circumstances in which one of the greatest 20th-century poets lived and worked,” Fleishman said of the weekend’s symposium.

Speakers traveled from European cities including London, Stockholm, Prague and Moscow to discuss the novel. Other U.S. universities were represented as well, including the University of Michigan, USC and the University of Chicago.