In Memory: Pasternak

Today is Wednesday, 30 May 2007.

On this day in 1960, died the greatest of Russian poets and novelists, Boris Leonidovich Pasternak, author of many poems and Dr. Zhivago, aged 70.

Winter Night

by Boris Pasternak

It snowed and snowed ,the whole world over,
Snow swept the world from end to end.

A candle burned on the table;
A candle burned.

As during summer midges swarm
To beat their wings against a flame
Out in the yard the snowflakes swarmed
To beat against the window pane

The blizzard sculptured on the glass
Designs of arrows and of whorls.

A candle burned on the table;
A candle burned.

Distorted shadows fell
Upon the lighted ceiling:
Shadows of crossed arms,of crossed legs-
Of crossed destiny.

Two tiny shoes fell to the floor
And thudded.
A candle on a nightstand shed wax tears
Upon a dress.

All things vanished within
The snowy murk-white,hoary.

A candle burned on the table;
A candle burned.

A corner draft fluttered the flame
And the white fever of temptation
Upswept its angel wings that cast
A cruciform shadow

It snowed hard throughout the month
Of February, and almost constantly

A candle burned on the table;
A candle burned.
___________________

Here is rare video of Pasternak:

As an American dissident since the 1960s, I cannot begin to express how much the solidarity I felt with the Soviet dissidents, such as Pasternak, Andrei Donatovich Sinyavsky (d. 1997), etc. meant to me.