In a fascinating article in the New Criterion, Michael Weiss looks at the career of Boris Pasternak (above), author of Doctor Zhivago. Quite amazingly, Pasternak succeeded in avoiding Stalin's wrath when so many other writers, including Osip Mandelstam, didn't. He had an aura Stalin respected. At 2 one morning, Weiss tells us, Pasternak's phone rang. It was Stalin, who wanted to know why he should spare Mandelstam from the Gulag. The conversation finished as follows:
STALIN: But is he [Mandelstam] or is he not a master? PASTERNAK: That is not the issue! STALIN: What is the issue then? PASTERNAK: I would like to meet with you . . . and for us to talk. STALIN: About what? PASTERNAK: About life and death . . . (Stalin then hung up.)
A bit hard to get back to sleep after that, you'd think, but Pasternak was a cool customer. Which Stalin also respected.
