Lara

by Anna Pasternak

  During the autumn of 1959, when he wasn’t answering all his pressing correspondence, Pasternak began work on his first original work since Doctor Zhivago. ‘Of course these very letters greatly hindered him in his second source of happiness,’ his sister Lydia wrote, ‘his new work, which he had begun to write as soon as Doctor Zhivago was off his hands with no less zeal and enthusiasm.’ This was a play called The Blind Beauty – a trilogy set in a manor house in the nineteenth century.

  According to Olga, ‘BL intended to show what he understood by freedom and the country’s cultural tradition. At the beginning of the play – the time is just before the abolition of serfdom in 1861 – there is much talk among the characters of freedom, particularly the problems of social freedom, as seen from the point of view of Russia’s history and the situation at the time. After the reform, it soon becomes clear that the whole idea of social freedom is in general an illusory one, and that, as before, man is only truly free in art.’

  That winter, Boris took Irina and Olga to the theatre – one of his passions – for what would be the last time. ‘BL loved organising outings to the theatre, no doubt because it reminded him of his youth when all he needed was to see the stage curtains to shake with love and enthusiasm,’ remembered Irina. ‘He would order a whole load of tickets from the ticket office and would then transform himself into some kind of “ticket booth” as my mother described it.’

  A Hamburg theatre was on tour in Moscow. Irina described how Boris ‘divided his theatre outings fairly. He went to see Faust with his wife, Zinaida, and their son Leonid, and took Mama and me to see The Broken Jug.’ Irina found the German black comedy by Heinrich von Kleist hard going. The play mocks the failings of human nature and the judicial system in a forgiving way. As Irina didn’t really understand German, she was rather bored. Many others in the auditorium clearly felt the same, as there was little laughter. Boris, who spoke ‘perfect German’, was enthralled. (One of his idiosyncrasies, given his linguistic abilities and fluent French, was that he liked to speak to all foreign correspondents, if possible, in German.) ‘He was laughing so loudly and generously, you could hear him at the back of the room,’ said Irina. ‘By the time the interval came, he was radiant with delight at his admiration of the spirit of the piece and the excellence of the play.’ At the end of the performance, the trio went backstage. Pasternak, ‘who was now a world-wide celebrity, was surrounded by actors who still had their make-up on and were handing him books and programmes to autograph. He was talking in German and they were drinking his words.’

  Afterwards, Boris hailed a taxi. ‘We looked like a respectable family,’ said Irina, ‘the mother wearing the new artificial fur coat she had received from “over there”, the daughter showing off in the middle of a group of press correspondents and the father radiant, distributing autographs to delighted Germans. All this was barely a year after he felt relegated to the gutter and all the injuries he had been afflicted with. I was suddenly seized by the feeling of unreality, by all that was surrounding me, its short-lived nature and the feeling that faith had got it wrong when it presented us with this happiness and that it all might just disappear.’

  Irina could not shake off her prescient disquiet. Now a fourth-year student at the Literary Institute in Moscow, Irina was in a relationship with a French student called Georges Nivat. He was studying at Moscow University as part of an academic exchange programme. Boris thoroughly approved of Georges and was keen for him to marry Irina. He wanted Irina to have some financial and emotional security by moving with Georges, after their degree studies, to France.

  During that winter, Irina and Georges spent a lot of time revising for their exams at the Little House. ‘BL would arrive just after seven … even when the evenings were getting darker in the winter,’ said Irina. ‘He liked to know that in the middle of the snowdrift there was a candle, lighting up a window, (as in Doctor Zhivago) where someone was waiting for him. We would rush to meet him, help him take his heavy fur-trimmed coat off and shake the snow off it. He would explain how the hill had caused him to be out of breath. He would say: “I found it hard to control my breathing as I was getting nearer but I kept on thinking it was normal for an eighty-year-old, and then I thought, hold on a minute, I am only seventy.” We all laughed together.’

  Olga later wrote: ‘There was a tacit agreement between us in those days that we must keep our sense of humour, seeing the funny side of things wherever we could, and it seems that we managed to infect BL with out “lighthearted” view of events.’ Boris loved to tell comic stories about minor, slapstick incidents – characters in the village who forced their way into the dacha or offered to put the novel into a secret code for him. They were childishly amusing events that Olga could see through. Boris was to a large extent exaggerating his bonhomie when, in reality, everything was very painful to him at this time. Olga knew this, yet to keep his spirits buoyed, said that ‘we were constantly laughing, and an outsider might have thought we hadn’t a care in the world’.

  Irina’s fondest and most precious memories of Boris are also from their last New Year’s Eve together, ‘warm and cosy against the snow’ in the glassed-in veranda at the Little House: ‘There was a Christmas tree lit with real candles whose bouncing and rippling lights illuminated a Pasternak deep in thoughts, his face full of beauty but whose charms were starting to fade away, a face which was already retiring from the world, just like these wavering lights.’ Olga was busy at the table, amusing everyone with her extravagance (they were served three poussins each). ‘We drank real French champagne to celebrate New Year’s Eve in anticipation of a New Year full of promises,’ Irina recalled. ‘For BL, his work, his place, his success and for me, France, a new life, a happy relationship. When it came to serve the chocolates, we were all pretty merry but more from our excitement, than from our consumption of alcohol. We sang ‘O Tannenbaum’ in German and other Russian songs. It was all very jokey and fun.’

  But then, she added soberingly: ‘As always our two-faced Pasternak split his evening in two. He stayed with us until eleven p.m. before getting back to his family home where his family and guests were waiting for him. We walked him to the gate of his dacha. We knew our limits.’

  As they walked back through the falling snow to the Little House, Irina thought back on the evening. ‘BL was in good health but I sensed something was not to last. Often his gaze was above everybody’s heads and he was staring as if into eternity. He was brilliant that night; he told brilliant, captivating stories and there was nothing to suggest that anything was wrong. But I had a premonition that he was looking into the future – a future that he was not going to be a part of.’

  12

  The Truth of Their Agony

  During the early months of 1960, life for Olga and Boris seemed to go on ‘much as before’. Olga went frequently into Moscow on Boris’s literary business, and when she returned to Izmalkovo he would be waiting for her; pacing up and down in front of the Little House, unable to fully settle in himself until his ‘right hand’ was beside him. On Sundays, Olga would often go out on skis with friends, before entertaining them over lively lunches at the Little House. ‘Sometimes BL lunched at the Big House, sometimes with me – there was no hard and fast rule about this,’ said Olga.

  On Wednesday 10 February, Boris celebrated his seventieth birthday. ‘It was astonishing how young and trim he still was at this age,’ Olga remembered. ‘His eyes shone brightly as ever, he was just as easily carried away, and he was as spontaneous and unreflecting as a child.’

  On the morning of his birthday, Boris arrived at the Little House and he and Olga drank brandy together, before exchanging ‘fond kisses’ in front of the crackling stove. Boris turned to his beloved and said with a sigh: ‘How late everything has come for me … but we did get through all our troubles together, Oliusha. And everything is alright now. If only we could live forever like this.’ They sat and read ‘with huge enjoyment’ the piles of birthday greetings and gifts
which had arrived from all over the world. Nehru sent an alarm clock in a leather case. Other presents included a little statuette representing Lara, decorative candles and delicate images of saints from Germany.

  As winter turned into spring, Boris worked furiously on The Blind Beauty. He was in regular correspondence with Feltrinelli over the play’s progress – the astute Italian publisher had insisted on exclusive world rights to his entire oeuvre; past, present and yet to come. As part of his own daily ritual, Boris would arrive at the Little House every evening and read aloud his work in progress. ‘He put on a show of being in better spirits, fooling both himself and me,’ Olga said. ‘Three times he read from his play at great length. He spoke the lines with great expression, imitating popular speech with gusto and lingering over the passages he thought funny. He corrected himself and added things in pencil as he went along.’

  But Olga began to notice the first, troubling signs that Boris was not well. ‘He would sit down to go through some translation or other, but he at once began to feel tired and I would have to do most of the work by myself. He began to complain about a pain in his chest, he was having trouble with his leg again.’

  In March, Olga slipped on the staircase in her Moscow apartment, severely tearing a muscle in her leg. It was put in plaster and she had to remain in the city for the month, which distressed Boris. ‘This meant a disruption in his usual routine – something that irritated him more than anything.’ One morning, when Boris was feeling strong enough, he climbed the stairs to visit Olga. Whilst he was there, the telephone rang. It was Mirella Garritano, the wife of the correspondent who had succeeded Sergio D’Angelo in Moscow. Mirella asked Olga to meet her at the post office and collect some books that had been sent for Pasternak. As Boris was not able to go, and Olga was in plaster, he asked Irina and Mitia to collect them. According to Olga, ‘they could not refuse anything he asked’.

  Mirella handed them a small suitcase, which Mitia brought back to the apartment. When Olga opened it, they all gasped in surprise. Instead of books, it contained bundles of Soviet banknotes in wrappers, neatly stacked together. These had been sent, indirectly, from Feltrinelli, who referred to them as ‘sandwiches’. Boris gave Olga one roll, to cover some expenses, and took the rest of the cash to Peredelkino.

  Irina, who was now engaged to Georges, saw little of Boris during these weeks. The last time was at Peredelkino on a beautiful sunny day in March. ‘I bumped into BL as he was visiting my grandmother who had moved into a nearby dacha with her third husband,’ remembered Irina. ‘BL was delighted by the fact that she and her husband were looking so well. They were full of energy and joie de vivre. He did not like anything remotely reminding him of death – he refused to open the Paris Match covering Camus’s death. Nothing pleased him more than seeing elderly people in good health. The sun was really warm on that spring day and it was impossible to look at the snow. BL screwed up his eyes and kept wiping them as he never wore sunglasses. He seemed tanned, healthy and happy.’

  Olga also felt that by April everything augured well. ‘April was blissful – as any April always is. Particularly splendid was our small garden with its pine trees, bushes coming into flower, and pale-green birches. Dappled with spots of sunlight it seemed such a safe and splendid haven for us. BL looked to be well and in good heart, and the days resumed their normal measured pace.’

  On 4 April, Boris wrote to Feltrinelli in Milan, enclosing a document to be delivered to him by Heinz Schewe. It was entitled Power of Attorney.

  I entrust OLGA VSEVOLODOVNA IVINSKAYA to place her signature on all instructions related to the publication of my works in those European countries where they have been printed or will be printed, as well as on all financial receipts and financial documents.

  I ask that OLGA VSEVOLODOVNA IVINSKAYA’s signature be believed as if it were my own and to consider all instructions originating from Olga Vsevolodovna as my own.

  The power of attorney which is granted to OLGA VSEVOLODOVNA IVINSKAYA is in effect indefinitely. I entrust her with the potential control over all publications, as well as financial operations in the case of my demise. I ask that all requests for information and receipts to my literary work be addressed to her.

  B. Pasternak.

  During the third week of April, Olga noticed something ‘disturbing about BL’s appearance. He was generally fresh and rosy-cheeked in the mornings but suddenly he began to look distinctly sallow.’ On Wednesday 20 April, he took a turn for the worse. The doctor was called and said he suspected angina. Boris visited Olga as usual that evening and told her that he would have to stay in bed for a while. He said he would bring his play to her and that she must not let him have it until he was well again. He had already copied out the first half of the play and through sheer willpower, carried on despite attacks of cardiac arrhythmia and acute pain below his shoulder blades. Several times a day he would stop work, lie down and wait for the pain to pass before resuming his writing.

  Olga, resigned to not seeing him for ten days or so, was astonished when on Saturday 23 April she suddenly saw Boris coming down the lane to the Little House, dilapidated briefcase in hand. She ran out, ecstatic, to meet him. ‘My joy at seeing him so unexpectedly was premature. He looked pale and haggard, a sick man. We went inside the room, where it was cool and shaded.’ Initially Boris seemed to be agitated over his financial situation. He was expecting some funds and there was a delay in their arrival. Heinz Schewe had promised to help but he was away. Maybe Sergio D’Angelo would turn up, he wondered, or another Italian courier. Olga started asking questions, similarly concerned.

  Without replying, ‘Boris kissed me – as though by this he could regain his health, as though it would give him back his strength, courage and will to live.’ Olga found herself thinking back to April 1947, the first time Boris had kissed her – at dawn in the Potapov apartment – equally ardent and impassioned.

  When he was ready to leave, Olga walked him part of the way back to the Big House. They stopped at the ditch near the dacha, beyond which she never usually went. Just as he was leaving, Boris turned to her. ‘Oliusha, I almost forgot – I’ve brought you the manuscript.’ He took a rolled-up sheaf of paper from his briefcase – he always wrapped his work up in the same, neat way – and handed it to her. It was the manuscript of The Blind Beauty. ‘Keep it,’ he said ‘and do not let me have it back until I get better. I am going to attend to nothing now except my illness. I know you love me, I have faith in it, and our only strength is in this. Do not make any changes in our life, I beg you.’

  It was the last time that Olga and Boris spoke to each other.

  Irina also had her last conversation with Boris, on the phone, around this time. ‘He answered in a very weak and distant voice. From then on, he no longer had the strength to go to the phone booth anymore.’ When there was no further news, Irina went straight to Peredelkino ‘to be closer to him’. ‘We thought it would be easier to get some news. It rained continuously for the first three days of May and Mama and I stayed on our own, unable to speak.’

  On 25 April the doctor diagnosed angina and Boris was ordered to have complete bed rest. He was moved from his upstairs study to the small, rectangular music room downstairs, which looked out onto the veranda and the garden. On the 27th he wrote to Olga, explaining that he was in terrible pain, writing lying down, against doctors’ orders. Typically, he wrote that he was looking forward to hearing more of her reactions to the play, which still needed a lot of work: ‘There is so much unnatural chit-chat, which must either be cut out or re-done.’ He described his excruciating pain and how they would have to ‘cross off, two weeks, at the very least, of our life’. He clearly expected to recover. He warned her not to ‘take any active steps’ to see him. Knowing Olga, he anticipated that she might try to come to the dacha, but strictly warned against it. ‘The waves of alarm set off by it would impinge on me and at the moment, with my heart in this condition, it would kill me. Z in her foolishness would not have th
e wit to spare me.’

  Finally he told her: ‘If you begin to feel particularly cheated and unhappy in the situation arising from this new complication, take firm hold of yourself and remember: everything, everything crucial that gives meaning to my life is in your hands alone. So be brave and patient. I kiss you and hug you endless times. Don’t upset yourself. We have come through worse things than this. Your B.’

  Irina observed her mother’s despair. ‘My mother had a gloomy intuition reinforced by the fact that BL had given her the manuscript of The Blind Beauty as a farewell. At the same time, she would hang onto any kind of hope – the dreams she had, the nurses’ opinion, the doctors’ conversation. Once she shouted out “Oh Irina, how can we carry on afterwards? How can we live without Pasternak?”’

  On 5 May, Koma Ivanov came into the garden of the Little House in a state of some agitation. He had brought Olga a package from Boris which contained a number of notes written in pencil. Boris had also sent Olga his treasured ‘Diploma from the American Academy of Arts and Letters’. He was tremendously proud of this honorary membership, in recognition of creative achievement in the arts, which he had received three months earlier. He wanted Olga to safeguard it for him. Koma was distressed to report that at best Pasternak might have had a minor heart attack but that treatment was difficult because of asthmatic breathing caused by some other condition.