The thought of death and overcoming of death in B. Pasternak’s cycle ‘Some Songs in Letters So She Won’t Be Bored’

Abstract

The intertextual connections with the Bible found in the cycle ‘Songs in Letters So She Won’t Be Bored’ (My Sister Life, 1917) help identify the features of artistic expression of the Christian ideas of immortality in the early works of B. Pasternak. An analysis of the author’s symbolism shows that the philosophising persona of Pasternak’s book ponders on death looking for the ways to overcome it. The way to overcome “boredom”— death is the “narrow way” of the Gospel, whereas the motif of grace is manifested in the images of nature, human soul, and history.

Keywords

• b. pasternak
• christianity
• intertexuality
• poetic symbols