Doctor Zhivago Family Quotes

While he's young, Zhivago doesn't understand that he has come from a rich family, because he's living only with his mother. His dad, on the other hand, is an irresponsible jerk who goes off and blows all the family money. What's kind of ironic, though, is that Zhivago grows up to abandon his own family, too, although the circumstances are a bit different.

Rather than tell Zhivago the truth about his father, his mother is always careful to lie and to say that his father has just gone away for a little while. It's kind of the Russian version of something like: "Your dad went out for cigarettes… five years ago."

When his mother is gone, Zhivago continues to hear her voice wherever he goes, especially when he's out in nature. This just goes to show how strong a presence his mother was in his life. You could even argue that the guy spends the rest of his days trying to fill the hole left by his mom's death.

While Zhivago tends to hear his mother in nature, Lara hears only nature, which to her is actually better than a mother or father. On top of that, she also finds that nature contains more wisdom than a book. For her, nature is all she needs, and family doesn't seem all that important in this passage.

Dying mothers are a bit of a trend in this book. When Anna Gromeko dies, her daughter Tonya cries for hours and hardly knows where she is. Zhivago doesn't feel as grieved as she does, but that's only because he was so sad at his own mother's funeral that he's basically become desensitized to the sadness of death. That sort of thing comes in handy when you're a doctor.

When his mother dies, a young Yuri Zhivago doesn't know what to do with himself. With his dad gone, too, he has no one to help guide him through life, at least until his uncle Nikolai shows up and totally does a great job.

It's been a long time since Zhivago has visited his mother's grave. When a funeral brings him to the same graveyard in later years, though, it's clear that Zhivago still feels his mother's loss to his core.

When his son is first born, Zhivago doesn't really feel any connection to the boy. He feels like he's barely had anything to do with the kid's birth, especially considering how he's not even allowed in his wife's hospital room. This kind of emotional distance from his family is exactly the kind of thing that'll help explain Zhivago's abandonment of them later in the book.

When he first gets back to his family after serving in the First World War, Zhivago feels like there's nothing more important than having peace with his family. Unfortunately, it doesn't take long for him to stop feeling this way. It seems like only a week or two before he starts getting antsy again and wants to do something to break away from domestic boredom. Luckily, there's a revolution going on, so there's always lots of exciting stuff happening.

Here's a great example of family not coming through for you when you need them. The poor young Vasya isn't supposed to go off into a labor camp. But unfortunately, his uncle totally tricks him into taking his (the uncle's) spot on the train, which basically gives the kid a prison sentence for never doing anything wrong.