Doctor Zhivago (1965) - Quotes

Identity and Misunderstanding in Dialogue

The Girl: I'm not your niece, Comrade General.

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The Challenge of Literary Appreciation

Yevgraf: This is a new edition of the Lara poems.

Engineer: Yes, I know. We admire your brother very much.

Yevgraf: Yes, everybody seems to.. now.

Engineer: Well, we couldn't admire him when we weren't allowed to read him...

Yevgraf: ...No.

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Impatience and Progress in Engineering

Engineer: If they were to give me two more excavators, I'd be a year ahead with the plan by now.

Yevraf: You're an impatient generation.

Engineer: Weren't you?

Yevgraf: Yes, we were. Very. Oh, don't be too impatient, Comrade Engineer; we've come very far, very fast.

Engineer: Yes, I know that Comrade General.

Yevgraf: Yes, but do you know what it cost..? There were children in those days who lived off human flesh, did you know that?

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Reflection on a Tragic Historical Event

Gromeko: They've shot the Czar, and all his family. Oh, that's a savage deed.

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Claiming Belonging in Revolutionary Times

Gromeko: [He picks up a shovel and makes to force his way in.] A body, styling itself the Yuriatin Committee of Revolutionary Justice, has expropriated my house. In the name of the people. Very well. I'm one of the people too!

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Declaration of Freedom Amidst Confinement

Amourski: I am a free man, Lickspittle, and there's nothing you can do about it. I am the only free man on this train. The rest of you are cattle!

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A Call for Anarchy and Rebellion

Amourski: Long Live Anarchy! Lickspittle! Bureaucrat!

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A Shift in Admiration and Perspective

Pasha Antipov / Strelnikov: * after telling Zhivago that he used to admire his poetry

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The Death of Personal Life in Russia

Pasha Antipov / Strelnikov: [...] I shouldn't admire it now. I should find it absurdly personal. Don't you agree? Feelings, insights, affections... it's suddenly trivial now. You don't agree; you're wrong. The personal life is dead in Russia. History has killed it. The private life is dead - for a man with any manhood.

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The Burden of Loyalty and Betrayal

Pasha Antipov / Strelnikov: * while interrogating Zhivago

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Innocuous Appearances and Hidden Truths

Pasha Antipov / Strelnikov: You put your knife with a fork and a spoon and it looks quite innocuous. Perhaps you travel with a wife and child for the same reason.

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The End of Peaceful Demonstrations

Pasha Antipov / Strelnikov: There'll be no more peaceful demonstrations. There were women and children, Lara, and they rode them down. Starving women asking for bread. And up on Tamskaya Avenue the pigs were eating and drinking and dancing.

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The Commonality of Humanity

Viktor Komarovsky: [Reeling drunk] We're all made of the same clay, you know! Clay! Claaaaay!!

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A Desperate Plea for Protection

Viktor Komarovsky: But don't you see her position? She's served her purpose. These men who came with me today as an escort will come for her and the child tomorrow as a firing squad! Now I know exactly what you think of me, and why. But if you're not coming with me, she's not coming with me. So are you coming with me? Do you accept the protection of this ignoble Caliban on any terms that Caliban cares to make? Or is your delicacy so exorbitant that you would sacrifice a woman and a child to it?

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A Desperate Offer of Assistance

Viktor Komarovsky: Yuri Andreievich, you spent two years with the partisans, fifth division. You have no discharge so you are a deserter. Your family in Paris is involved in a dangerous émigré organisation. Now all these are technicalities. But your style of life; everything you say and think, your published writings are all flagrantly subversive. Your days are numbered unless I help you. Do you want my help?

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A Moment of Power and Vulnerability

Viktor Komarovsky: * after forcing himself on Lara

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Reality of Consent and Manipulation

Viktor Komarovsky: And don't delude yourself this was rape. That would flatter us both.

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Disruption of Silence in a Restaurant

Viktor Komarovsky: * breaking the uneasy silence in an expensive restaurant caused by the singing of a Bolshevik demonstration on the street outside

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Post-Revolution Harmony and Uncertainty

Viktor Komarovsky: No doubt they'll sing in tune after the revolution...

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The Affection for Poetry in Russia

Yevgraf Zhivago: But if people love poetry, they love poets. And nobody loves poetry like a Russian.

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Love and Loss Amidst Despair

Yevgraf Zhivago: She'd come to Moscow to look for her child. I helped her as best I could, but I knew it was hopeless. I think I was a little in love with her. One day she went away and didn't come back. She died or vanished somewhere, in one of the Labour Camps. A nameless number on a list that was afterwards mislaid. That was quite common in those days.

Brotherhood and Betrayal in Political Loyalty

Yevgraf Zhivago: That was the first time I ever saw my brother. But I knew him. And I knew I would disobey the Party. Perhaps it was the tie of blood between us, but I doubt it; we were only half-tied anyway, and brothers will betray a brother. Indeed, as a policeman I would say get hold of a man's brother and you're half-way home. Nor was it admiration for a better man than me. I did admire him; but I didn't think he was a better man. Besides, I've executed better men than me with a small pistol.

Observing Zhivago's Simple Act of Labor

Yevgraf Zhivago: * on seeing Zhivago pulling wood from a fence

The Dilemma of Individual vs. Collective Needs

Yevgraf Zhivago: I told myself it was beneath my dignity to arrest a man for pilfering firewood. But nothing ordered by the Party is beneath the dignity of any man. And the Party was right: one man desperate for a bit of fuel is pathetic; five million people desperate for fuel will destroy a city.

Enduring Suffering Amidst War's Devastation

Yevgraf Zhivago: Even Comrade Lenin underestimated both the anguish of that nine hundred mile-long front, and our cursed capacity for suffering.

The Nature of Volunteerism and Happiness

Yevgraf Zhivago: Happy men don't volunteer. They wait their turn, and thank god if their age or work delays it.

The Importance of Timing and Readiness

Yevgraf Zhivago: The Party looked to the conscript peasants. Most of them were in their first good pair of boots. When the boots wore out, they'd be ready to listen. When the time came, I was able to take three battalions with me out of the front lines; the best day's work I ever did.

Reflections on World War I by Yevgraf Zhivago

Yevgraf Zhivago: * on World War I

Organizing Defeat for Revolutionary Victory

Yevgraf Zhivago: [the warring powers] They were shouting for victory all over Europe—praying for victory to the same God. My task—the Party's task—was to organize defeat. From defeat would spring the Revolution...and the Revolution would be victory for us

Reflections on the Impact of War

Yevgraf Zhivago: * on World War I

War Perspectives in Class Terms

Yevgraf Zhivago: In bourgeois terms it was a war between the Allies and Germany. In Bolshevik terms it was a war between the Allied and German upper classes - and which of them won was a matter of indifference.