Nikolai Nikolaevich

Character Analysis

He isn't in the book for very long, but Yuri Zhivago's beloved uncle Nikolai is crucial for making Zhivago into the man he grows up to be. Above all else, the man believes deeply in the power of the individual, especially the individual with a good mind. In fact, Nikolai is so devoted to the life of the mind that he always takes an opportunity to write down any interesting thoughts that come to him: "He did not keep a diary, but once or twice a year he wrote down in his thick notebook the thoughts that struck him most" (2.10.31).

But for all his love of the individual mind, Nikolai can also be very proud in a way that cuts him off from other people. When he tries to tell a friend about his ideas, for example, he gets annoyed that the friends don't fully understand him: "He was angry with himself for blurting out some of his innermost thoughts to that blockhead Vyvolochnov without making the slightest impression on him" (2.10.31). Rather than think that this is a problem with his own ideas or the way he communicates them, Nikolai blames others for being too dumb to understand him.

Uncle Nikolai's belief in the individual is a big part of what makes him a hero to his nephew, Yuri Zhivago. When Zhivago finds out that Nikolai has moved back to Moscow in later years, he is overwhelmed with a happiness we rarely see from him: "It was an astounding, unforgettable, portentous meeting! The idol of his childhood, the ruler of his youthful thoughts, stood before him again, alive, in the flesh" (6.4.29).

The interesting thing is that as he gets older, Nikolai becomes devoted to the ideals of Communism, which totally aren't about the individual at all—they're about the community and the state. It's a total turnaround from his earlier ideas. In the end, Nikolai is convinced that the good of the many is more important than the good of the individual, and he believes that the Bolshevik Revolution might be the best way of achieving this.

This might seem like an unbelievable change of heart, but it's actually what happened with a lot of Russian intellectuals at the time. Everyone knew there needed to be some big reforms, and a lot of intellectuals wanted to see Russia become more of a republic or a democracy, like England or France.

When the Bolshevik Communists took over, they said they were trying to right the wrongs of the old economic system and make people equal. (And a lot of them were trying to do that.) The Bolsheviks promised income, employment, equal rights, and services like education and healthcare to everyone. Sounds like a pretty good thing, right? A lot of intellectuals were won over by this; even Pasternak himself thought it might be a good thing at first.

It wasn't until later that the new government started showing its nasty true colors... but by then it was too late.