Nineties Russia was thrown into a garbage pit, where its body was quickly covered by flocks of spiritual-practice enthusiasts of instant preparation: horoscopes, palmistry, dowsing, yoga, followers of the Roerich movement, Buddhism. By a strange coincidence, the focus of all false meanings turns out to be the late Boris Leonidovich Pasternak.
A war is on. A war of spirit against death. A war of true meanings against caramel-church-like spirituality. It’s a hot war. It’s fought by living people with real weapons.
Despite the fact that the novel in its time received the label “anti-Pasternak”—in essence, it is no more anti-Pasternak than an orthography dictionary.