[Although] Pasternak's earliest images of life are feminine images, they are not associated with human incarnations of life, but rather with the personification of abstract forces: Nature …, the Life Force or Life …, both feminine nouns. Indeed, in [My Sister, Life], personification is a favorite device used to emphasize the poet's sense of personal involvement with Nature and Life. It comes as no surprise to find love poems and nature poems addressed to Life, for Pasternak's earliest love poetry is more often dedicated to the Life Force than to a human being. The few exceptions in My Sister, Life which are addressed to a woman portray her more as an object, as another natural phenomenon, than as a female person, as a woman with whom the poet can share his emotional life. And she is always associated with Nature: she is either imagined as (and transformed into) one or...