PASTERNAK, Boris (1890-1960). Autograph letter signed ('Pasternak') to Boris Kirillovich [Gudarev?], Moscow, 6 April 1948, 2 pages, folio, in purple ink, with footnote in pencil. Pasternak is preparing to send Kirillovich copies of the poems to be added to his novel [Dr Zhivago]; he has not been neglecting his correspondent, but regaining his strength. He talks of his translation from Shakespeare and the poems of the Hungarian Sandor Petöfi, his health, and in a postscript mentions the verses from Hamlet and Anthony and Cleopatra, and his works in the selected poetry of Soviet writers. In 1948 Pasternak, among others, was persecuted as a result of Zhdanov's orders and consequently his translations of Shakespeare and his poems, to be published in the selected poetry, were destroyed.