Doctor Zhivago is a creative work.
Doctor Zhivago ( Italian : Il dottor Zivago ) is a 1965 British-Italian epic romantic drama film directed by David Lean . Doctor Zhivago ( До́ктор Жива́го , Doktor Zhivago [ ˈdoktər ʐɨˈvaɡə ] ) is a novel by Boris Pasternak , first published in 1957 in Italy . Fiction is the classification for any story or similar work derived from imagination -- in other words , not based strictly on history or fact . A novel is any relatively long piece of written narrative fiction , normally in prose , and typically published as a book .