Classic review: THE MASTER AND MARGARITA

Often found on lists of one of the best books of the 20th century, The Master and Margarita has occupied a space on my TBR for many years even though I knew very little about it. What I did know sounded interesting and promising -- set in Russia in the 1930s it is a piece of satire poking fun at Russia (USSR) under Stalin. What I came to understand was it would have been a much more enjoyable reading experience if I actually knew more about life in the Soviet Union under Stalin or generally more about Russian history. I confess, therefore, to spending a great deal of time while I listened to this audiobook scratching my head. What did this or that represent? Most of the humor and satire were completely lost on me, sadly.

The author, Mikhail Bulgakov, was trained as a medical doctor and served in that capacity during the First World War. Sometime in the 1920s he turned all of his attentions to writing and actually had a few of his plays performed. Unfortunately his work was labeled by the Stalinist regime as subversive and after 1928 nothing he wrote was published or performed. At one point Bulgakov wrote to Stalin himself asking for assistance, explaining that he wasn't being subversive, he was just writing satire. Stalin intervened and Bulgakov was a least able to get a job afterwards, though he didn't like the job and kept writing on the side. He started writing The Master and Margarita sometime in the early 1930s, after burning his first attempt of the novel which he started in 1928. He worked on four variations of the story for ten years before his death. When Bulgakov died in 1940 from renal failure due to high blood pressure, the story was complete but had not been edited, so was not ready for publication. The censors weren't willing to publish it after it was ready. It took another 27 years until a censored version of the book was published in Moscow in 1966/67 and until 1973 that Bulgakov's complete, uncensored novel was published. I was still a bit unclear which of the four drafts ended up at the top of the heap.

If Bugakov had lived to witness the publication of his masterpiece, I'm sure the irony wouldn't have been lost on him. One of the main themes of the book centers around this quote, "Manuscripts don't burn," signifying the immortality of art and literature, despite repression, persecution, and destruction by authoritarians. His work may not have been published in a timely manner, but it was published and is now a highly regarded work emerging from that time period.

The book opens in Moscow in the 1930s when Satan comes to town in the form of a man, Woland, seeking to put on a magic show. He appears to two writers, one of which is a bad poet, and foretells their future deaths. The death of one of the writers, just minutes after the prediction, set off a cascade of events which involves most most of the literary elite of Moscow. Really odd things happen to everyone who comes in contact with Woland -- heads are detached and then reattached, money is handed out and then it disappears, a black cat walks, talks, and shoots a gun -- no one can explain what is going on. And it it here that I am straining my brain trying to figure out what Bulgakov is making fun of. How does a talking black cat stand for something in Soviet society?

To add to my confusion, the story occasionally shifts to a different location and time period where readers are treated to a conversation between Pontius Pilate and someone (the devil?) about his treatment of Jesus and his crucifiction. We later learn that this conversation is actually the book written by a man called only the Master. When the Master can't get the book published, he attempts to burn the manuscript, but his love, Margarita, saves it from the flames.Their story is woven between the two other plots, but stands on its own and is very bizarre, too. Was there a happy ending? I think so, or at least the Master and Margarita are reunited, after a long separation and joyous reunion, and all of Moscow has come to accept that something weird happened to them but it was probably a case of mass hypnotism. (Ha!)

I just read the blurb on the back of the print edition I own. Two things stuck out to me which I missed until now. First it says the book is a revision of the stories of Faust and of Pontius Pilate. So Faust, we know, exchanged his soul for some worldly power or gain. Margarita had to go to hell to save the Master. Ah, I figured out one thing! She was the Faust character. The Pontius Pilate story is from the Bible, I assume that is being retold. The retelling is quite different than the original. The blurb also says that the book has philosophical depth. This is where I am completely lost and wished I'd done more research before I started reading it. I am positive I would have liked the book much better if I had read it as part of a college class where the professor could guide my thinking and point out all the aspects of the book I missed.

But, whew, I finished the dang thing and can forevermore say I've read it.

-Anne