5 ms·

The Master and Margarita is indeed a fantastic read, but there’s a dark subtext. For example, the supernatural happenings and bumps in the night from the neighb

The Master and Margarita is indeed a fantastic read, but there’s a dark subtext. For example, the supernatural happenings and bumps in the night from the neighboring apartment are likely Bulgakov making commentary on the purges. Bulgakov layered things. On the surface, lightheartedness. Underneath, a very bleak and tortured soul.

habosa 8y ago
I read a version with enough footnotes to help me understand that underneath a funny and beautiful book is an attempt to use satire to say something serious about the regime that Bulgakov lived under. Part of what makes this book so great is how it is effective at this goal but also just fantastic literature. I'm a heavy reader but bad at reviews. All I can say is read this one. One of the best books I've ever read and that was clear to me before I finished it.
- Tomte 8y ago
  I've read/skimmed two academic books commenting on The Master and Margarita and it lessened my enjoyment. There was lots and lots of "Woland is obviously not the devil, unlike everyone assumed" and much lofty discussion that I couldn't follow at all. I'd strongly advise to leave that out, but read a more conventional commentary like the web site linked somewhere in this thread.
  - innocentoldguy 8y ago
    I agree! I highly recommend against reading academic interpretations/critiques of any book. I graduated summa cum laude with a degree in creative writing. Much of my college study was focused on literary criticisms and theory. As someone trained in the art, I believe taking a perfectly good novel and blowing it through the enema of Marxist, Postmodernist, or Feminist activism, for instance, is the best way to shit all over an author's work.
    - blablablerg 8y ago
      I see how you graduated summa cum laude in creative writing.
      - ironic_ali 8y ago
        Fair enough... But please explain why.
- widforss 8y ago
  Do you have an ISBN or link to that version?
  - habosa 8y ago
    https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margarita-50th-Anniversary-Penguin-Classics/dp/0143108271/ https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margarita-50th-Anniversary-Pen...
- StavrosK 8y ago
  I read the book without any annotations and, while I could understand that there were references to other things, I missed those references and the general cultural context, which led me to not really like the book very much.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- dhimes 8y ago
  So, this is a bit of a shameless plug, but also relevant. My wife won an award for her fictionalized/fantasy account of the writing of TMaM, and it illuminates the context for the work. You might enjoy it. http://centerforfiction.org/awards/the-first-novel-prize/2017-winner-julie-lekstrom-himes/ http://centerforfiction.org/awards/the-first-novel-prize/201...
tzmudzin 8y ago
... that already realized there's nothing it can do to stop the terror machine. When you're robbed of everything, and things get worse every day, gallows humor is the only freedom you can enjoy. End even that only in private. "It is extraordinary that Bulgakov managed to write a novel that is so full of humor and wit and lightness of tone when he was living through this period", writes Groskop. I guess she missed the point.
- varjag 8y ago
  Yep, there are many scenes where you have to know the zeitgeist to understand the gravity of situation. Like when NKVD finds 400 dollars in the janitor's apartment. It's set up like a sitcom scene but the guy's going to die.
  - samat 8y ago
    Not just him, but his family, possibly colleagues and friends would suffer.
felipeerias 8y ago
There is a point where most the inhabitants of a shared flat vanish one after the other as if by magic, leaving only one of them behind. Luckily, the footnotes point out the tiny clues in the text that tell the whole story: that tenant had denounced all of his flatmates to the secret police so he could keep the whole place for himself.
- pvg 8y ago
  They're not really 'tiny clues' - this thread makes it sound like this stuff is some set of subtle veiled hints and allusions. It's certainly possible to miss if one is unfamiliar with the historical context and it's worth getting a well-annotated edition but it's hardly the intent of the author - there are lots of places where it's quite explicit and overt. The book itself could not be published when it was written and when it was originally published, many of the more obvious references to repression were edited out.
  - felipeerias 8y ago
    I happen to be reading the novel at the moment, so it was easy to find an example. In this fragment, the master recounts the last time that he saw his loved one. The sentences are spread over 3-4 pages: “This was at dusk, in mid-October. And she left. [...] A quarter of an hour after she left me, there came a knock at my window [...] Yes, and so in mid-January, at night, in the same coat but with the buttons torn off, I was huddled with cold in my little yard.” Just like that, three months have vanished. Those missing buttons are the only indication of where he spent those lost months: it was customary to remove belts, shoelaces and buttons from those held for questioning by the secret police.
    - pvg 8y ago
      Those missing buttons are the only indication That's a wonderful example and no, they aren't. To a contemporary Soviet reader (or a modern one with a bit more context), it's crystal clear who the 'they' knocking on the window in the middle of the night are. In fact, such readers would have a pretty good idea where things are headed the moment the new 'friend' Mogarich appears and is described. And after the knock but before the buttons, our knowingly winking omniscient narrator suddenly disappears, stops being omniscient and refuses to tell us what happened! The buttons are a nice detail at the tail end on which to hang an explanatory footnote, perhaps, but not some hidden clue, left in there for readers to suddenly slap their forehead and say 'Aha!'. It's a multilayered work and, stylistically, Bulgakov is often a circumspect narrator. But the repression bits are not some particularly deeply hidden layer at all. You're barely a few pages in when Ivan suggests Kant be sent to the Solovki, one of the OG Gulags. The very title of the first chapter is a reference to the paranoia and legitimate fears of the period.

habosa 8y ago

I read a version with enough footnotes to help me understand that underneath a funny and beautiful book is an attempt to use satire to say something serious about the regime that Bulgakov lived under. Part of what makes this book so great is how it is effective at this goal but also just fantastic literature. I'm a heavy reader but bad at reviews. All I can say is read this one. One of the best books I've ever read and that was clear to me before I finished it.

Tomte 8y ago
I've read/skimmed two academic books commenting on The Master and Margarita and it lessened my enjoyment. There was lots and lots of "Woland is obviously not the devil, unlike everyone assumed" and much lofty discussion that I couldn't follow at all. I'd strongly advise to leave that out, but read a more conventional commentary like the web site linked somewhere in this thread.
- innocentoldguy 8y ago
  I agree! I highly recommend against reading academic interpretations/critiques of any book. I graduated summa cum laude with a degree in creative writing. Much of my college study was focused on literary criticisms and theory. As someone trained in the art, I believe taking a perfectly good novel and blowing it through the enema of Marxist, Postmodernist, or Feminist activism, for instance, is the best way to shit all over an author's work.
  - blablablerg 8y ago
    I see how you graduated summa cum laude in creative writing.
    - ironic_ali 8y ago
      Fair enough... But please explain why.
widforss 8y ago
Do you have an ISBN or link to that version?
- habosa 8y ago
  https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margarita-50th-Anniversary-Penguin-Classics/dp/0143108271/ https://www.amazon.com/Master-Margarita-50th-Anniversary-Pen...
StavrosK 8y ago
I read the book without any annotations and, while I could understand that there were references to other things, I missed those references and the general cultural context, which led me to not really like the book very much.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
dhimes 8y ago
So, this is a bit of a shameless plug, but also relevant. My wife won an award for her fictionalized/fantasy account of the writing of TMaM, and it illuminates the context for the work. You might enjoy it. http://centerforfiction.org/awards/the-first-novel-prize/2017-winner-julie-lekstrom-himes/ http://centerforfiction.org/awards/the-first-novel-prize/201...

tzmudzin 8y ago

... that already realized there's nothing it can do to stop the terror machine. When you're robbed of everything, and things get worse every day, gallows humor is the only freedom you can enjoy. End even that only in private. "It is extraordinary that Bulgakov managed to write a novel that is so full of humor and wit and lightness of tone when he was living through this period", writes Groskop. I guess she missed the point.

varjag 8y ago
Yep, there are many scenes where you have to know the zeitgeist to understand the gravity of situation. Like when NKVD finds 400 dollars in the janitor's apartment. It's set up like a sitcom scene but the guy's going to die.
- samat 8y ago
  Not just him, but his family, possibly colleagues and friends would suffer.

felipeerias 8y ago

There is a point where most the inhabitants of a shared flat vanish one after the other as if by magic, leaving only one of them behind. Luckily, the footnotes point out the tiny clues in the text that tell the whole story: that tenant had denounced all of his flatmates to the secret police so he could keep the whole place for himself.

pvg 8y ago
They're not really 'tiny clues' - this thread makes it sound like this stuff is some set of subtle veiled hints and allusions. It's certainly possible to miss if one is unfamiliar with the historical context and it's worth getting a well-annotated edition but it's hardly the intent of the author - there are lots of places where it's quite explicit and overt. The book itself could not be published when it was written and when it was originally published, many of the more obvious references to repression were edited out.
- felipeerias 8y ago
  I happen to be reading the novel at the moment, so it was easy to find an example. In this fragment, the master recounts the last time that he saw his loved one. The sentences are spread over 3-4 pages: “This was at dusk, in mid-October. And she left. [...] A quarter of an hour after she left me, there came a knock at my window [...] Yes, and so in mid-January, at night, in the same coat but with the buttons torn off, I was huddled with cold in my little yard.” Just like that, three months have vanished. Those missing buttons are the only indication of where he spent those lost months: it was customary to remove belts, shoelaces and buttons from those held for questioning by the secret police.
  - pvg 8y ago
    Those missing buttons are the only indication That's a wonderful example and no, they aren't. To a contemporary Soviet reader (or a modern one with a bit more context), it's crystal clear who the 'they' knocking on the window in the middle of the night are. In fact, such readers would have a pretty good idea where things are headed the moment the new 'friend' Mogarich appears and is described. And after the knock but before the buttons, our knowingly winking omniscient narrator suddenly disappears, stops being omniscient and refuses to tell us what happened! The buttons are a nice detail at the tail end on which to hang an explanatory footnote, perhaps, but not some hidden clue, left in there for readers to suddenly slap their forehead and say 'Aha!'. It's a multilayered work and, stylistically, Bulgakov is often a circumspect narrator. But the repression bits are not some particularly deeply hidden layer at all. You're barely a few pages in when Ivan suggests Kant be sent to the Solovki, one of the OG Gulags. The very title of the first chapter is a reference to the paranoia and legitimate fears of the period.