Follow me, reader! Who ever told you there is no such thing in the world as real, true, everlasting love? May the liar have his despicable tongue cut out! Follow me, my reader, and only me, and I'll show you that kind of love!
Margarita wakes up on Good Friday after 12 o’clock and as we know, Christ was crucified between noon and 3 o’clock. She wakes up and knows something is going to happen. Master has disappeared. Margarita’s dream about a place she doesn't recognize with the log hut is a clue that he is arrested and imprisoned somewhere. To a Russian reader it would be clear from this section that Bulgakov is describing the Master either in a camp or in exile, although he is careful to make it a dream.
Margarita goes to a park near the Kremlin wall and meets Azazello. She at first thinks she is being picked up, and then she thinks she is being arrested - typical string of reactions. “What is this: as soon as you start talking they think you’re going to arrest them!”
Since Azazello (also Azazel) is the fallen angel who taught women to paint their faces, it is clear why he, and not Behemoth, must deal with Margarita at this point. Azazello is sent to give her the cream - the cream that turns you into what you are.
Margarita turns into a witch - witch as part of woman's real nature.
Natasha, her maid, also turns into a witch, and the neighbor, Nikolai Ivanovich, turns into a pig.
His name is connected to Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin - a party ideologist who was an intelligent charming man whom women loved. Bukharin had conflicts with Stalin because he was opposed to collectivization. The scene is tide to the idea that the old Bolsheviks like Nikolai Ivanovich who liked women are demons who become swine.
Witches’ Sabbath traditionally takes place on Good Friday, from the time that Christ dies on Friday afternoon through the time when he is resurrected. And that's exactly why the Satan’s Ball takes place on Friday night and that is the reason why Woland and his crew are in Russia until Sunday morning.
Bulgakov is theoretically describing a Witches’ Sabbath (also see Walpurgis Night (Walpurgisnacht)) , but the tone is comic rather than threatening. The extravagant details of the enchanting ball scene, which appears to be both an updating of a Witches’ Sabbath and a version of the classic ball scenes to be found in nineteenth-century Russian literature, actually has its source in the author’s own life. Bulgakov and his wife attended a ball at the American embassy in 1935, which in terms of everyday life in 1930s Moscow was truly amazing, since it featured live bears and birds, and lavish musical entertainment as well as enormous amount of food and drink – and a few well-known informers as well.
At the ball, Margarita has a picture of a poodle on a heavy chain around her neck. This is another Faustian reference; Mephistopheles takes the form of a poodle at one point. However, this is also displaced Gospel material, since, unlike Yeshua, Margarita does go through her version of the Stations of the Cross with something heavy around her neck.
Margarita and Yeshua are corresponding characters. The difference is that Yeshua says he loves all people, and all people are good. Whereas Margarita’s love and her concern extends mainly towards the Master, whom she wants to get back and who is ultimately liberated and whose manuscript is restored.
Margarita goes to a park near the Kremlin wall and meets Azazello. She at first thinks she is being picked up, and then she thinks she is being arrested - typical string of reactions. “What is this: as soon as you start talking they think you’re going to arrest them!”
Since Azazello (also Azazel) is the fallen angel who taught women to paint their faces, it is clear why he, and not Behemoth, must deal with Margarita at this point. Azazello is sent to give her the cream - the cream that turns you into what you are.
Margarita turns into a witch - witch as part of woman's real nature.
Natasha, her maid, also turns into a witch, and the neighbor, Nikolai Ivanovich, turns into a pig.
His name is connected to Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin - a party ideologist who was an intelligent charming man whom women loved. Bukharin had conflicts with Stalin because he was opposed to collectivization. The scene is tide to the idea that the old Bolsheviks like Nikolai Ivanovich who liked women are demons who become swine.
Witches’ Sabbath traditionally takes place on Good Friday, from the time that Christ dies on Friday afternoon through the time when he is resurrected. And that's exactly why the Satan’s Ball takes place on Friday night and that is the reason why Woland and his crew are in Russia until Sunday morning.
Bulgakov is theoretically describing a Witches’ Sabbath (also see Walpurgis Night (Walpurgisnacht)) , but the tone is comic rather than threatening. The extravagant details of the enchanting ball scene, which appears to be both an updating of a Witches’ Sabbath and a version of the classic ball scenes to be found in nineteenth-century Russian literature, actually has its source in the author’s own life. Bulgakov and his wife attended a ball at the American embassy in 1935, which in terms of everyday life in 1930s Moscow was truly amazing, since it featured live bears and birds, and lavish musical entertainment as well as enormous amount of food and drink – and a few well-known informers as well.
At the ball, Margarita has a picture of a poodle on a heavy chain around her neck. This is another Faustian reference; Mephistopheles takes the form of a poodle at one point. However, this is also displaced Gospel material, since, unlike Yeshua, Margarita does go through her version of the Stations of the Cross with something heavy around her neck.
Margarita and Yeshua are corresponding characters. The difference is that Yeshua says he loves all people, and all people are good. Whereas Margarita’s love and her concern extends mainly towards the Master, whom she wants to get back and who is ultimately liberated and whose manuscript is restored.
Manuscripts don’t burn is a phrase that went into Russian literature history. Woland is talking about the immortality of a created work, possibly in the sense that sooner or later it will turn up, perhaps even to be given to one writer or another as inspiration from another world. However, despite this phrase, Bulgakov himself knew very well that manuscripts do burn, since he burned a number of his own in 1930 – including the first draft of a novel about the devil – when he lost faith in his future.
Nevertheless, the phrase is iconic for the Russian and Soviet culture, signifying that no matter how hard enemies of the state worked to destroy the literary works, they ultimately did not succeed.
Nevertheless, the phrase is iconic for the Russian and Soviet culture, signifying that no matter how hard enemies of the state worked to destroy the literary works, they ultimately did not succeed.
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