Two Adversaries Continues.
“…I shall
walk alone to the unknown limits…”
S. A. Yesenin.
The séance of black magic in Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita is written far more enigmatically than the
reader can even suspect. Bulgakov’s passion for secrecy can be well summarized
by the following Yesenin lines:
“I shall let
no one inside my private room,
I shall not
open the door to anyone.”
“…I shall
not part with my beloved lyre.
I shall not
pass it on to stranger hands,
Not to my
mother, not to a friend, not to my wife.
It was to me
only that it entrusted its sounds,
And to me
only did it sing its tender songs…
You have a
different life. You have a different tune.
While I
shall walk alone to the unknown limits…”
Bulgakov’s 12th chapter “Black
Magic and its Unmasking” starts with a circus number. Maxim Gorky’s article
Sergei Yesenin closes with a
reminiscence of how Gorky in Yesenin’s company visited the famous Luna-Park in
Berlin.---
“The ugly splendor of the Luna-Park enlivened Yesenin.
Chuckling with laughter he was running from one rarity to another… There were
innumerable unsophisticated amusements there, there were many lights. For about
three minutes he was looking with attention over there, where high up in the
air, silhouetted against the black clouds, a woman was walking on a tightrope
stretched over the pond. She was illuminated by Bengal fires, over her and
seemingly after her flew rockets, dying off in the clouds and reflected in the
water of the pond. It was almost beautiful, but Yesenin mumbled: ‘They are just after scaring people. However,
I just love the circus.’”
Because of this, the chapter Black
Magic starts with circus, reiterating the fact that the book has been
written by Bulgakov from the person of Yesenin.
It was S. Yesenin, his contemporary, whom Bulgakov chose to make the
author of Master and Margarita. (The
reader will get a clearer picture of this in my chapter Dress Rehearsal for Master and Margarita.)
Chapter 12 opens with a traditional circus number. Thus Bulgakov, once
again in his own way, contrasts the regular-quality lead-in performance with
the most bizarre show that follows, which, besides, contains a hidden meaning.
The show consists of a number of parts, viewed under different angles. I am
writing about one such angle in my chapter The
Spy Novel.
I would also like to draw the reader’s attention here to the fact that
Bulgakov, using Kot Begemot shows that each character in the novel has its
prototype. Thus already in the 12th chapter he shows that his novel
is a grandiose rebus, which needs to be solved. For example, “somebody else’s
watch” fished by Koroviev out of Rimsky’s vest pocket, will be discussed in my
future chapter The Bard. Here,
though, we may simply note the key words “he
wiped his moustache with a makeup cloth.” In other words, the cat is not a
cat in reality. He is what we may call wearing
makeup, and he appears as a man already in chapter 10, in the scene of
Varenukha being beaten up in a public toilet. The significance of this scene
will be discussed in my chapter Variety. In
so far as the bicycle circus number is concerned, I have written about it
already in connection with Kot Begemot, who, disguised as the rook-chauffeur,
brings Margarita back to Moscow from the river in chapter 21 The Flight. While the circus artist
winds up his opening act at the séance of black magic by driving off the stage
on a single bicycle wheel, Kot Begemot, disguised as a Rook, flies off on a
single car wheel.
Bulgakov’s circus would not have been so interesting for a researcher,
but for the following lines of V. V. Mayakovsky:
“How many
poets have the sleight of hand!
Like a
magician, he pulls a line
Out of his
own mouth, and out of those of others.”
These lines explain the trick which opens Bulgakov’s séance of black
magic:
“Fagot clicked his fingers and exclaimed jauntily: Three-four! He caught a deck of cards
out of the air, shuffled it and sent it in a ribbon to the cat. The cat
intercepted the ribbon and sent it back. … Fagot opened his mouth, like a nestling,
and one after another, swallowed all the cards.”
In order to fully appreciate this scene, we must realize of course that
two great Russian poets, A. S. Pushkin and M. Yu. Lermontov, are participating
in this card trick. As I already observed in my chapter The Triangle, Lermontov had the habit of talking to Pushkin in his
poems, giving alternative versions of Pushkin’s works (in this case, the jocular
version of Pushkin’s Pique Dame comes
to mind, which happens to be Lermontov’s Tambov
Treasurer’s Wife), and doing it masterfully. This masterfulness was noted
by Bulgakov and shown in the Séance of
Black Magic.
A second component of this trick, written by Bulgakov, happen to be the
following lines from V. V. Mayakovsky:
“And the
black palms of the congregated windows
Were dealt
burning yellow cards…”
Pay attention to the “black palms.” Bulgakov indeed had to know very well
the works of his contemporaries, as he himself says it in the Theatrical Novel about S. L. Maksudov,
who made it his first order of business to buy himself books by contemporary
authors.
And in Master and Margarita it
is master who, having won a lottery, buys himself a veritable library of books
“smelling (I bet) of antique chocolate,” in order to write his historical novel Pontius Pilate.
In this, Bulgakov describes himself. I cannot stop being amazed by the
quality of Bulgakov’s research, thinking through the minutest detail. And also
by the fact that his works are studded with incredible riddles every step of
the way.
***
Perhaps, the most bizarre words in Master
and Margarita belong to Koroviev in the chapter The Great Ball At Satan:
“And indeed, I would
rather have preferred chopping wood, instead of receiving [the guests] here on
this platform.”
Curiously, these truly strange words are also best explained through V.
V. Mayakovsky’s poetry:
“Love means
running deep inside the yard,
And until
rookish night
Chopping
wood with a glistening axe,
Playing with
your strength.”
This proves again that in Bulgakov’s Master
and Margarita the two rooks, A. S. Pushkin and M. Yu. Lermontov, are taken
from Mayakovsky’s poetry, as the scene of filling the swimming pool with
champagne and cognac features them both.
…Behemoth made some magic passes in front of Neptune’s mouth and at
once all the champagne, hissing and roaring, was drained out of the pool, and
Neptune began spewing forth no longer a playful and foamy stream of dark-yellow
color. Shrieking with horror, the ladies screamed: “Cognac!” and rushed away
from the edge of the pool to behind the columns. In a few seconds the pool was
filled up. Spinning triple in the air, the cat crashed into the turbulent
cognac. He crawled out, spluttering, his tie all soaked, having lost the
gilding on his whiskers and his lorgnette.
Begemot’s example was followed only by the ingenious dressmaker and
her escort, unidentified young mulatto. Both of them plunged into the cognac,
but here Koroviev caught Margarita’s arm, and they left the bathers to their
own devices…
In such a way Bulgakov adds one more portrait of Alexander Sergeyevich
Pushkin to his display in Master and
Margarita, reminding us and pointing out, like he does it in the portrait
of the “Backenbarter” with Claudine [see my chapter Margarita’s Maiden Flight, segment XLV, etc.], Pushkin’s wild and
scandalous youth. There is a good reason why Yesenin in his poem To Pushkin writes:
“Oh,
Alexander, you were a rogue,
Like today I
am a hooligan.”
It is not clear, but highly plausible, that the “ingenious dressmaker,” of whom Koroviev tells Margarita at the
ball, is none other than the said “Claudine,”
for whom the Backenbarter mistakes Margarita in the river scene of the chapter The Flight.
…Or else it may be another page from Pushkin’s bachelor life, linked to
the establishment of a certain madam Sophia Astafievna, who is exposed not by
Koroviev but by A. S. Pushkin himself. Even so, how can we fail to be amazed by
the mind and the nobleness of the man who wrote the following refreshing and
uplifting lines to his beloved wife:
“I just had to marry
you, because without you I would have been miserable for life!.. The responsibility
of family life makes a man more moral.”
To be continued…
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