GALINA SEDOVA’S BULGAKOV. CCLXVI.

Dress Rehearsal for Master and Margarita.

A Piece of Onion Ends.

 

 “…Pushkin-devil slipped away…”

A. S. Pushkin. A Ballad.

 

The 13^th chapter of the Theatrical Novel – I Perceive the Truth – closes with the words:

“The night had been eaten up, the night had departed.”

These words remind me of the ending of the 6^th chapter of Master and Margarita, Schizophrenia, as was Told. Here Bulgakov talks about the poet Ryukhin whose prototype is V. V. Mayakovsky, who takes the poet Ivan Bezdomny whose prototype is S. A. Yesenin, into the psychiatric clinic, and then returns to the restaurant. Bulgakov writes:

“...Within a quarter of an hour, Ryukhin, in complete solitude (sic!), was sitting bent over smoked fish drinking glass after glass, realizing and admitting that there is nothing in his life that could be corrected anymore, but only forgotten. The poet had spoiled his night, while the others were having a feast, and this could never be restored.

He only had to raise his head from the lamp (sic!) toward the sky to realize that the night had vanished irretrievably… The poet was uninhibitedly attacked by the day.”

Here we must not forget that V. V. Mayakovsky serves as the prototype of both the poet Ryukhin and Woland. As for Bombardov’s two prototypes in the Theatrical Novel, they are Mayakovsky and Pushkin. If in Master and Margarita Bulgakov splits his poets in half, then in the Theatrical Novel he combines two poets in one character.

By carefully using the words: “The night had been eaten up, the night had departed,” Bulgakov shows that it was not the non-existent Bombardov who had left, but the night as such.

The night is the poet’s life. It brings tranquility, quietude, inspiration, freedom from all influences of the day. Although Maksudov is not a poet, he likes to work during the night. All through the night he was having a wake over himself, over his novel, over his play Black Snow. He was talking to himself, arguing with himself, trying to persuade himself to accept his own point.

And the point is that in the Theatrical Novel Bulgakov was undertaking a daring experiment that combined the whole Magnificent Four in a single character with a dual personality.

In the 13^th chapter I Perceive the Truth Bulgakov “blows Gogol and smoke,” to use S. Yesenin’s words. I might say that there is quite a lot of “smoke” in this chapter. As for “Gogol,” that one is all over the Theatrical Novel.

But, being an original writer, Bulgakov adds something entirely of his own, which is a “piece of onion,” “kusochek luku.” I have already explained elsewhere what the oily spot from this piece of onion signifies.

Now comes the turn of the piece of onion itself. What does Bulgakov wish to tell us?

Having become acquainted with Maksudov well enough, the reader surely understands that he is a generous man. Hence, it is quite reasonable to surmise that he had indeed bought all that wine and smoked salmon, plus the red caviar to go with the pancakes, made by the master’s wife.

So, what does the piece of onion have to do with it? Onion does not belong with caviar!

And the first thing that comes to mind here is the parallelism between Maksudov and Bombardov in this 13^th chapter of the Theatrical Novel: I Perceive the Truth. Here is what Maksudov thinks about Bombardov:

“You are a very interesting, observant, and wicked man,  [Maksudov] thought about Bombardov, and I like you immensely, but you are cunning and secretive, and it has been your life in the theater that has made you such.”

Here Bulgakov talks from his own experience, having spent ten years of his life in the theater. First it was the Moscow Arts Theater, then the Bolshoi. “Cunning and secretive” he had become too.

A couple of pages later in the same chapter it is already Bombardov who tells it like it is to Maksudov, following the latter’s cue:

“You are a poet, may the devil take you! – I [Maksudov] wheezed.

And you, thinly smiling whispered Bombardov, are a wicked man!..

His words stung me. I thought that I knew the man not at all, but then I immediately remembered Likospastov’s words about the wolfish grin.”

Why would Bulgakov draw such attention to the words “a wicked man”? In order to understand how Bulgakov’s mind works, we need to return to the scene with Likospastov. This scene comes up as early as in the second chapter of the novel, titled A Fit of Neurasthenia.

“There is something unsympathetic in you. You better believe me! But I love you anyway, love you even if they kill me for it!”

And here it comes:

“A sly [sic!] one he is, the scoundrel. A man with a twist!.. So this is the way it is, he shouted, taking offense, and made a gesture inviting all of them as his witnesses. – Look: he is looking at me with wolf’s eyes! [sic!]”

Maksudov himself confesses that, having been offended by the critics of his novel, he was overcome by malice: “To begin with, -- I started again, with malice [sic!]…”

There is a great sea of material here. We have “malice,” a “scoundrel,” a “man with a twist,” plus “wolf’s eyes.” [Let me remind the reader that only S. Yesenin identified himself with a wolf. See my chapter Margarita and the Wolf.] But I was primarily interested in just one word: the Russian word “lukavy,” “sly.” In the Russian language this word signifies the devil. (The Lord’s Prayer, which in the English version ends with “And deliver us from evil,” says in Russian: “I izbavi nas ot Lukavogo.”)

Thus we can see that the word “lukavy” is a very special word, and by no means a mere synonym of “cunning.” And this is the word Likospastov used to describe Maksudov.

Considering that the end of Likospastov’s speech contains some important material relevant not to the Theatrical Novel but to Bulgakov himself and his novel Master and Margarita, I am quoting this passage:

“…Try to understand! Try to understand that the artistic value of your novel is not all that great (here came a soft guitar chord from the sofa) for you to go to Golgotha on its account. Please understand!”

This whole passage has direct relevance to Master and Margarita, specifically to the sub-novel Pontius Pilate. By the way, in Bulgakov’s lexicon “a guitar chord” signifies the firing squad. All this material from the 2^nd chapter of the Theatrical Novel proves that this novel is truly a “dress rehearsal” for Master and Margarita.

Being done with that part, I am returning the reader’s attention to the word “lukavy.” It is inside this word that we ought to see “kusochek luku.” The two words have the same root -luk-, but their meaning is quite different.

In the 7^th no-title chapter of the Theatrical Novel Maksudov reminisces on his past life and also reads books of his contemporaries, which he had previously purchased. Bulgakov gives him the following words:

“Reading a short story describing a certain journalist, … I recognized the sofa with a sticking out spring, the blotting paper on the table… In other words, that was me described in the story! The same pants, the head drawn into the shoulders, and wolfish eyes… In a word, ME!..”

Maksudov, however, strongly disagrees with such a portrayal. ---

“…But I swear by everything dear to me in life that I was portrayed unfairly. I am by no means cunning, or greedy, or sly [lukavy], or a careerist, and I had never said the kind of nonsense ascribed to me in this story!”

Using the word “lukavy” in the 7^th chapter, Bulgakov clearly wishes to draw the reader’s attention to it, as it is already present in the 2^nd chapter:

“A sly one he is, the scoundrel!”

Thus Bulgakov asserts that he is a writer unlike all others. He is a writer of puzzles, and many of these puzzles he wrote for his own amusement, that is, for the heck of it.

For example, this 7^th chapter of the Theatrical Novel has no title. Why?

I am opening Diaboliada. (Whatever you say, we are talking about “Lukavy,” that is, the devil!)

Chapter 7 of Diaboliada is titled The Organ and the Cat. In the 7^th no-title chapter of the Theatrical Novel Bulgakov writes about Maksudov’s deceased cat and a non-existent grand piano sitting on his table and playing music by itself.

There is also a false clue in comparing the two personages: Maksudov and Korotkov. To assume that these characters may have the same prototype would be wrong. As we know, Maksudov has no problem with his identity papers, whereas Korotkov cannot receive new papers, to replace the stolen ones, without an official note from the housing authority supporting his claim.

Giving these examples, I hope to demonstrate that Bulgakov is a “lukavy” writer. And so, Bulgakov adds to Yesenin’s “blowing Gogol and smoke” his own “kusochek luku.” In the process, he challenges the Russian reader as to why “luku” and not “luka.” The difference is in the last letter, but we get “lukavy” from “luka,” rather than from “luku.”

The reader will find out why Bulgakov blows so much smoke in this chapter and so much Gogol in the Theatrical Novel as a whole, in my subsequent chapters, later on.

This is the end of the present chapter. We will return with the next chapter, the psychological thriller Strangers in the Night.