Strangers in the Night.
Blok Split Continues.
“He hid his head
between the knees
And won’t show his face to
me.
But on the final day, at the
bottomless hour,
Breaking each and every law,
He will rise up, the lawless
ghost…”
Alexander Blok. Verses
About a Fair Lady.
At
the mere thought of death, Blok’s novice remembers the girl whom he had
murdered:
“I am
young, and I’m fresh, and in love,
I’m alarmed, in angst, and
pleading,
I am greening, the mysterious
maple,
Always bending toward you…
You will come under the broad
marquee
To dream in the green shade.
You’re alone [sic!], in love,
and with me,
I will whisper to you a
mysterious dream…”
From
the “dream” to the reality of the relentless chase, transforming the mystique
into a detective story.
“Behind
the dark distance of the city
White ice was coming to an
end,
I befriended the darkness
And slowed down my fast pace…
Out of the darkness toward me
A man stood up.
Hiding his face from me,
He quickly walked forward
To where there was no light,
And where the ice ended…
(Observe
the unusual dimensions of Blok’s mystical world. The man stands up “toward”
him, but at the same time walks “forward,” away from him!)
…He turned back his face and
I met
A single burning eye.
And then the icy hole closed
up,
His eye’s fire was
extinguished…
And I didn’t know when and
where
He had come from and
disappeared into,
And how the blue dream of the
heavens
Turned upside down in the
water.”
An
amazing mastery in this Blokian storytelling!
Let
it be noted that, using Blok’s thoughts and images, Bulgakov introduces
Woland’s “burning eye” into Master and
Margarita.
M.
Bulgakov correctly understood the next-in-line Blokian poem, interrupting the
story, but providing an explanation for it. It is the poem about Harlequin.
This
conspicuous interruption of Blok’s storyline struck me so much when I was first
reading this cycle that I understood already then that Blok’s poetry ought to
be read as a whole, and not in isolation from the rest of his poems, that his
ideas pass on from one poem to another, and that he is a consummate enigmatic
and mystical thinker.
I
was extremely interested in Blok’s image of Harlequin. I just couldn’t believe
that Blok was introducing dolls and puppets into his works without a compelling
reason. I had to find out why he was doing it. And I was not disappointed in my
discoveries.
Harlequin
is an entirely mystical figure, being such since medieval times.
[Harlequin inherits his physical ability and
trickster qualities from the Middle Ages. The name Harlequin is taken from that
of a mischievous devil or demon character in popular French passion plays. It
originates with an Old French term herlequin, hellequin, first
attested in the 11th century, by the chronicler Orderic Vitalis, who
recounts a story of a monk who was pursued by a troop of demons when wandering
on the coast of Normandy at night. These demons were led by a masked,
club-wielding giant and they were known as familia harlequin. This
medieval French version of the Germanic Wild Hunt is connected to the English
figure of Herla cyning (host-king; German Erlkonig, known to all the world from Goethe’s poem and Schubert’s
song). Hellequin was depicted a black-faced emissary of the devil, roaming the
countryside with a group of demons chasing the damned souls of evil people to
Hell. The physical appearance of Hellequin offers an explanation for the
traditional colors of Harlequin's red-and-black mask. The first known
appearance on stage of Hellequin is dated to 1262. The name also appears as
that of a devil, as Alichino in Dante’s Inferno.]
Having
figured out the character of Harlequin already from Blok’s early Verses About a Fair Lady, I have found
it much easier ever since to analyze his other poems, because it taught me to
never take anything of his for granted.
Bulgakov
surely understood this too, as he takes his idea precisely from the legend of
Harlequin, and not from Goethe’s Faust.
Bulgakov’s genius makes use of great Russian poets. Hence, in Master and Margarita we find both the
devil Woland (V. V. Mayakovsky) and the demon Azazello (S. A. Yesenin).
As
for Harlequin’s colors, Bulgakov passes them on to his Satan (Woland). His
Woland is wearing “a mourning [that is black] cloak lined with flaming fabric.”
What a contrast his attire makes with the “white cloak lined with blood-color
underside” worn by Pontius Pilate, providing a spectacular opening for the
second chapter of Master and Margarita.
–
“In a white cloak with a blood-red lining, sporting the shuffling
cavalryman’s gait… Procurator of Judea Pontius Pilate came out into the roofed
colonnade between the two wings of the palace of Herod the Great.”
Showing
some similarity to Harlequin from the French medieval legend, Woland emerges at
the séance of black magic at the Variety Theater if not in a full mask, at least
in a half-mask.
“...The arriving celebrity [Woland] impressed everybody by the
length of his tuxedo... and by the fact that he appeared in a half-mask.”
In
addition to this, Bulgakov takes Woland’s “burning eye” from the 5th
cycle of the Verses About a Fair Lady.
And
also, it is quite possible that Bulgakov takes his owl in Master and Margarita from Blok, who for some reason has a
predisposition toward this bird. In the earlier quoted poem Blok says:
“My
eyes are an owl’s eyes…”
And
in Bulgakov:
“Two eyes peered into Margarita’s face. The right eye with a golden
spark at the bottom [sic!] would bore anyone to the bottom of their soul.”
And
also in Chapter 32 Forgiveness and
Eternal Rest:
“This
knight once made an unfortunate joke, replied Woland, turning his face with
a softly burning eye toward Margarita.”
We
may well call an owl’s eyes “burning
eyes.”
Blok
closes his poem with the following words:
“But
someone was waiting at the crossroads
For my final frightful words…
Clearer and closer is the
dream of the end…”
But
who is that?
“He
hid his head between the knees
And won’t show his face to
me.
But on the final day, at the
bottomless hour,
Breaking each and every law,
He will rise up, the lawless
ghost…”
To
be continued…
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