Strangers in the Night.
A. A. Blok. Madness.
The Mystical Novel.
Verses About A Fair Lady. VI.
“Grass was breaking near the forgotten graves.
We forgot yesterday… And
forgot the words…
And silence fell all around…”
Alexander Blok. To S. Solovyev.
Why
is Blok’s “Death” white? He explains
this oddity in the 1906 poem In the Attic
from the poetry cycle The City.
This poem is Blok’s take on the 1906 poem Delirium
about a “White Ancient Maiden.”
Possessing
an uncommonly gruesome sense of humor, probably helping him to endure the harsh
reality of his surroundings, Blok gives the reader another take on the same
subject:
“What
in the world is higher
Than light-filled attics?
I can see the chimneys on the
roofs
Of distant pubs.
There is no way to go there,
And what for – now?..”
The poem’s background is the
death of a “young wife.” –
“Here
– I am tied to her only…
Here – the door is shut…
And she can hear nothing –
Hears but does not look,
Quiet – she is not breathing,
White [sic!] – she is silent…”
Blok
is asking his friend – the North Wind – to bestow all kinds of gifts on the
“young wife”:
“Give
her a dress
White [sic!] as you are,
Bring into her bed
Snow flowers!
So that she would look
festive
And as white as snow!
So that I would be looking greedily
Out of that corner!”
And
as for Blok’s words: “But there was only a shadow plodding on there, and dropping down behind
the hills…” – Bulgakov has this, in the 31st chapter of Master and Margarita, titled On Vorobievy Hills:
“Master ejected himself out of the saddle, left the horseback
group, and ran to the edge of the hill.”
Bulgakov’s
master is a “shadow,” considering that Blok had died in 1921. One more example
of Russian mysticism in Bulgakov. He is not using the Blokian word “shadow,” but
the Blokian “hill” is here, as in “behind
the hills.”
Also
in this poem a partial explanation is contained as to why master’s hair has
become white:
“…Margarita could not see herself, but she could well see how
master had changed. His hair was shining white now in the moonlight…”
As
for why master’s hair “formed into a plait at the back
of his head” – the reader will find that
out in my chapter A Swallow’s Nest of
Luminaries.
“And
I listened – and I heard:
Among the quivering lunar
spots [sic!]
A faraway stallion’s gallop
was ringing,
And the light whistling was
intelligible.”
Apparently,
the road was not just “white under the
moon,” but also all around on the road and in the fields adjacent to it
there were “quivering lunar spots”
penetrating into the shadows from rocks, bushes, trees, tall grasses and
individual flowers.
In
Bulgakov, Blok’s poetic expression “among
the quivering lunar spots” is transformed in the sub-novel Pontius Pilate into a mystical depiction
of an “olive estate.” –
“...In a few minutes Judas was already
running under the mysterious shadow [sic!] of sprawling giant olives. The road
was rising up the hill. Judas was breathing heavily, at times getting out of
darkness into the intricate lunar carpets...”
Thus,
Blok’s “quivering lunar spots” become
“intricate lunar carpets” in
Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita.
Also
from the same Blokian poem we get a clarification of master’s words during his
farewell to Ivan at the psychiatric clinic:
“The noise of the storm was sliced through by a distant whistle. – You hear that? – asked master. – It’s the noise of the storm… – No, it’s me being called; it’s time for me
to go, – explained master and got up from the bed.”
So,
here is Blok once more:
“And
I listened – and I heard…
A faraway stallion’s gallop
was ringing,
And the light whistling was
intelligible.”
After
the departure of master and Margarita from Ivanushka’s hospital room –
“...[Ivanushka] fell into disquietude. He was troubled, catching
with his ear, already used to constant silence, some restless steps and muffled
voices behind the closed door.”
And
in Blok:
“But
here and farther – an even sound,
And the heart was slowly
struggling,
Oh, how could one figure out
Where the knocking was coming
from,
Wherefrom a voice would be
heard?”
The
sounds and knocks were coming from Room 118 behind the wall, and so did the
voices.
And
here the mysticism takes over the scene, as Ivanushka summons the head nurse
and demands to be told whatever just happened in Room 118:
“And you tell me straight as
it is, for I can feel it all through the wall.”
Having
learned that his neighbor next door had just passed away –
… Ivan meaningfully raised his finger and said: I knew that! Let me assure you, Praskovia
Fedorovna, that right now in the city one more person has passed away. I even
know who. –Here Ivanushka smiled mysteriously. – It was a woman.”
And
here it becomes clear that Bulgakov follows precisely that poem by Blok, in
order to show his death. For, it is not Blok who “receives the non-existent,”
but Sergei Yesenin, Ivanushka’s prototype, receiving the deceased master and
Margarita. And Blok is the prototype of master in the psychological thriller of
Master and Margarita, which I call Strangers in the Night.
This
may be rather difficult to comprehend, but all because M. A. Bulgakov is indeed
a “mystical writer,” as he calls himself in his famous letter to Stalin.
To
be continued…
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