GALINA SEDOVA. A CHAPTER ON BULGAKOV. CCCCXXX

Gumilev. The Vengeance.

Posting #9.

“In my hour of death I swear,

Hiding behind the door of death,

I will be lying in wait for you.”

N. S. Gumilev. After-Death Vengeance. A Ballad.

Now back to Abadonna. For some reason, Bulgakov decides to acquaint Margarita with this mysterious personage of Master and Margarita. But before we get to the discussion of this meeting, it is worth noting that the first time when Margarita is being called a “Donna” is when Woland introduces his “retinue” to her.

And now “Donna” Margarita meets Abadonna at the end of that same chapter 22 of Master and Margarita: Under the Candles. –

“Abadonna! – called Woland quietly, and immediately out of the wall there appeared a figure of a thin man in dark glasses.”

Margarita sees Abadonna another time at the Ball. –

“With the last strike of the clock, whose sound was coming from who knows where, silence fell upon the crowd of guests. Then Margarita saw Woland again. He was walking surrounded by Abadonna, Azazello, and a few more black and young [figures], looking like Abadonna.”

Here again we find the same ambiguity in Bulgakov, like in Koroviev’s case. Does “black” refer to the color of the skin or the color of the dress? It is most likely that those “looking like Abadonna” were all dressed in black clothes. Meanwhile, Abadonna himself is a white-skinned man, as it becomes clear at the end of the chapter, already on the next page.

After Woland calls Baron Meigel “a snitch and a spy,” Abadonna appears before the Baron.

“The baron became whiter than Abadonna, who was exceptionally pale by his nature. And then something strange happened. Abadonna found himself face-to-face with the Baron, and took off his glasses for a second. At that very moment something sparked with fire in Azazello’s hands, something clapped noiselessly, like a clap of hands. The baron started falling down backwards, scarlet blood gushed from his chest… Koroviev put the chalice under the gushing stream…”

The situation with Meigel is in a way very similar to the killing of Judas. As Aphranius explains to Pontius Pilate, Judas was “killed with an uncommon skill… Kindly pay attention to the bag… I vouchsafe to you that Judas’ blood gushed like a wave. I’ve seen quite a few killings in my life…”

Meigel’s blood gushed out of his chest in a stream, while Judas’s blood gushed like a wave, with such strength that the bag of money was soaked in it. In Judas’s case it was done by professional assassins working for Aphranius.

In Meigel’s case the scene is even more interesting, for, as the reader already knows, participating in it are prototypes of famous Russian poets. And the really interesting question is why Azazello with his revolver was not enough. Why did Bulgakov need to introduce for such a short period of time the mysterious personage of Abadonna? Then, why did Abadonna need to take off his dark glasses? Why was this whole thing so necessary to Bulgakov? Why did it have to be done publicly? Doesn’t Woland’s little speech sound like that of the procurator?

All these questions in fact boil down to one: What is the identity of the person behind Abadonna? Why, in choosing this name, Bulgakov simultaneously calls Margarita “Donna” for the first time? Knowing that Margarita’s prototype is the famous Russian poetess Marina Tsvetaeva, the answer is very short.

Abadonna’s prototype had to be a Russian poet who, in Bulgakov’s opinion had been set up. The circle closes now. Having introduced N. S. Gumilev as V. S. Lastochkin, and giving some of his traits to other personages of Master and Margarita, such as Woland, master, and even Margarita, Bulgakov, if we strip off the fantastical element, arranges a public execution for the man who had betrayed N. S. Gumilev to the authorities. The betrayer and the betrayed simply had to meet face to face in the scene of Woland’s vengeance.

What remains is to draw the reader’s attention to two interesting details with regard to Gumilev.

1.      Who are those “a few more black and young [figures], looking like Abadonna”?

Gumilev was a very famous poet, and he had numerous students, followers, and imitators. In the same chapter Bulgakov writes practically the same thing in connection to another famous poet S. A. Yesenin:

“Young people, accompanying Azazello, smiling with lifeless, but polite smiles, were already pressing Monsieur Jacque and his spouse to the side…”

These young people can also be students, followers, or simply admirers of Yesenin.

Considering that Abadonna, having already been introduced by Bulgakov in the previous chapter Under the Candles, doesn’t get any credit that these young people look at all like him.

2.      There is a good reason why Bulgakov creates an ambiguity with the word “black” in regard to the young people who look like Abadonna. I was also struck by the fact that negro servants were employed at Satan’s ball. That seemed strange to me, especially until I figured out that Bulgakov was allotting to Gumilev a dual role to play in his novel Master and Margarita.

I already wrote elsewhere that N. S. Gumilev considered himself not only a warrior poet, in which he was following M. Yu. Lermontov, but also a traveler. He was deeply attracted to Africa, which he visited on two memorable occasions, the second time as a member of an expedition under the auspices of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Thus, introducing black people not only as servants but also as guests at the ball, Bulgakov honors Gumilev, who published his poems about Africa, as well as representative examples of African folklore, in his poetic collection The Tent.

It is most likely that Gumilev was stunned by the African sky, because it is the sky which he had previously called “the starry tent.”

As the reader already knows, in the Theatrical Novel Bulgakov introduces the word Tent in describing one of the offices of the Independent Theater. In this manner, M. Bulgakov points to the presence of Gumilev in Master and Margarita as the most interesting scenes in the Theatrical Novel relate to Master and Margarita, hence I called my chapter on the Theatrical Novel, A Dress Rehearsal for Master and Margarita.

The Golden Stallion, whom Maksudov presumably sees on the student stage of the Independent Theater, comes out of Gumilev’s prosaic work The Golden Knight, whose steed is of course a Golden Stallion.

***