Alpha And Omega.
Posting #26.
“His eyes flashed like bolts of lightning. It was hard
to take this piercing right-through gaze.
It had a magnetic effect [on women].”
D. Merezhkovsky. The
Night Luminary.
A
particularly vivid and at the same time simple example of Bulgakov
intentionally confusing both his reader and the researcher is served by the
following passage from the 2nd chapter of Master and Margarita: Pontius Pilate:
“Having arrived with the procurator to Yershalaim, the First Cohort
of the Twelfth Lightning Legion had positioned itself in the rear of the
Palace...”
The
researcher ought to have been struck by the fact that after this introduction
Bulgakov immediately drops the word “Twelfth.”
The point is that as I have already written before, “12” points to Alexander
Blok’s poem The Twelve, while “Lightning” is taken from the poetry and
memoirs of Marina Tsvetaeva who apparently loved to use this word which shows
the liveliness of the human mind.
Bulgakov
drops the word “Twelfth” because of
the death of Alexander Blok, who happens to be one of the prototypes of Yeshua,
condemned to death not having received a reprieve from the local authority, the
Jewish Synhedrion. Two criminals: Dismas and Gestas, according to Bulgakov, had
been inciting the mob against Caesar and had been apprehended and condemned to
death by the Roman power. The other two, Varravan and HaNozri, had been
arrested by the local power and condemned by the Synhedrion.
Three
times had the Roman procurator asked the High Priest Caiaphas who of these two
would be released according to the Jewish Pesach tradition: Varravan or
HaNozri. And all three times the answer had been the same: Varravan, despite
the fact that Varravan was a violent criminal who had been causing a riot
against the local (not Roman!) power and even killed the Jewish guard who had
been trying to apprehend him.
Considering
that Bulgakov’s prototypes are Russian poets, what is Bulgakov talking about
here?
Clearly,
V. Ya. Bryusov had been asking for N. S. Gumilev’s release as soon as he had
learned about the poet’s arrest in Petrograd. Bryusov had also petitioned the
authorities to allow A. Blok to go to Finland for medical treatment. But in
both cases Bryusov’s intercession had come too late.
So,
if Bryusov is Pontius Pilate, whom does Bulgakov call “Caesar in Caesarea?”
Whom else if not the highly influential Russian writer of the time, founder of
the BVL: Library of World Literature, who provided employment for Gumilev and
Blok, and even for Bulgakov himself, the Emperor of the Russian literary world
Maxim Gorky. In 1921 Gorky approached Lenin in Moscow on behalf of Blok and
Gumilev, but this was a belated effort. Both poets died in August 1921 in the
span of 4 days.
L.
Yu. Shervinsky in Bulgakov’s first novel White
Guard is his first attempt to introduce a mystical figure into his works,
starting with either existent or nonexistent Golden Sword and ending with the
dream of Alexei Turbin’s sister Elena Vasilievna, in which Shervinsky presents
himself to her as Demon from the
celebrated eponymous poem by M. Yu. Lermontov.
With
the help of this “dream,” Bulgakov expands the character of Shervinsky,
Lermontov had introduced into Russian poetry the expression: “as though in a
dream.”
As
I have already written, Lermontov had a great influence on both poets: Blok and
Gumilev, in their mystical approach to the world. In my chapter The Garden I wrote that the prototype of
Varravan is a composite of two poets: Balmont and Bely, who at the same time
serve as prototypes of the chief of secret service (Balmont) and Matthew Levi
(Bely). Both of them were revolutionaries under surveillance of the Tsarist
Okhrana… Some sense of humor Bulgakov possesses!
The
prototypes of Mark Ratkiller and other Roman military officers in Bulgakov’s
subnovel Pontius Pilate are revealed
in my chapter The Bard.
And
so, Bulgakov’s “mysterious colonel” is either L. Yu. Shervinsky (whose
prototype is M. Yu. Lermontov, recipient of a Golden Saber for military valor)
or N. S. Gumilev himself, appearing in Alexei Turbin’s dream as a “Mongol,”
whose features seem to belong to Junior Lieutenant Fedor Nikolayevich Stepanov,
nicknamed Karas. –
“Karas with cadets armed with machineguns was on duty at the exits
leading to the garden on the grounds of the Alexander School. Dressed in
sheepskin coats and rotating every hour were four cadets by the thick-muzzled
mortars.”
In
other words, a great responsibility lay on Karas, and he couldn’t possibly have
left his post. On the other hand, Shervinsky was part of the Prince’s retinue,
but he did not leave for Germany with the Prince. Just as he got himself a
paper identifying him as a member of the Kramskoy Opera Studio, by the same
token he could have gotten himself any kind of paper. We must not forget that
by the time the mysterious “man in the uniform of an artillery colonel”
appeared in the palace the Hetman was no longer there.
Considering
that in those days cavalry and artillery were closely tied together (cannons
were obviously pulled from place to place by horsepower), an ingenious Junior
Lieutenant, such as L. Yu. Shervinsky, would find it an easy job to get himself
an artillery colonel’s uniform. Under the circumstances, when everybody knew
that wearing an officer’s uniform in the city about to be occupied by enemy
forces of different persuasion was tantamount to a death warrant to the wearer,
it was the opposite thing that most officers were doing – getting rid of such
lethal identification as soon as possible. It is quite likely that Shervinsky
may have taken that uniform from the same military supplies facility as Colonel
Nai-Turs got felt boots for his soldiers from.
But
the most important fact is given by Bulgakov in the 14th chapter of White Guard, and no one notices that
Shervinsky’s new ID, after Petlura enters the city, declares him to be an
artiste of the Kramskoy opera studio. It must be said that the Russian painter
Ivan Kramskoy, whose name is used by Bulgakov, happens to be the creator of the
“Unknown Woman.”
Is
Bulgakov sending some kind of message here? You bet!
Which
means that under the guise of Shervinsky he is hiding quite a personality!
I
have already written that the Shervinsky character contains features of the
great Russian poet M. Yu. Lermontov. Little did I know then that the personage
of the mysterious “man in the uniform of an artillery colonel” contains
features not of one but of two Russian poets: Lermontov and his disciple
Gumilev.
In
fact, this is the only way how this character can be explained. Bulgakov also
reveals that it is Shervinsky who gets into “the small
whitewashed communications room, which looked like none of the other palace
rooms…” through his repeated use of the keyword “brazen.”
Now
compare the following passages from Bulgakov’s White Guard. The first one is from chapter 7:
“The telephone was ringing nonstop, and the lackeys’ faces became
as though brazen; and jumping in their eyes were merry lights.”
At
the same time the word “brazen” has been used already in chapter 3 in relation
to Shervinsky:
“In the brazen eyes of the small Shervinsky, joy started jumping
like little balls.”
Merezhkovsky
in his article The Night Luminary thus
describes the gaze of M. Yu. Lermontov:
“His eyes flashed like bolts of lightning. It was hard to take this
piercing right-through gaze. It had a magnetic effect
[on women].”
Lermontov,
and by no means Gumilev, is emerging as Shervinsky’s prototype here.
To
be continued…
***
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