Poplavsky.
The Drowning
Uncle.
Posting #4.
“Chicken
fried, chicken steamed
Was
taking a walk on Nevsky Prospekt.
He
was apprehended, he was arrested,
Demanded
that he show his passport…”
A Humorous Song.
We are left with explaining the scene involving M. A.
Poplavsky’s passport, when Kot Begemot demands that Poplavsky show him his
passport.
“Passport! – yapped the
cat and stretched out a plump paw.
Understanding nothing and seeing nothing but the two sparks burning
in the cat’s eyes, Poplavsky pulled his passport out of his pocket like a
dagger. The cat picked up from the console table a pair of eyeglasses in a
thick black frame, put them on his muzzle, which made him look even more
imposing, and pulled the passport from Poplavsky’s jumping hand.
I wonder if I am going to
faint? – thought
Poplavsky…
Which precinct issued this
document? – asked the cat
peering into the page. There was no answer.
Number four hundred twelve! – the cat answered himself, tracing the
passport with his paw, while holding it upside down. – But yes, of course. This precinct is known to me. They are issuing passports
to just anybody. And I for instance would never have issued a passport to
someone like you! No way I would! Just one look at this face, and I would have
rejected! – The cat became so angry that he threw the passport on the
floor.”
This scene follows the popular satirical song about a
fried-and-steamed chicken:
“Chicken
fried, chicken steamed
Was
taking a walk along the street.
He
was caught and arrested,
And
ordered to show his passport.
He
had no passport, then pay the money.
There
was no money, then go to jail…”
Bulgakov introduces this scene not merely for laughs.
Nobody puts Poplavsky, the Kievan uncle, in jail, as the two personages who
meet the Kievan economist-planner in the no-good apartment #50 have as their
prototypes two great Russian poets of the Golden Age: A. S. Pushkin and M. Yu.
Lermontov. Both were killed in duels, and thus take the side of N. S. Gumilev
against M. A. Voloshin.
The story with the passport is easily explained.
Neither A. S. Pushkin nor M. Y. Lermontov could travel abroad, but M. A.
Voloshin was allowed to. Add to this the fact that Voloshin was an adept of
theosophy, whereas Pushkin and Lermontov were both Russian Orthodox. Pushkin
frequently closed his letters to his wife with references to God:
“...As for Mashka, Sashka-the-redhead and
you [Pushkin’s wife Natalia Goncharova] – I am kissing you and crossing you.
Lord be with you!”
And in another letter:
“...Ah, Lord Jesus Christ! I kiss Masha and
ask to remember me. What kind of rash does Sasha have? Christ be with you. My
blessings and kisses to you!”
And at Eastertime:
“...Wifey,
my Angel!.. Resurrection! Christ is Risen! My dear wife, it’s sad, my Angel,
sad without you. Farewell, my all. Christ is Risen. Christ be with you.”
Although M. Yu. Lermontov died at such an early age of
26, yet through all his rebellious nature, I can see his intense religiosity
coming through in his works. Unfortunately, I do not have his letters to work
with.
But coming through more in this passage is perhaps
tongue-in-cheek, but still bitterness of Bulgakov himself, who was disappointed
and dejected by the fact that he was never allowed to travel abroad. At the
core of this disappointment I see Bulgakov’s desire to write and bring back his
travel diaries.
I believe that it was mostly due to his literary
interest that he wanted to travel abroad, not just to see foreign lands, but to
give their descriptions and thus to further enrich Russian literature.
I have read Dostoyevsky’s diaries and find them very
interesting in that respect as well.
***
Knowing that Margarita’s prototype is Marina
Tsvetaeva, who wrote a very good poem on the death of M. A. Voloshin, I was
surprised that she wrote no memoirs of him. The only time she writes about
Voloshin in her memoirs is in her Captive
Spirit, which is actually her memoir about Andrei Bely.
Marina Tsvetaeva describes her meeting with Asya Turgeneva
at Musaget where she was brought by Max Voloshin. I presume so because of the
first poem in my BVL edition of her works reads:
“My poems,
written all so early…
Scattered
in the dust of bookshops,
Where
nobody was taking them, nor takes them,
My
poems are like precious wines,
Their
time will come.”
I am giving this poem here because Tsvetaeva wrote it
in Koktebel on May 13, 1913. As I already mentioned before, she was already
acquainted with Max Voloshin in 1910, and also that Voloshin’s mother had built
a house in the Crimea: in Koktebel.
Calling Voloshin “Max” in this poetry cycle, Marina
Tsvetaeva does the same thing in her memoirs:
“I first saw Asya Turgeneva at Musaget
where I was brought by Max.”
That’s why I would like to end this chapter with the
words of a person who was well-disposed to M. A. Voloshin:
“…Max,
how eternal I felt
Being
inside your breast!..
Max,
it will be so soft for me
To
sleep on your rock!”
Marina Tsvetaeva called her poetry cycle in memoriam Maximilian Voloshin: ICI – Haut [Here High Up].
“They
buried the poet
On
the highest spot…
I
know the mountain
Which
renamed itself…
And
so the burial is in an hour,
It
went as Voloshin’s Mountain…”
And now, the name Poplavsky itself. Bulgakov takes it
once again from Marina Tsvetaeva in her memoirs about V. Ya. Bryusov. It is
here that she writes about the poetess Natalia Poplavskaya, obliquely
indicating that someone from the Poplavsky family had sold out N. S. Gumilev to
the Bolshevik authorities, using unfounded claims and resulting in the great
poet’s death in August 1921.
***
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