The Bard.
The Desperado-Flibustier.
Posting #2.
“Ah, you’ve come back,
said Woland. Then of
course the building
has burned to the ground.”
M. Bulgakov. Master
and Margarita.
Bulgakov’s
“dagger-beard” is also pointing to K. D. Balmont, as N. S. Gumilev writes in
his article of literary criticism: Leaders
of the New School:
“...With him [Balmont] stormily rushed into the peacefully grazing
herd of old words, of all those fallings-in-love,
hopes, beliefs, maidens, youths, flowers,
and dawns, – new words: devils, hunchbacks, cruelties, perversions, – all that he [Balmont]
himself picturesquely called dagger-words.”
That’s
why Bulgakov gives this personage a “dagger-beard.”
And indeed, if you look attentively at portraits and photos of Balmont, you can
see that he had such a sharp beard.
Balmont’s
poetry contains quite a few poems about pirates, explaining Bulgakov’s words:
“…under a black coffin flag
with Adam’s head (the head of death) upon it.”
Bulgakov’s
whole next paragraph is devoted to a single fact, to a single thought, which is
thus expressed at the end of the paragraph:
“Oh gods, my gods, give me
poison, poison!”
By
means of this, Bulgakov sends the reader a clue to the effect that the
“commander of the brig” Archibald Archibaldovich appears not only in Master and Margarita proper, but in Pontius Pilate as well. The fact that the
name of this “apparition in hell” is Archibald Archibaldovich becomes known
only more than two pages later. This name sells the store on its connection to
Balmont: we find Balmont’s “bal-” in
both the first name and patronymic of Bulgakov’s character.
There
is also another explanation why Bulgakov chose such an unusual name for his
character. Balmont was a prolific translator from foreign languages, and he
traveled a lot. In particular, he translated the works of the English poet
Percy Bysshe Shelley. Hence the name Archibald Archibaldovich. Just like in the
name of Koroviev I see “krov’”, “blood,” I see Balmont’s “bal” twice in the name
of Archibald Archibaldovich.
Briefly
appearing at the end of Chapter 6: Schizophrenia,
As Was Told, the reader next finds this personage in Chapter 28: The Final Adventures of Koroviev And Begemot,
where we are moving next.
Neither
Koroviev nor Begemot has an ID card allowing them to enter the restaurant. Only
when Archibald Archibaldovich appears on the scene, the situation changes
dramatically:
“He was looking at the two suspicious ragamuffins amiably and more
than that, he was making inviting gestures to them. Seductively smiling,
Archibald Archibaldovich led the guests to the best table… He personally moved
the chair away from the table, offering Koroviev to sit down… Seeing how the restaurant
chief was treating these highly questionable customers, the waiters dropped all
their reservations and got to business with all seriousness.”
What
also gives Archibald Archibaldovich away is his musical purring. (In Russian, murlykanye.)
1. To begin with, the Russians of today owe their
knowledge of E. T. A. Hoffmann’s novel about the cat Murr primarily to the
Balmont translation. (The earlier N. Ketcher translation into Russian has long
become a rarity.)
2. Secondly, in her memoirs of Balmont, Marina Tsvetaeva
compares him to Rudyard Kipling’s Cat Who
Walked by Himself. “Such a cat are you Balmont,
and such a cat am I. All poets are such cats.”
3. Thirdly, Marina Tsvetaeva nicknamed her son Murr, after Hoffmann’s Cat Murr.
Bulgakov
writes:
“Customers were looking at the table where Koroviev and Kot Begemot
were sitting, as it was as though accreting delicacies…”
Bulgakov
draws the reader’s attention by intermixing such words as “the two mysterious customers” or “two dressed like some kind of buffoons,” or “dear guests.” He writes:
“Ah, how clever was Archibald Archibaldovich! And how observant!
Archibald Archibaldovich knew about the séance of black magic at the Variety
Theater and about many other happenings; he never missed a single word checkered, not a single word cat. Archibald Archibaldovich knew
right away who his customers were. His phenomenal sense immediately told the
Griboyedov Restaurant chief that his two customers’ dinner would be albeit
plentiful and resplendent, but of short duration to the extreme.
Archibald Archibaldovich’s actions would appear somewhat puzzling
to an observer. He directed himself not to the kitchen to observe the
preparation of fillets [for Koroviev and Begemot], but to the restaurant’s
pantry. He opened it with his key, locked himself inside, removed from
an icebox – carefully, so that he would not smudge his cuff – two weighty balyks,
wrapped them in newspaper, checked making sure that his summer overcoat was
there. And the flair that never failed the former pirate did not let him down
once more…
From the back entrance of the restaurant onto the veranda three men
dashed in tightly stretched belts over their waists, in leggings and with
revolvers in their hands… They immediately opened fire on the veranda, aiming
at the heads of Koroviev and Begemot…”
And
here we have another incontrovertible proof that the restaurant chief Archibald
Archibaldovich is none other than K. D. Balmont.
“Both [visitors] fired upon instantly melted in the air, while a pillar
of fire came out of the primus striking the tent, where there appeared as
though gaping jaws with black edges around and started crawling out in all
directions. [And here it comes!] The fire dashing through [the hole] rose up to the roof of
the Griboyedov House. Folders with papers lying in the window of the second
floor’s editorial office suddenly flared up, after them the curtain caught
fire, and the fire as though someone was fanning it, moved inside the aunt’s
house in pillars.”
N.
S. Gumilev writes that three poetry collections of Balmont stand out, in his
opinion. They are Burning Buildings [sic!],
Let Us Be Like the Sun, and Only Love. “Even
though there are some weak poems there, they will forever remain in the memory
of all who read them.”
And
all these three themes are present in Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita and in the sub-novel Pontius Pilate. Plenty of sun, lots of love from master and
especially from Margarita. As for fires, there are many of them as well. They
start with the burning of the no-good apartment #50, then the burning of the
Griboyedov House. Telling Woland about the shooting there, Koroviev and Begemot
ran off into the boulevard, but the “call of duty” brought them back.
“Ah, you’ve come back, said
Woland. Then of course the building has
burned to the ground.”
Soon
after the demise of the Griboyedov House, comes the burning of the Torgsín
store, which sells foods in short supply to customers with hard currency. And
the last fire takes place in master’s basement. An unforgettable scene!
But
let us return to the culprit of all these fires: the Russian poet K. D.
Balmont:
“Having left the building in advance through a side entrance,
running nowhere and in no hurry at all, like the captain of a burning
ship who must be the last one to abandon it, Archibald Archibaldovich was
standing calmly in his summer overcoat with silk lining, with two balyk logs
under his arm.”
This
is how Bulgakov plays upon the fire at the Griboyedov House, as the building of
the Writers House was burned to the ground. Bulgakov takes away K. D. Balmont’s
poetry collection Burning Buildings,
leaving the poet with just two of his collections: Let Us Be Like The Sun and Only
Love.
But
there is another, more macabre interpretation.
Although
K. D. Balmont left Russia for France before Blok’s death and Gumilev’s
execution, it is impossible to explain the two balyks other than by Bulgakov’s
unusual macabre sense of humor. The reader certainly remembers that Archibald
Archibaldovich was wrapping his balyks in newspaper. This is how the
Russian people learned about the deaths of both poets – Blok and Gumilev – from
the newspapers.
[See
Bulgakov M. A. Feuilletons and Essays. A
New Method of Spreading a Book.]
P.
S. Having written that Archibald Archibaldovich was standing “in his summer overcoat with a silken [sic!] lining,”
Bulgakov is hinting that Professor Bure in the 18th chapter The Hapless Visitors and Archibald
Archibaldovich in the 28th chapter The Last Adventures of Koroviev and Begemot, as well as in the 5th
chapter The Affair at Griboyedov, –
have the same prototype who is K. D. Balmont. As we know, the 18th
chapter closes with the following words:
“At the foot of [Professor Kuzmin’s] bed over the silken quilted
blanket sat the white-moustached Professor Bure, compassionately looking at
Kuzmin…”
Bulgakov
must be applying the word “silk” to K. D. Balmont’s poetry, simultaneously
confusing the researcher, as the “silken quilted blanket” belongs to Professor
Kuzmin, whose prototype is of course Valery Yakovlevich Bryusov.
***
This is the end of the Desperado-Flibustier.
I will return with Bezdomny’s Progress.
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