Magic Of The Sorcerer Molière.
Posting #15.
“But you, my poor and
bloodied master!
You did not want to die
anywhere –
either at home or outside
home.”
M. Bulgakov. Molière.
The
end of the 10th chapter Burgognians
Beware: Molière is Coming! resembles master’s scene in the 31st
chapter of Master and Margarita: On
Vorobievy Hills. Bulgakov writes:
“Molière stopped the caravan and stepped out of the wagon to
stretch his legs. He took several steps away from the caravan and started
peering into the city, which, 12 years before, had thrown him out, bankrupt and
shamed. Shreds of memories rushed through his brain. For a moment he was
overtaken by fright and he was drawn backward. He felt like he was old, and he
said, moving his lips in solitude: Turn
back? Yes, I’ll turn back! He turned and walked to the front wagon of the
caravan, and told his front echelon: Well,
move forward!”
And
in the 31st chapter of Master
and Margarita: On Vorobievy Hills. Bulgakov writes:
“Master ejected himself from the saddle, left the horseback group,
and ran to the edge of the hill, his black cloak dragging behind him on the
ground. A poignant sorrow crept into master’s heart, supplanted by sweetish
anxiety, a wandering Gypsy stirring. – Forever!
This has to be thought through! – thought master. He started listening and
accurately recording everything that was going on in his soul. The group of
horsemen were waiting for master in silence. They were watching as the black
long figure on the edge of the precipice was gesticulating, now raising his
head as though trying to cast his glance all across the city in order to look
beyond its limits, now hanging it low as though studying the trampled stunted
grass under his feet.”
Thus,
they are both “masters,” as in the Prologue
to Molière Bulgakov already calls him
“master” on page 12:
“But you, my poor and bloodied master! You did not want to die
anywhere – either at home or outside home.”
In
the novel Master and Margarita,
master combines the features of three Russian poets: Alexander Blok, Andrei
Bely, and Nikolai Gumilev. However, only one of them can be called a “bloodied
master” – Gumilev. His features are predominant in master. And in chapter 32: Forgiveness and Eternal Refuge, on the
last page where Margarita together with master are walking to their “last
refuge,” only Gumilev remains:
“Margarita could not see herself, but she could well see how master
had changed. His hair was shining white now in the moonlight, and at the back
of his head it formed itself into a plait which was flying in the wind… Like
the youth-demon, master was flying without taking his eyes off the moon, but he
smiled at her, like at a good acquaintance and a beloved.”
This
excerpt reveals Bulgakov’s mysticism. Margarita can’t see herself because her
prototype the Russian poetess Marina Tsvetaeva was still alive at the time of
M. Bulgakov’s death.
As
for master, what Bulgakov shows in this passage is the Russian poet N. S.
Gumilev. Master’s plait reveals Gumilev as Grinev, Pushkin’s personage in Captain’s Daughter, living in the time
of the Empress Catherine the Great in the 18th century, as Gumilev
portrays himself in his poem The Tram
That Lost Its Way. Bulgakov made this poem the basis of his novel Master and Margarita, as the “tram”
symbolizes human life.
Also
pointing to N. S. Gumilev is the comparison of master to the youth-demon, as
Gumilev built his life along the lines of M. Yu. Lermontov, whom Bulgakov
portrays as Kot Begemot and next as a youth-demon.
N.
Gumilev came up with a ranking system for poets, where the top rank belongs to
the so-called “warrior-clerk,” the poet-warrior. In his life, Gumilev followed
M. Yu. Lermontov, having signed up as volunteer for military service in the
Russian Army in World War I.
Gumilev
valued Lermontov’s poetry very highly and emulated Lermontov as well in his
personal bravery and fearlessness.
There
are two more things to explain. Why does master like the youth-demon never take
his eyes off the moon?
As
I have already explained elsewhere, Bulgakov takes this from D. S.
Merezhkovsky, poet, mystic, philosopher, who was calling Pushkin the “daytime
luminary” of Russian poetry and Lermontov the “nighttime luminary” in an
eponymous article.
***
In
the invented story of Molière’s trip to Naples, Bulgakov shows N. S. Gumilev’s
trip to Crimea where he allegedly became acquainted with a young man from a
good family, who later slandered him, bringing about Gumilev’s arrest and
execution. This young man wrote poetry, ingratiating himself into Gumilev’s
style and taste. In his memoirs, the Russian poet G. Ivanov describes the
provocateur:
“He was tall and slim, with a merry glance and an open youthful
face. He wrote verses that were not a bad imitation of Gumilev’s.”
In
the 11th chapter of Molière:
Bru-ha-ha, Bulgakov teaches the beginning writer how to read human faces.
In his novel Molière, Bulgakov
describes his dramatis personae without ever getting a slightest glimpse of
them. And how could he? Molière lived in the 17th century!
Having
become interested in theater back in Northern Caucasus, Bulgakov had to possess
an excellent imagination. But a person’s imagination is always based on
something real. In the opening of the 11th chapter, Bulgakov
describes Molière through movements:
“…Running among [the assistants], agitated, now shouting, now
pleading with someone, was a man.”
In
order to describe this man, Bulgakov is using words that could refer to anyone.
The man turns out to be “ugly” and “grimacing.” In the scene he has smudged the
sleeve of his caftan with paint.
Such
a description of Molière is hardly giving the reader anything, but still it is
very-very interesting. Moreover, to make the description even more enigmatic,
Bulgakov writes:
“Because of his agitated state, the man’s hands had become
unpleasantly cold.”
Where
does Bulgakov take all of this from? Does he want the reader to figure out that
Molière is rubbing one hand against the other or is putting both hands
crisscross under his arms? The imagination of the beginning writer is now
running wild…
To
be continued…
***
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