Wednesday 26 September 2012

Master and Margarita


The Master and Margarita («Ма́стер и Маргари́та») is a 1967 novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, woven around the premise of a visit by the Devil to the fervently atheistic Soviet Union. Many critics consider it to be one of the best novels of the 20th century, and the foremost of Soviet satires, directed against a suffocatingly bureaucratic social order.


 `I  am  a master.'  He grew  stern and  took  from  the pocket  of  his
dressing-gown a completely greasy black cap  with the letter 'M' embroidered on it in yellow silk.  He put this cap on and showed himself to Ivan both in profile and  full face,  to prove that he was a master. `She sewed it for me with her own hands,' he added mysteriously.
(chapter 13)


'She  was  carrying repulsive, alarming  yellow flowers in  her hand. Devil knows  what they're called, but for some reason they're the first to appear in Moscow. And these flowers stood  out clearly against  her black spring coat. She was carrying yellow flowers! Not a nice colour. She turned down a lane from Tverskaya and then looked back. Well, you know Tverskaya! Thousands of people were walking along Tverskaya, but I can assure you that she  saw me alone, and looked not really  alarmed, but even as if in pain. And I was struck not so much by her beauty  as by an extraordinary loneliness  in  her eyes, such as no one had ever seen before! Obeying this yellow  sign, I also turned down the lane and followed  her.  We walked along the crooked, boring lane silently, I  on one side, she  on  the other. And, imagine, there was  not a soul in the lane. 
(chapter 13)

Read the book here (English or Russian)
The info about the book - (c) wikipedia
The pictures are from the TV-film 'Master and Margarita' (2005) by V.Bortko, from the web-site www.kino-teatr.ru and www.kinopoisk.ru