The Master and Margarita (Macmillan Collector's Library)

“Please allow me to introduce myselfI'm a man of wealth and tasteI've been around for long, long yearsStole a million men's soul and faithI was around when Jesus ChristHad his moment of doubt and faithMade damn sure that PilateWashed his hands and sealed his fatePleased to meet youHope you guess my nameBut what's puzzling youIs the nature of my game”- Mick Jagger, ‘Sympathy for the Devil’ (1968)************“May I sit down?' the foreigner asked politely. 'Unless I heard wrong, you were pleased to say Jesus never existed?' ‘No, you did not hear wrong, that is precisely what I was saying.' 'Amazing! Forgive me, but as I understand you also do not believe in God? ' 'No, we don't believe in God, but can speak of it freely!’ 'You are atheists? Oh, how lovely!' 'In our country atheism does not surprise anyone. We have ceased believing in fairy tales about God.’ The stranger went on: 'But here is a question that is troubling me: if there is no God, then who governs the order of things?' 'Man governs it himself.' 'Pardon me,' the stranger responded gently, 'but in order to govern, one needs to plan for a certain length of time. Allow me to ask you how can man govern when he cannot even vouch for his own tomorrow?”“Answer, then, do you know a certain Judas from Kiriath, and what precisely did you say to him about Caesar, if you said anything?' 'It was like this.' the prisoner began eagerly. 'The evening before last, near the temple, I met a young man who called himself Judas. He invited me to his place in the Lower City and asked me to give my view of state authority. He was extremely interested in this question.' 'And what did you say?' asked Pilate. 'Among other things, I said that all authority is violence over people, and that a time will come when there will be no authority of the Caesars. Man will pass into the kingdom of truth and justice, where there will be no need for any authority. Then men ran in, bound me, and took me away to prison.’ ‘There never has been, is not, and never will be any authority in this world greater or better for people than the authority of the emperor Tiberius!' Pilate's voice swelled.”“One day I opened a newspaper and saw in it an article by a critic in which he warned to all and sundry that I had attempted to foist into print an apology for Jesus Christ. Two days later appeared another article, in which its author recommended striking hard at ‘Pilatism’ and at the icon dauber who had ventured to foist it into print. I opened a third newspaper. There were two articles in it. I assure you the earlier critiques could be counted as jokes compared to what this was. Suffice it to say one article was entitled "A Militant Old Believer".“The fire roared in the stove. I took the heavy manuscript of the novel from the desk drawer and started burning it. This was hard to do because paper written upon it reluctantly burns. I tore up the notebooks, stuck them vertically between the logs, and ruffled pages with the poker. The novel was stubbornly resisting but nevertheless perishing. Familiar words flashed before me as the yellow climbed steadily up the pages, but the words still showed through. They would vanish only when the paper turned black and I finished them off with the poker.”- Mikhail Bulgakov ‘The Master and Margarita’ (1928 - 1940)************The Devil visits 1930’s Moscow and he meets two literary friends in the park having a conversation about atheism and the non-existence of Christ. He tells them Christ did exist and gives them a detailed account of Pontius Pilate’s moral dilemma as he condemned him to the cross. But how did he know? Because he was there. He then predicts the death of one of them later that night in exact detail. After seeing this happen the Poet becomes mentally disturbed and he tries to follow the Devil. He visits the literary club his dead friend planned to attend that night and is sent to a madhouse.When citizens begin to mysteriously disappear it is difficult to tell if police or the Devil is responsible. He is a Professor of Black Magic, engaged by a resident of an accursed flat for seven performances which the man has no recollection of contracting. He meets the Devil and his retinue of a tall thin man and a black cat big as a hog, who walks on two legs and speaks. The Devil requires more space in shared government apartments and transports tenants to the Black Sea. They frame the flat manager who gets arrested for black market activity. Characters wind up in the same psychiatric hospital.In the madhouse the Poet meets the Master, another patient who describes a love affair with Margarita and psychological descent after his novel about Pontius Pilate was censored by critics, which he burns. The Devil and his entourage perform a seance driving the audience to insanity. Currency hoarders are interrogated to cough up their cash. The seance had rained down ten rouble bills which infect the city with all sorts of mayhem, bureaucrats replaced by empty suits and money transformed into labels. As mass hypnosis reigns, people across the city begin to sing the same song in unison.Originally written in 1928 the manuscript was burned by Bulgakov out of a fear of state repression. He continued to work on it until his death in 1940. A censored version was published in 1966 in the Brezhnev years and a manuscript smuggled to Paris in 1967. It is a brilliant satire of Josef Stalin’s USSR with nighttime disappearances, communal housing and denunciation of neighbors. Bulgakov asked Stalin if he could emigrate to write in freedom but was denied. Churchill said: “It’s a riddle wrapped in a mystery, inside of an enigma” as this masterpiece has remained.

Great quality book, nice presentation to give someone as a gift, but it's really small. Not exactly comfortable to hold while reading. It would have been perfect if it was larger.

The devil visits Stalin’s Russia and finds that evil and chaos already dominates. Bulgakov draws a vision of surreal evil engulfing Russia and implicitly blames Stalinist terror. Stalin is almost certainly the Master and his minions are a scarcely veiled Zhadanov and Beria. What an evil time? It beggars the imagination.

Aside from what these scientists did to the pooch, this was a very creative story. I do believe if Mary Shelley were alive today she would have gotten a hoot out of it. It's not that long so is a good place to start if you haven't read any other works by this author.

As this is my first reading of this book (and I admit that I probably read through it too quickly), I will have to revisit this volume again as there are so many complexities that come to the reader especially towards the end of the novel.I’m not saying this to discourage anyone from reading it (not at all!), but there are many elements and stories tied into other stories and elements that after having finally read this book, I need sufficient time to digest its intricacies.

I love the book small size and quality, but sad that outer paper was damaged in the box, I wish the sender wrapped it.

I had no idea the book would be so small, 6" x 4" and the print size is tiny too, which is too much of nuisance. It is likely a good read, as it was recommended so highly, but the drawbacks outweigh my pleasure.

Beautifully- made book, however only six inches tall!