The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov is included on The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read list, it is also part of the Le Monde’s 100 Books of The Century, and it is 38th on The Greatest Books of All Time site – hundreds of works from there are reviewed on my blog, I am plugging the best gig there: https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/02/is-this-unique-could-it-make-money.html

 

The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov is included on The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read list, it is also part of the Le Monde’s 100 Books of The Century, and it is 38th on The Greatest Books of All Time site – hundreds of works from there are reviewed on my blog, I am plugging the best gig there: https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/02/is-this-unique-could-it-make-money.html

 

 

10 out of 10

 

Mikhail Bulgakov was born in Kyiv – which used to be called Kiev, indeed, on the pages dedicated to the author and the book, you still get the passe, now compromised Russian name, which we need to reject, the least we can do to expose Putin’s war – so the question is, shall we celebrate him as Ukrainian or Russian?

 

The glorious author was censored in the Soviet Union, like so many other luminaries, and indeed, The Master and Margarita exposes communist, Soviet failures, corruption, stupid laws – such as the ban on hard currency, which was nevertheless so coveted, as I know from personal experience – idiotic officials, a failed system altogether

The surrealist aspects make me think that this was also prophetic, or/and realistic, because if we are tempted to say ‘come on, a black cat doing all that, and then Satan walking through Moscow, under the guise of Professor Woland’ then we just take a look at what is happening now in the world, the once great America and say

 

-          Well, Orange Woland has taken over the free world

 

Yes, many will be turned off by such parallels or worse, even saying that this ‘very stable genius’ is Beelzebub himself – but what am I saying, many? There may be not a single person reaching so far, ergo, I can go on in the same vein – yet I say that the cult of MAGA has selected The Chosen, only he comes from the other place

Horror is mixed with comedy in The Master and Margarita, just like in this real world, where you have Orange Woland launch attacks on allies, planning to invade Greenland, Canada, Gaza, Panama and who knows what else, and then setting economies on fire, with tariffs on all, including the island with no people…

 

-          Only penguins, called McDonald something

 

At the start of The Master and Margarita Satan predicts that Berlioz – the names are splendid here, Azazello, Behemoth – will die, his head will be cut off by a woman, oil being spilled, and what do you know, presto, a tram car does severe the head of the chairman and later, the head is stolen from the corpse

Furthermore, a telegram is sent ‘I have been run over by a tram car. Funeral Friday’ and the uncle receiving this, a smart man we are told, presumes that the nephew must be in a bad way, but how could he be sure of the burial on Friday – the following is another satire, the incrimination of the housing problem under communism

 

Then we have Yeshua Ha-Notsri, Pontus Pilates and the story of Jesus, modified but still close to the one we know from the bible, evidence of the complexity of this magnum opus, another cause for the censors to keep this off the shelves, where it stayed for such a long time – I wonder what Putin makes of it, he will claim Bulgakov though

Margarita is perhaps the most overwhelming character, she becomes a witch, for a short time, plays the insanity, or sinful game, getting some vengeance or closure, accepting a Faustian pact in order to save her lover, The Master

The latter is an alter ego of Mikhail Bulgakov, he suffers because of critics and censorship, ending up in a mental hospital, but ‘ love conquers all’, with the help of Woland, maybe The Master and Margarita will be together

 

Now for my standard closing of the note with a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this https://realinibarzoi.blogspot.com/2025/02/is-this-unique-could-it-make-money.html   – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se

 

 There is also the small matter of working for AT&T – this huge company asked me to be its Representative for Romania and Bulgaria, on the Calling Card side, which meant sailing into the Black Sea wo meet the US Navy ships, travelling to Sofia, a lot of activity, using my mother’s two bedrooms flat as office and warehouse, all for the grand total of $250, raised after a lot of persuasion to the staggering $400…with retirement ahead, there are no benefits, nothing…it is a longer story, but if you can help get the mastodont to pay some dues, or have an idea how it can happen, let me know

 

As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/realini-in-newsweek-participant-in.html

 

Some favorite quotes from To The Hermitage and other works

 

‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’

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