The Master and Margarita is this month’s Reading group choice. It was nominated by commenter Saorsa and seconded by several others, one of whom called it “one of the best novels ever written”.
Certainly, it’s a book that has stood the test of time. In fact, as luck has it, this year marks the 50th anniversary of the first attempt to bring it to publication, following a tortuous gestation.
Mikhail Bulgakov started writing The Master and Margarita around 1928 and it quickly became his chief obsession. But he burned his first draft in 1930, thinking he had no future as a writer living in Stalinist Russia. This was a reasonable assumption, for a well-known public figure who refused to toe the party line and had even privately admitted: “My sympathies were entirely on the side of the Whites, whose retreat filled me with horror and incomprehension.”
Miraculously, Uncle Joe seems to have liked the irreverent author and spared him. It was an inherited kidney disease that took Bulgakov when he was only 49, in 1940. By this time he had almost finished his masterpiece. Indeed he was making plans to get it published as soon as he could; a terrifying prospect to his friends and family, given the book’s vigorous lampooning of the Soviet Union. It wasn’t until 1966 that his widow released a version of The Master and Margarita - and even then it was heavily censored. But more complete versions soon started circulating in samizdat editions - and in the west Michael Glenny’s spritely translation hit the shelves by 1967.
Since then, it’s gone from strength to strength, remaining hugely popular in Russia and influencing all kinds of writers and public figures in the west.
I’m a fan, too - although it’s 15 years since I read it. I’m looking forward to getting reacquainted with that cigar-chomping cat and oddly dressed devil. I’ll be reading Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky’s Penguin translation, alongside Michael Glenny’s 1967 classic (which is currently available from Vintage). I hope you’ll join me.
To further that aim, we’ve got five copies of the book to give away to the first five readers in the UK to post “I want a copy please”, along with a nice, constructive comment in the comments section below. If you’re lucky enough to be one of the first to comment, email Laura Kemp with your address (laura.kemp@theguardian.com). Be nice to her, too. And as usual, all suggestions and ideas for future discussions will be gratefully received!
