Banned: Satan+cat+USSR (The Master and Margarita)

Satan comes to Moscow with a bigass talking cat by his side? Sold.

But the book featuring this wild tale wasn't published in the 1930s, when it was written. Instead, the author wrote it for the drawer. He probably had dreams that it wouldn't always be hidden in that drawer, that he would see it available to all in the country. But he wrote without that certainty.

And long after his death, the story was published to international acclaim, and Russian censorship. And today, the story still excites and stings, as does the story of how it came into readers' hands.

How did The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov become one of the most scandalous, biting, jaw-droppingly weird books to ever escape repression and become a banned phenomenon? And why does it still hit today?

In this bonus series for paid subscribers of the Rebel Yell Creative newsletter, we look at extra Art of Resistance stories: lesser-known banned books, hidden methods of censorship, the wild world of manifestos, and more powerful ways of using art as resistance. This week: The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, banned in the Soviet Union.

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So first let me admit: I fucking love this book. Not surprising, maybe, since I was pretty much obsessed with the Soviet Union as a kid in the 80s.

In the early aughts, in my master's in literature program, I took an Eastern European lit course, which assigned The Master and Margarita. And I fell in love, choosing to focus on the book in my MA thesis.

And what's not to love? In the book, Satan comes to Moscow in the appearance of a rogue bureaucrat named Woland. He brings with him a human-sized cat, Behemoth, with a penchant for gunplay, along with a retinue of freaky-ass buddies. And Woland and team proceed to fuck with Soviet society under Stalin.

Along the way, we meet Pontius Pilate (yeah, that guy). An author named The Master. And his lover-turned-legit-witch Margarita.

Maybe all these disparate elements shouldn't work as a piece of lit. But the organized chaos of it all is exhilarating. And it's a direct comment on the organized terror and repression in the U.S.S.R. in the 1930s.

Quick Soviet Primer

In the 1930s, when this book was written and set, the Soviet Union was entering its third decade as a country.

Leader Josef Stalin had demanded that the ideas of communism speed up, that the enormous country all simultaneously transform agriculture, rebuild industry, and immediately overturn centuries of feudal practices. The result: chaos, massacres, and disastrous famine that killed millions of Russians.

At the same time, Stalin was consolidating power in Moscow and crushing repression, meaning millions of people disappearing to secret prisons and work camps (called gulags).

And while all this was happening...life in many ways went on. People still went to parties, and fancy dinners. They read books, and watched opera and films. In the midst of terror and purges, people still tried to climb career ladders, earn praise and accolades, get rewards.

Artists were expected to portray ecstatic happiness of Soviet life. Writing was a protected career, one of many providing unionized work for creators. But only if they followed the company line of rah-rah Russia. If they did: praise, accolades, and even funded residencies in summer dachas (kind of like the Hamptons in the U.S.).

If they did not use their art to praise Russia, the artists would not be allowed to write. Or in some cases, they could be arrested, sent to a gulag, and killed.

The Master

Mikhail Bulgakov was one of these career writers. He was previously a physician who served as an army medic during the Russian Revolution. By the 1930s, he was a playwright and storyteller of some renown. His work carefully skated that line of what he was allowed to say and what he wanted to say. Stalin himself liked Bulgakov's plays, a big boon at the time. But also a terrifying reality: Stalin had his eyes on Bulgakov.

So Mikhail Bulgakov played the part. But on the side, he was working on a secret book. He was pouring everything into The Master and Margarita, all the ridiculousness and bureaucracy of modern Soviet life, with the undercurrent of terror, and the reality of people disappearing into black vans in the night. He was also pouring himself: his experiences, fears, his love affairs, his grief at people now gone.

The Book

The Master and Margarita could be read simply as a wild adventure and fantasy novel. Some unfamiliar names and references, sure, but still an excellent read.

But Bulgakov was also infusing symbols, hints, and outright satire to make the characters tell another story. If Russians had been allowed to read it at the time, they would have read all the seemingly silly and passive aggressive lines and actions by Woland and his crew as direct critiques of Soviet corruption. They would have understood that the whole subplot of the Pontius Pilate book was unspeakably rebellious, as religion was banned. They would have spotted the unspoken signs noting The Master as a gulag survivor.

So Bulgakov knew the book could get him killed. He started work on it around 1928, but, perhaps in despair, perhaps in a protective move, he burned the first draft in 1930.

But he started again, compelled. He wrote all through the 1930s, and read a near-final version to his friends in 1939. All of whom started silent and in horror, knowing nothing like it could ever be published.

He died from kidney disease in 1940, at just 49 years old. The book remained in the drawer.

Manuscripts don't burn

In 1966, with Stalin long dead, the country was experiencing The Thaw, a brief time of relaxed rules around what could be published. Elena, Bulgakov's widow, allowed a heavily-censored and shortened version of the book to be published in the Moscow Review.

But at the same time, the full manuscript of the book was smuggled out of the Soviet Union to Paris. The first book edition was published in French. An Italian publisher then released the first Russian language edition in 1967.

But since neither editions were available inside Russia, samizdat took over. The underground writing network, consisting of hand-typed and -passed writings, printed and distributed copies throughout the Soviet Union.

Since then, the book has been published in Russia, and all around the world. It gets banned again and again, burned again. And it always rises.

[BTW: Did you hear The Art of Resistance episode on Samizdat?]

The book today

Around 2010, I was working at an ad agency in Chicago. Two of my co-workers and friends grew up in the Soviet Union, one in Uzbekistan and another in Lithuania. Both told me that The Master and Margarita was now revered by Russian expats.

And since, I've only seen the popularity grow. Fan art and tattoos are everywhere on the internet. My own love for the book grows after 25-some years.

Maybe this exchange in the book shows one reason why. As the novel grows close to a close, Woland is deep in conversation with The Master. The writer reveals that, just like Bulgakov himself, he had burned his book, the one that would send him back to the camps. But Woland pulls out the manuscript, magically untouched by fire. Then he says:

MANUSCRIPTS DON'T BURN.

And if that isn't a fuck-you to banners of books everywhere, I don't know what is.

How to read

So let's say you're ready to read this gem. Some tips:

• Use the footnotes / endnotes. They're going to clue you in to some of the specifics of Soviet Russia that are being mocked or defied. I recommend my edition for this purpose.

  
  

• Understand patronyms. Characters in the book call each other by their first and middle names a lot. In Russia the middle name is actually a version of the father's name (cus yay patriarchy). Example: Dimitry has two kids. His son, Mikhail, will have a middle/patronymic name of Dmitrievich. His daughter, Anna, will have Dmitrievna as the patronym. And it's common to use both names together.

Enjoy!

This bonus series is just one of your benefits as a paid subscriber of the Rebel Yell Creative newsletter and/or Art Lab member. Look for another story next week!