A 50th-anniversary Deluxe Edition of the incomparable 20th-century masterpiece of satire and fantasy, in a newly revised version of the acclaimed Pevear and Volokhonsky translation Nothing in the whole of literature compares with The Master and Margarita. One spring afternoon, the Devil, trailing fire and chaos in his wake, weaves himself out of the shadows and into Moscow. Mikhail Bulgakov’s … into Moscow. Mikhail Bulgakov’s fantastical, funny, and devastating satire of Soviet life combines two distinct yet interwoven parts, one set in contemporary Moscow, the other in ancient Jerusalem, each brimming with historical, imaginary, frightful, and wonderful characters. Written during the darkest days of Stalin’s reign, and finally published in 1966 and 1967, The Master and Margarita became a literary phenomenon, signaling artistic and spiritual freedom for Russians everywhere.
This newly revised translation, by the award-winning team of Pevear and Volokhonsky, is made from the complete and unabridged Russian text.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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This is one of my favorite books ever. I’ve read it three times. It is a satirical look at the literary world in the Moscow of the 30’s, among many, many other things. The devil. Witches, A magical cat. It has everything.
Think I’ll need to read this book several more times to mine all of the gold!!! What a treasure.
Still thinking about this one. Fascinating look at Russia through the lense of Satan trolling for subjects. Sometimes funny, others haunting, others unsettling.
The book explores responsibility towards truth when authority would deny it and freedom of the spirit in an unfree world among other things
Russian friends always recommend this book. I can’t say I understand all the nuance, but what a tale of madness, the weird, and the overwhelming.
Allegorical and tough to read at times. What’s with the affinity of Russian authors to give a character multiple names –
I read this in the late ‘70s while majoring in Russian. It remains one of my f protect books of all time. The characters are unique and compelling. The storyline is true to the Soviet era. It made me laugh and cry and I have read it numerous times. This translation is different from my battered paperback, but not significantly. Read it! You’ll be glad you did.
My all-time favorite among the Russian classics 🙂
Good, not great. I think one would need more context on who the characters represent in the Russian society of the time.
As with all great Russian novels; this one written during the reign of Stalin, this is a metaphorical play on the surreal nature of life in a totalitarian state and how it warps people’s senses of what’s real and unreal.
A funny, original and entertaining story with some moral and political heft. I had to take notes to keep track of the long- and multi-named Russian characters in the first half of the novel, but the second half is much easier to follow.
This was by far the most challenging book I have ever read. Ever. It was recommended to me by a friend and it is on the list of “100 books you should read before you die”.
This book as a cult following – a serious one. Bulgakov was a famous Russian writer but he died before his book ever got published. He lived in the early 1900’s and died in 1940, but with Russia at war – and what he printed would have put him in jail for sure – it never saw the light of day until the 1960s.
I have never read a Russian novel before and this one was hard. VERY hard. Thank goodness it had a commentary section in the back of the book that broke out some of meanings of the Russian words. That helps a great deal. But it still took me over 2 weeks to read its 335 pages because I could only do one or two chapters a night before I needed to take a break.
If you are looking to challenge yourself this year – I suggest reading The Master and Margarita. The premise of the book is…….all over the place. Really – it is the story of how Satan visits Moscow and how he wreaks havoc on a group of writers who were atheist. They don’t believe in God or Satan, and this doesn’t make Satan very happy.
The Master (whose real name we never learn) is a writer. He doesn’t actually enter the novel himself until about 1/3 of the way through the book. Bulgakov died before the book went to print, and people speculate that he might have called it something else had he lived to see it printed. The Master is writing a story about Pontius Pilate and his crucifixion of Yeshua – who the reader believes is Jesus. But this is never told. This manuscript of the Master is intertwined between the “present” story of these writers in Moscow and what happens to them if they cross Woland (who is Satan – but again, not really said). Margarita is The Master’s love of his life. She is a beautiful woman who leaves her husband to be with the Master and encourage him to write his story of Pontius Pilate.
Is your head spinning yet?
The writer lived in a very tumultuous Russia. The 1930s in the Soviet Union were very unsafe – especially when it came to writing. There is a line in the back of the book that says “All of Bulgakov’s literary energy and creative will were concentrated on proving something that his enviornment contradicted: that manuscripts don’t burn, that art outlasts the tyrants, that entropy doesn’t triumph over the creative spirit.”
I can’t give you much more because this book goes is so many directions that it would be impossible to really give you a feel for it. I do suggest you reading it. I would give it 4 stars, and hope that someday to read it again to see what I missed and to better understand it.
This book , while brilliant, literally made me ill. I had to finish it, but I found it so disturbing, I was relieved when I reached the end. I felt I had escaped from Hell!
Hilarious and cynical — what can be better.
While this was an original idea I found the story pretty weird. Had to really concentrate to keep the characters’ names straight.
This was interesting, but it could have used a good editor, read Goethe’s Faust.
I read this in college and every so many years I return to read it again. A great “magical” book exploring Stalin’s purges.
Truly a classic.
I read this decades ago. My reading it again was greatly enhanced by the footnotes in this edition.
Couldn’t get thru it