The Master and Margarita (Vintage Classic Russians Series)

Mikhail Bulgakov

Mar 2010 · Random House

About this ebook

in Bulgakov's allegorical masterpiece of Stalin’s regime the devil is making a personal appearance in Moscow.

He is accompanied by various demons, including a naked girl and a huge black cat. When he leaves, the asylums are full and the forces of law and order are in disarray. Only the Master, a writer and a man devoted to truth, and Margarita, the woman he loves, can resist the devil’s onslaught.

‘Stunning, superb...Bulgakov is one of the greatest Russian writers, perhaps the greatest’ Independent

‘A masterpiece – a classic of twentieth-century fiction’ New York Times

TRANSLATED BY MICHAEL GLENNY, INTRODUCED BY WILL SELF

Ratings and reviews

A magical realism novel with a lot of Russian names that are hard to remember. There are too many characters and any good ideas are lost in the confusion.

Every one else seems to love this, I just couldn't get into it, one random bizarre after another; completely disjointed.

I thoroughly enjoyed Boulgakov's magical story, his exquisite style and sharpness of his satire. The Soviet world has long vanished but this book stays as a timeless gem of world literature.

About the author

Mikhail Bulgakov (1891 - 1940) was born and educated in Kiev where he graduated as a doctor in 1916. He rapidly abandoned medicine to write some of the greatest Russian literature of this century. After a lifetime at odds with the stultifying Soviet regime, he died impoverished and blind in 1940, shortly after completing his masterpiece, The Master and Margarita. None of his major fiction was published during his lifetime.