Essays. An essay on the topic Gogolian traditions in Mikhail Bulgakov’s novel “The Master and Margarita” What traditions of Gogol continues Bulgakov

See the end of the test for the correct answers to the questions.

Test based on the novel by M.A. Bulgakov "The Master and Margarita"

11th grade

1. In what year was the novel “The Master and Margarita” written:

1) in 1930 2) in 1939 3) in 1940

2. How many years did Bulgakov work on the novel “The Master and Margarita”?

1. 8 years 10 years 12 years

3. In the novel, fiction is a means of satire. In Chapter 17, the committee chairman's suit independently signs resolutions. Whose traditions does Bulgakov continue here?

1. Gogol 2) Saltykov-Shchedrin 3) Dostoevsky

4. How would you define the composition of the work?

1. ring composition
2. "a novel within a novel"
3. consistent plot composition, i.e. chronological sequence followed

5. It is known that literary scholars find three main worlds in the novel. Find the fourth odd one.

1. ancient Irshelaim
2. eternal otherworldly
3. fantastic
4. modern Moscow

6. Which of the heroes knows that the winner is always alone, that he has only enemies and envious people, he has no equal, there is no person with whom he would like to talk, he is called a ferocious monster, and he even boasts about this, because the world is ruled by law strength?

1. Pontius Pilate 2) Woland 3) Berlioz 4) Koroviev

7. During the interrogation of Yeshua, Pontius Pilate discovers that his mind no longer obeys him. He asks the accused a question that does not need to be asked in court. What kind of question is this?

1. What is power? 2) What is life? 3) What is truth? 4) What is talent?

8. What vice does Woland consider the most serious?

1. lie 2) cowardice 3) betrayal 4) adultery

9. Who owns the words “Manuscripts do not burn”?

1. Margarita 2) Master 3) Yeshua 4) Woland

10. In the novel there are double heroes (the Master - Yeshua, Aloysius - Judas, Ivan - Levi Matvey) and even double objects (a thunderstorm in Moscow and Yershalaim, a jazz orchestra in Griboedov and at Woland’s ball). Does Margarita have doubles?

1. Yes 2) No

11. Which of the characters is characterized as follows: “Looks about forty-odd years old. The mouth is kind of crooked. Shaven clean. Brunette. The right eye is black, the left one is green for some reason. The eyebrows are black, but one is higher than the other”?

1. Woland 2) Berlioz 3) Stravinsky 4) Azazello

12. In whom did the Master see his follower? Which of the novel's heroes was imbued with the same philosophical ideas and moral categories as himself?

1. Styopa Likhodeev 2) Ivan Bezdomny 3) Rimsky

13. Which character is described as follows: “Convulsions passed over his face every now and then. Fear and rage swam and darted in his eyes. The narrator was pointing his hand somewhere towards the moon, which had long since left the balcony?

1. Yeshua Ha-Nozri
2. Doctor Stravinsky
3. Levi Matvey
4. Master

14. Which of the characters is described like this: “Some kind of either sick or not sick, but strange, pale, overgrown with a beard, in a black cap and some kind of robe, was going downstairs with unsteady steps”?

1. Pontius Pilate
2. Ivan Bezdomny
3. Master
4. Roman

15. Which character owns the words: “And the Christians, without inventing anything new, created their own Jesus in the same way, who in fact was never alive”?

1. Koroviev
2. Berlioz
3. Margarita
4. Pontius Pilate

16. Which character owns the words: “Keep in mind that Jesus existed... He just existed and nothing more... And no proof is required”?

1. Natasha
2. Woland
3. Ivan Bezdomny
4. Annushka

17. About whom did Matthew Levi say: “He did not deserve light, he deserved peace”?

1. about Pontius Pilate
2. about Berlioz
3. about the Master
4. about Ivan Bezdomny

18. Why is Yeshua presented in the novel as a tramp?

1. this matches the biblical story
2. the author seeks to contrast the character of Yeshua with the biblical image
3. the author emphasizes the hero’s internal freedom, opposed to the hierarchical world
4. the author seeks to show Yeshua as a poor man

19. Give detailed answers to the questions:

What realities is the literary world of Moscow built from? How was the real atmosphere of Bulgakov’s ideological persecution, the atmosphere of life in Moscow in the twenties and thirties reflected in the novel “The Master and Margarita”?

Answers:

M. A. Bulgakov is a talented Russian writer who worked at the beginning of the 20th century. In his work, such a trend in Russian literature as “the fight against the devil” stood out. In this sense, M. A. Bulgakov is, as it were, a continuator of the traditions of N. V. Gogol in the depiction of the devil and hell - his habitat. The author himself said about the novel “The Master and Margarita”: “I am writing a novel about the devil.” Gogol’s traditions were most clearly manifested in this work of the writer.

For example, in Gogol’s “Dead Souls,” the outskirts of the city of N appear before us as hell - with its incomprehensible season, with its small devils, but the devil himself is not openly represented. In Bulgakov's novel, the devil is visible in action, and the specific city of Moscow becomes his temporary habitat. “Moscow was giving off the heat accumulated in the asphalt, and it was clear that the night would not bring relief.” Well, isn't this hellish hell! The day turned out to be unusually hot, and on that day Woland appeared, he seemed to bring this heat with him.

Bulgakov also has such an important point as the description of the moon in the sky. The heroes constantly look at the moon, and it seems to push them to some thoughts and actions. Ivanushka stopped writing poetry, the master, looking at the moon, became worried. She is present in the novel, like a pagan goddess. And at the same time, the moon is a circle, and Gogol’s circle is a symbol of eternity, immutability, and closedness of what is happening. Perhaps Bulgakov, with the help of this detail, wanted to show that in Moscow “all the same things that already existed in ancient times are concentrated? The same people, characters, actions, virtues and vices?

Or remember the scene of Satan's ball. This is clearly a bunch of devils. Although no, not really devils - more like “dead souls”. Complete people, not even people anymore - non-humans, evil spirits, dead people. Bulgakov, as it were, continued Gogol: those dead souls that Chichikov collected in order to “resurrect” are collected and revived here. For Bulgakov, the main condition for the revival and resurrection of the soul is faith. Woland says to Berlioz’s head: “There is one among them (theories), according to which everyone will be given according to their faith.” After which Berlioz fades into oblivion. After his death, he will never go to Woland’s ball, although he sinned enough to then be a guest at this terrible celebration, and he was killed through his machinations. Here is the method of resurrecting the soul that Woland proposes: everyone will be given according to their faith. And this method turns out to be the most effective of all proposed by both Gogol and Bulgakov.

There is another point of global similarity here - the game of chess by Woland and Behemoth is reminiscent of the game of checkers by Nozdryov and Chichikov. Hippopotamus also cheats. His king, by winking, “finally understood what they wanted from him, suddenly pulled off his robe, threw it on the square and ran away from the board.” But by doing so, Behemoth, unlike Nozdryov, admits his defeat. This game can be seen as a symbolic duel between good and evil, but evil wins because of the “betrayal” of Behemoth. This is a hidden allusion to the betrayal of Pilate and the crucifixion of Yeshua. But evil does not reign supreme in the world, and the silvery lunar road symbolizes the eternity of good.

M. A. Bulgakov is a talented Russian writer who worked at the beginning of the 20th century. In his work, such a trend in Russian literature as “the fight against the devil” stood out. In this sense, M. A. Bulgakov is, as it were, a continuator of the traditions of N. V. Gogol in the depiction of the devil and hell - his habitat. The author himself said about the novel “The Master and Margarita”: “I am writing a novel about the devil.” Gogol’s traditions were most clearly manifested in this work of the writer. For example, in Gogol’s “Dead Souls,” the outskirts of the city of N appear before us as hell - with its incomprehensible season, with its small devils, but the devil himself is not openly represented. In Bulgakov's novel, the devil is visible in action, and the specific city of Moscow becomes his temporary habitat. “Moscow was giving off the heat accumulated in the asphalt, and it was clear that the night would not bring relief.” Well, isn't this hellish hell! The day turned out to be unusually hot, and on that day Woland appeared, he seemed to bring this heat with him. Bulgakov also has such an important point as the description of the moon in the sky. The heroes constantly look at the moon, and it seems to push them to some thoughts and actions. Ivanushka stopped writing poetry, the master, looking at the moon, became worried. She is present in the novel, like a pagan goddess. And at the same time, the moon is a circle, and Gogol’s circle is a symbol of eternity, immutability, and closedness of what is happening. Perhaps Bulgakov, with the help of this detail, wanted to show that in Moscow “all the same things that already existed in ancient times are concentrated? The same people, characters, actions, virtues and vices? Or remember the scene of Satan's ball. This is clearly a bunch of devils. Although no, not really devils - more like “dead souls”. Complete people, not even people anymore - non-humans, evil spirits, dead people. Bulgakov, as it were, continued Gogol: those dead souls that Chichikov collected in order to “resurrect” are collected and revived here. For Bulgakov, the main condition for the revival and resurrection of the soul is faith. Woland says to Berlioz’s head: “There is one among them (theories), according to which everyone will be given according to their faith.” After which Berlioz fades into oblivion. After his death, he will never go to Woland’s ball, although he sinned enough to then be a guest at this terrible celebration, and he was killed through his machinations. Here is the method of resurrecting the soul that Woland proposes: everyone will be given according to their faith. And this method turns out to be the most effective of all proposed by both Gogol and Bulgakov. There is another point of global similarity here - the game of chess by Woland and Behemoth is reminiscent of the game of checkers by Nozdryov and Chichikov. Hippopotamus also cheats. His king, by winking, “finally understood what they wanted from him, suddenly pulled off his robe, threw it on the square and ran away from the board.” But by doing so, Behemoth, unlike Nozdryov, admits his defeat. This game can be seen as a symbolic duel between good and evil, but evil wins because of the “betrayal” of Behemoth. This is a hidden allusion to the betrayal of Pilate and the crucifixion of Yeshua. But evil does not reign supreme in the world, and the silvery lunar road symbolizes the eternity of good. Here, in brief, are perhaps the main parallels that can be drawn between “Dead Souls” by N.V. Gogol and Bulgakov’s novel “The Master and Margarita,” created much later, but having the same power of influence on the reader as the great creation of the Russian genius XIX century.

1) M. Bulgakov - student of Pushkin and Gogol.

When reading the novel "The Master and Margarita", one is struck by its striking similarity with the traditions of such great writers as Pushkin and Gogol. This parallel can be traced in many aspects of Bulgakov's work. An example would be burning part of one's creations. The only difference is that Pushkin was forced to burn his diary and the tenth chapter of Onegin, due to possible accusations of unreliability and the desire to hide the names of his Decembrist friends from a hostile gaze. Bulgakov and Gogol burned their manuscripts because of dissatisfaction with themselves, because of the discrepancy between the plan and the implementation. However, Bulgakov, in the end, follows Pushkin and restores, redoing, the text of the novel about the devil. The repetition of the Latin proverb “Manuscripts do not burn” was suffered through the author of the novel. A repetition of Gogol's behavior was impossible not only because historical circumstances had changed, but also because Bulgakov was in many ways not like Gogol. The satire that Bulgakov valued was not as pathetic and solemn as Gogol’s. Pushkin's grace of irony captivates Bulgakov more than Gogol's caustic sarcasm. A striking example of “graceful irony” can be “The Master and Margarita” and “The Heart of a Dog,” where the author, with his characteristic irony, describes the people around him.

In Pushkin, Bulgakov felt an artist and a person close to himself in his worldview and passions in art. The writer connected his fight with Soviet society with the name of Pushkin. Bulgakov is closer to Pushkin’s position of accepting life, rather than Gogol’s repulsion from it.

But one cannot assume that Mikhail Afanasyevich was closer to Pushkin than to Gogol. “My teacher is Gogol,” Bulgakov declared more than once. In a letter to V. Veresaev dated August 2, 1933, Bulgakov says: “...sat for two nights over your Gogol. God! What a figure! What a personality!” The commitment to Gogol was so great that at the moment of mental crisis, when Bulgakov, hounded by bans on printing and performing his works on stage, wrote a letter to Stalin in 1931, asking for permission to travel abroad, the writer tried to repeat the model of behavior of his famous predecessor: “... knew only that “that I was not going at all to enjoy foreign lands, but rather to endure it, as if I had a presentiment that I would only learn the value of Russia outside Russia and gain love for it far from it.” These words sound like a sincere attempt to repeat Gogol’s path.

Bulgakov depicts the world of Moscow as immobility, incapacity for tragic oncoming movements. This static nature of the Moscow circle pushed Bulgakov towards Gogol’s style. Creating a film script based on “Dead Souls,” Bulgakov constantly dynamizes and expands the scope of Gogol’s narrative, realizing that cinema is a world of events. The consciousness of Muscovites is focused only on familiar circumstances and comically tries to attach the “fantastic” to the “real”. Likhodeev’s transfer to Yalta amazes his colleagues: “It’s funny to talk!” Rimsky shouted shrilly. “Whether he talked or didn’t talk, he can’t be in Yalta now! This is funny!”

He’s drunk... - said Varenukha.

Who's drunk? - asked Rimsky, and again both stared at each other.

The Gogolian style in this dialogue is obvious, and it is necessary, since Bulgakov describes a motionless world that absorbs nothing except known circumstances: “During the twenty-five years of his activity in the theater, Varenukha saw all sorts of scenes, but then he felt that his mind was being clouded, as it were. a veil, and he was unable to utter anything except the everyday and completely absurd phrase: “This cannot be!” How reminiscent this is of Korobochka’s reaction to Chichikov’s proposals! The Gogolian style is inevitably present in the Moscow chapters of The Master and Margarita, since the system of repetitions of some situations in the biblical chapters creates a diminishing effect. (for example, in the 18th chapter, the pumping up of mystery with sounds without explaining their source, as in the scene with Levi.) The suffering of Styopa Likhodeev in the 7th chapter “Bad Apartment” is somewhat reminiscent of the headache of Pontius Pilate, but in their description it is not spirituality that appears, and animality.

The vanity and self-interest of a society of beggars in the 9th chapter of “Koroviev’s Jokes” are described completely in Gogolian tones. The petty alogism of Berlioz’s “claims to the living space of the deceased” is reminiscent of scenes from “The Government Inspector” and “Dead Souls”:

“And within two hours, Nikanor Ivanovich accepted thirty-two such statements. They contained pleas, threats, slander, denunciations, promises to carry out repairs at his own expense, indications of unbearable overcrowding and the impossibility of living in the same apartment with the bandits. Among other things was a description of the theft of dumplings, placed directly in a jacket pocket, in apartment 31, stunning in its artistic power, two promises to commit suicide and one confession of a secret pregnancy." The pompous compliment characteristic of Gogol's style to obviously insignificant things helps Bulgakov to ridicule the world of ordinary people. Reminiscences of Gogol's style appear constantly in the Moscow chapters. In the 17th chapter, “Restless Day,” accountant Vasily Stepanovich Lastochkin is forced to deal with the consequences of the “damned session” and, under the pressure of a queue of thousands, is no less confused than Manilov was before Chichikov.

In the Moscow chapters, the action takes on an incoherent, feverish, noisy pace of buffoonery, as happens in “The Inspector General” and the city chapters of “Dead Souls.” Where there is no inner life of a person, the boiling of vanity becomes chaotic. The grasping instinct of the philistinism, the materialism of the Moscow public, in the literal sense of the word, were exposed by M. Bulgakov with the help of Gogol’s technique of reducing hyperbole. The entire scene in the Variety Show is a reduced variation of Mephistopheles’ aria from Charles Gounod’s opera “Faust” (“Satan rules the show there, people die for metal…”). And just as Gogol in “Dead Souls” slightly distorts Pushkin’s style (variations on the themes of “Gypsies” and Tatyana’s letter in a stranger’s note addressed to Chichikov), so Bulgakov, instead of Gounod’s poetic bacchanalia, gives a disgusting fever of vulgarity.

The eccentricity of Bulgakov's satire prompts us to remember that the Gogol tradition came to him through Saltykov-Shchedrin and Chekhov. This is especially noticeable in chapter 17, where Moscow is fascinated by the scandal and strives for it, like any eventless life. After the tragic requiem of the 16th chapter, this fussy allegro is especially comical. The drama of what is happening in Moscow is not perceived as a disaster, just as we calmly laugh at Chekhov’s “Death of an Official.” Before us are not people, but wind-up dolls who can only perform the part assigned to them, but are not able to navigate events, to be aware of them. The eccentricity of empty frock coats is directly reminiscent of Gogol and Shchedrin: “Behind a huge desk with a massive inkwell sat an empty suit and, with a dry pen not dipped in ink, was moving across the paper. The suit had a tie, a pen was sticking out of the suit pocket, but there was no body above the collar , no head, nor any hands peeking out from the cuffs. The suit was immersed in work and was completely unaware of the chaos that reigned all around.”

The phantasmagoria of replacing a person with a thing is characteristic of Gogol ("The Nose", "The Overcoat"), and is used by Bulgakov to emphasize the illogicality of Moscow life. Puppetry and inhumanity are noticeable in such characters as Sempleyarov, Maigel, as well as in many others.

P.S. Popov, friend of Bulgakov, In a letter to E.S. Bulgakova on December 27, 1940 noted: “Modern aesthetics (Bergson and others) say that the main spring of laughter is that comic feeling that is caused by automatic movement instead of organic, living, human, hence Hoffmann’s penchant for automata. And here is the laughter of M. A above everything automatic and therefore absurd - in the center of many scenes of the novel... The ideology of the novel is sad, and you cannot hide it... And it thickened the darkness, in some places it not only veiled, but dotted all the i's. In this regard, it can be compared with ". Demons of Dostoevsky. Contemporaries saw in Bulgakov's novel primarily an evil parody of Soviet society and emphasized primarily the influence of Griboyedov, Gogol and Dostoevsky on Bulgakov. There are many faces in Bulgakov's novel, the specific prototypes of which are recognizable. Of course, with all the character of such persons as Berlioz or Bengalsky, a type emerges in each of them. However, the eternal types (Yeshua, Pilate, Woland), breaking the shackles of time, carry the influence of Pushkin. The Gogolian tradition is certainly present in The Master and Margarita and is reflected in the werewolf motif. Suffice it to recall Behemoth or the transformation of the “bottom tenant” Nikolai Ivanovich into a hog. Bulgakov is really close to Gogol in his assessment of paganism (in Pushkin it is presented in the aura of poetry). In the novel, communist Moscow is presented as a step back from Christianity, a return to the cult of things and demons, spirits and ghosts. Bulgakov, who wrote in the feuilleton “The Adventures of Chichikov” about the revival of Gogol’s heroes in the post-revolutionary environment, completely agrees with N.A. Berdyaev, who in the article “Spirits of the Russian Revolution” (1918) recalled “The Inspector General” and “Dead Souls”: “In most of the appropriations of the revolution there is something Nozdrevsky. The mask replaces the personality. Everywhere there are masks and doubles, grimaces and shreds of a person. Lying of existence is ruled by the revolution. Everything is ghostly, all parties are ghostly, all the heroes of the revolution are ghostly. Nowhere can one find a solid being, nowhere can one see a clear human face. This ghostliness, this neo-ontology was born from falsity. "

Chichikov still travels around Russian soil and trades in dead souls. But he does not drive slowly in a carriage, rushes on courier trains and sends telegrams everywhere. The same element acts at a new pace. The revolutionary Chichikovs buy and resell non-existent wealth, they operate with fictions, not realities, they turn the entire economic life of Russia into fiction. But for all Bulgakov’s dislike for post-revolutionary Moscow, in his novel the extremes of vices (from gluttony to betrayal) acquire a fantastic flavor, in contrast to Gogol, who cared about their realistic portrayal, and from Dostoevsky, who considered them ineradicable. These vices are presented as a distortion of the human being, and not the basis of life. And therefore, not melancholy, not despair, but laughter crushing evil - the result of Bulgakov’s picture of Moscow in no way confirms Ha-Notsri’s assertion that there are no evil people in the world. Characters from Moscow life are, as it were, outside of good and evil, there is no place in them for an ethical assessment of themselves and life, and therefore disgust and laughter are the reader’s reaction given by the author. But Bulgakov’s world of Moscow is not absolutely mechanistic and dead, as in “Dead Souls,” where the picture of the provincial city was confirmed by “The Tale of Captain Kopeikin.”

Collisions of incompatibility between the extraordinary and the everyday lead to the split personality of Ivan Bezdomny, his confusion and illness. Events and previous ideas about life are not consolidated in his mind; and therefore he is better off in the house of sorrow than in open life. Here you can hear your inner voice, here Ivan rises from the bustle to a sense of the essence of life, which is a sacrament. "...That the matter here is unclean is clear even to a child. He is an extraordinary and mysterious person one hundred percent. But this is the most interesting thing! The man was personally acquainted with Pontius Pilate, what do you need even more interesting? And instead of , in order to raise a stupid fuss against the Patriarchs, wouldn’t it be smarter to politely ask about what happened next with Pilate and this arrested Ga-Nozri? And God knows what I was doing!” The author's irony of the hero no longer hides the drama of what is happening and is reminiscent of Gogol's "Notes of a Madman" and Hermann's madness in "The Queen of Spades", to which Gogol in his story gave an interpretation reduced to farce, but not excluding tragedy.

Ivan Nikolaevich, unlike all other Muscovites, invariably returns to the source of change in his soul, and on the spring full moon he dreams of the execution of Yeshua, and Ha-Notsri with the forgiven Pilate, and the beautiful Margarita, and his teacher “fearfully looking around with a beard” , master. And the lunar flood makes this “silent and usually calm man” happy. Here one can already hear Pushkin's belief that shocks are not without a trace, That a person reaches out to the high light. Of course, the writer of the twentieth century is more skeptical than the bright genius of Russia, but Bulgakov continues Pushkin’s path of faith in man.

2) Woland’s stay in Moscow.

The division between Pushkin's and Gogol's style of writing also affected Woland and his retinue. The demonic power and significance of the “messer” are noble, the actions of his henchmen are disgusting and permeated with the voluptuousness of sadism that is inherent in the Muscovites themselves. The hippopotamus enthusiastically tears off the head of Georges of Bengal, and then puts it back in its original place, as happens with the head of Socrates in Apuleius' Metamorphoses. But in a vulgar world, ancient stories become comedy.

bulgakov pushkin gogol master

The satirical boils up around Woland. For three days (the action of the novel fits into just three days), Woland and his retinue appear in Moscow - and everyday life is cut into the fury of satire. And now, rapidly, as in the whirlwind of Dante’s Hell, strings of satirical characters rush by - writers from MASSOLIT, the administration of the Variety Theater, experts from the housing association, theater figure Arkady Appolonovich Sempleyarov, the genius of house squabbles Annushka, the boring “lower tenant” Nikolai Ivanovich and others.

The satirical diverges in circles around Woland. It turns into a phantasmagoria of a black magic session. He goes on a rampage in Nikanor Ivanovich’s “dream,” which was granted to Nikanor at parting by the restless Koroviev. In the intersecting layers of fantastic satire of this “dream”, not one iota real and at the same time real to the last grain, mockingly, ironically, deafeningly sarcastic, everything is the very embodiment of the metaphor of “seats for currency”; and the heartfelt speeches of the blue-eyed “artist” that the money the country needs should be kept in the State Bank, and “not at all in my aunt’s cellar, where, in particular, they can be spoiled by rats”; and figures of money-grubbers who never want to part with their goods; and the stunned Nikanor, on whom all this phantasmagoria has fallen and who has no currency (but really, really not?).

An essentially feuilletonous, but phantasmagorically resolved image of an institution singing in a choir appears, the head of which, a feigner in terms of social work, invited ... Koroviev as the leader of the choral circle. And the generalized image of a “suit” that occupied Bulgakov for a long time and, apparently, conceived by him following the example of the “organ man” Saltykov-Shchedrin, perfectly signs papers instead of the Chairman of the Entertainment Commission Prokhor Petrovich, who is usually in this suit.

What is drawn into the satirical circle is something that Woland does not touch or almost does not touch. Ironic fantasy illuminates the restaurant ruler Archibald Archibaldovich, who suddenly appears before everyone as an eternal filibuster from a pirate ship. The poet Ryukhin becomes numb with impotent envy of Pushkin, realizing his grave mediocrity.

Woland's retinue exaggerates the real vices of people and drives them to aggressive bitterness. Of course, Woland's assistants are smarter and more insightful than Muscovites. But the vulgarity of their motives makes them similar. This is a fantastic Gogolian evil spirit, sinister and caricatured at the same time. Gella, especially in the scene of the attack on the financial director Rimsky, resembles Gogol's drowned women. Pushkin's devils in "The Tale of the Priest and His Worker Balda" are closer to the folklore irony over demons and crafty losers from the gang of devils in the 21st canto of Dante's "Inferno." Woland, on the other hand, is more like the philosophical Mephistopheles of Pushkin’s “Scenes from Faust,” looking skeptically at all the actions and feelings of man. Maestro Woland in the 12th chapter “Black Magic and Its Exposure” begins a leisurely conversation on stage; this dialogue with Fagot-Koroviev does not captivate the audience and frightens Bengalsky: “Tell me, dear Fagot, what do you think, because the Moscow population has changed significantly ?. the townspeople have changed a lot... outwardly, I say, like the city itself, however. There’s nothing to say about the costumes, but these... what’s their name... trams, cars have appeared...” This reflection in the old style has a hidden polemical character, which is revealed as sarcastic. pause before the word "externally". The Soviet government insisted on the changes that supposedly happened to people after the revolution. Therefore, Bengalsky, frightened by Woland’s discrepancy with the official point of view, hastens to give a translation: “The foreign artist expresses his admiration for Moscow, which has grown technically, as well as for the Muscovites.” Woland is alien to any admiration, as well as indignation: “Did I express admiration?” the magician asked Fagot...” The maestro’s arrogance does not allow him to communicate directly with Bengalsky, he addresses him only through his retinue, who finds power for the lackeys and for the public suitable language that Woland does not want to get dirty with: “Congratulations, citizen, you lied!” or: “This tapericha deck, dear citizens, is in the seventh row of citizen Parchevsky.”

Woland's "heavy bass" persistently repeats "a much more important question: have these citizens changed internally?" Everything that happened next clearly demonstrates the validity of Woland’s skepticism. This is the general line of behavior of Mephistopheles in Pushkin’s “Scene from Faust.” And the condescension of the prince of darkness is born from the awareness of the insignificance of “small powers”: “Well, they are people like people. They love money, but that has always been the case... Well, they are frivolous... well... and mercy sometimes knocks on their hearts... ordinary people... In general, they resemble the previous ones... the housing problem only spoiled them..." Woland looks at the world from eternity, noticing the fragmentation of humanity due to the everyday difficulties of the Soviet period, as M. Zoshchenko did in the Blue Book. In the novel, Woland is presented in four main episodes: Moscow (dispute at the Patriarch's Ponds, performance at the Variety Show) and universal (Satan's Ball, Eternal Shelter). Each subsequent event expands the reader's understanding of Woland's capabilities and power. Rejecting the portrait of the devil liquefied in the first editions of the novel, Bulgakov leads the reader to an ever higher idea of ​​him. Woland is many-sided and mysterious, unfussy and wise, fair and even noble in his aversion to vulgarity and generous to the sufferers. With all the power of Woland, Bulgakov gives him concrete human traits, just like Yeshua. Woland is deceived by his henchmen, his leg hurts inappropriately before the ball, he is tired of the bacchanalia of the victims of vice at the ball. Woland's omniscience, manifested in guessing the most secret thoughts and knowledge of all events revealed by the magic globe, does not save him from purely human difficulties. Bulgakov, following Pushkin, does not make the geniuses of good and evil supermundane, abstracted from life. Woland's stay in Moscow reveals evil, makes it obvious and turns the arrogant and self-confident inhabitants into puppets, which are controlled by his retinue, mockingly. Woland punishes evil. Satan's Ball is reminiscent of "A Feast During the Plague" not only because Margarita wants to lose herself in the clouds of demonic spells. Both Pushkin and Bulgakov have a duel between life and death, vice and holiness.

Let's see how this confrontation between Pushkin and Gogol's assessments of the natural essence of man develops in the novel "The Master and Margarita".

The epigraph from Goethe’s “Faust” seems to refer only to Woland, but, in essence, speaks of the irresistibility of good: “... so who are you, finally? - I am part of that force that always wants evil and always does good.

The separation of intentions and behavior in Bulgakov’s novel is quite consistent with the idea of ​​Pushkin’s “Belkin’s Tales”, where a person turns out to be above his intentions, dreams, prejudices, traditions of the environment, and his own self-esteem.

The novel begins with a dispute between Ivan Bezdomny and Berlioz about Jesus, whom the proletarian poet wrote, although in “black colors,” but “... completely alive, having once existed.” Berlioz insists that Jesus is a fiction, an “ordinary myth.” This is a debate about the dimensions of life. What is the world based on: goodness, faith, miracles or ordinary sober calculation? What is life: a high mystery or an elementary primitive, the unknown or the vulgarly repetitive? This is a dispute between God and the devil. In Pushkin’s “Scene from Faust,” Mephistopheles takes away from a person all hope for the significance of at least some aspect of his life, and gives birth in Faust to an impulse of boundless evil and a command to the devil: “Drown everything!” According to Pushkin, a person is not able to live without recognizing the lofty principles of existence. In Bulgakov, Woland turns out to be a defender of eternal principles, demonstrating the presence of secrets in the world. And therefore Bulgakov gives to this hero the “fiery eyes” of Pugachev and Pushkin himself. Woland appears as a participant and even a resolver of a dispute between two Muscovites from the literary world. It would seem, what should the devil do in a country where they don’t believe in God? But the “spirit of denial, the spirit of doubt” is called upon to refute human errors and punish them. Woland has a low opinion of people. A person, in his conviction, cannot control not only the world, but also his own destiny: “... how can a person control if he is not only deprived of the opportunity to draw up any plan for at least a ridiculously short period of time, well, years, say, a thousand, but can’t even vouch for his own tomorrow?” A person is mortal and does not know “where... fate will send death,” he instantly turns to dust, just like his plans. “An unpleasant story about sarcoma and a tram” is immediately illustrated by the death of Berlioz. This is a phantasmagoria in the spirit of Gogol and Dostoevsky.

Woland tells the story of Pilate and Yeshua. He, and not the Moscow inhabitants, was given the talent for this, given omniscience, not only psychological, but also historical, which seems to Berlioz madness. For Muscovites, life is a kingdom of prosaic dimensions; for them there are no higher principles, no God, no devil. And this evokes a mocking remark from Woland, in which the material poverty of Soviet life and the spiritual limitations of people are connected: “What do you have, no matter what you miss, you have nothing!” However, ironizing the Muscovites, Woland is divided: he has a thirst for limitlessness and no faith. The disharmony of these principles is similar to madness and dooms Woland to loneliness: “His friends decided to look into his eyes properly and were convinced that his left one, green, was completely insane, and his right one was empty, black and dead.” Different eyes are a duel between the color of life and the color of death, calling Woland to cleanse the world of filth and despise life for the inexhaustible abundance of evil and people’s pliability to it.

The insignificance of Moscow inhabitants and their consumer appetite deprive them of the feeling of the world as a mystery, a miracle. Lack of faith, according to Bulgakov, leads people to ossification. Perhaps this is why Woland’s retinue in Moscow appropriates the animal form discarded on the farewell flight (Chapter 32). However, Woland, who exposes and punishes evil, does not believe in the good nature of man. Is he right?