"However," Koroviev continued to chatter, "I knew people who had no idea not only about the fifth dimension, but who had no idea about anything at all, and nevertheless performed the most perfect miracles ..."

M.A. Bulgakov, "The Master and Margarita"

Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov is an artist who left a rich literary heritage in almost all genres: he began with a feuilleton, story, sketch, created a cycle of original plays and stage performances that had audience success, wrote novels, librettos, deep and brilliant novels - “White Guard ”,“ The Life of Monsieur de Moliere ”,“ Notes of a Dead Man ”and“ The Master and Margarita ”are the pinnacle of his creativity. This last work of the writer, his "sunset novel", completes the significant topic for Bulgakov - the artist and power, this is a novel of difficult and sad thoughts about life, where philosophy and science fiction, mysticism and heartfelt lyrics, soft humor and well-aimed deep satire are combined.
The history of the creation and publication of this most famous novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, one of the most outstanding works in contemporary Russian and world literature, is complex and dramatic. This final work, as it were, summarizes the writer's ideas about the meaning of life, about man, about his mortality and immortality, about the struggle between good and evil principles in history and in the moral world of man. The foregoing helps to understand Bulgakov's own assessment of his offspring. “When he was dying, he spoke,” recalled his widow, Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova: “Maybe this is right ... What could I write after the Master? ..”

The creative history of “The Master and Margarita” in the most general terms boils down to the following. Bulgakov attributed the idea of ​​the novel and the beginning of work on it to 1928, however, according to other sources, it is obvious that the idea of ​​writing a book about the adventures of the devil in Moscow came to him several years earlier, in the early to mid-1920s.

The first chapters were written in the spring of 1929. On May 8 of this year Bulgakov handed over to the Nedra publishing house for publication in the almanac of the same name a fragment of the future novel - its separate independent chapter called Furibunda's Mania, which in Latin means “violent insanity, rage mania”. This chapter, from which only fragments not destroyed by the author have come down to us, in content approximately corresponded to the fifth chapter of the printed text "It was in Griboyedov." In 1929, the main parts of the text of the first edition of the novel were created (and, possibly, its finalized draft version of the appearance and tricks of the devil in Moscow).

M. Bulgakov wrote a novel, which he read in a certain society, where he was told that they would not let him pass in this form, since he is extremely harsh with attacks, then he altered it and thought to publish it, and in the initial edition to put it into society as a manuscript and this is simultaneously with the publication in a truncated censorship form ”. Probably, in the winter of 1928-29, only individual chapters of the novel were written, which were distinguished by an even greater political acuteness than the surviving fragments of the earlier edition. Perhaps, given to "Nedra" and not fully extant, "Furibunda Mania" was already a softened version of the original text. Also plausible is Bulgakov's intention to put the manuscript into free circulation on the rights of “samizdat”: after all, there were already circulating among the interested public lists of “Cabal of saints”, “Heart of a Dog”, the story “Fatal Eggs” with another version of the ending unpublished in the collection “Subsoil”. In this first edition of the novel, there were at least 15 chapters, of which 10 had titles, occupying about 160 pages of handwritten text in a thick school-format notebook (this is how the handwritten editions of the novel survived).
In the first edition, the author went through several versions of the titles of his work: “Black Magician”, “Engineer's Hoof”, “Woland's Tour”, “Son of Doom”, “Juggler with a Hoof”, but he did not stop at any of them. This first edition of the novel was destroyed by Bulgakov on March 18, 1930, after receiving news of the ban on the play "Cabal of the Sanctified". The writer reported this in a letter to the government on March 28, 1930: “And personally, I, with my own hands, threw into the stove a draft of the novel about the devil ...” compositional juxtaposition of the two novels in the novel ("antique" and "modern"), which is the genre feature of "The Master and Margarita".

Actually, the “novel about Pontius Pilate”, written by the hero of this book, the master, does not exist; “Simply” the “strange foreigner” tells Vladimir Mironovich Berlioz and Antosha (Ivanushka) Bezrodny about Yeshua Ha-Notsri at the Patriarch's Ponds, and all the “New Testament” material is presented in one chapter (“The Gospel of Woland”) in the form of a live conversation of the “foreigner” and his listeners. There are no future main characters - the master and Margarita. So far, this is a novel about the devil, and in the interpretation of the image of the devil, Bulgakov is at first more traditional than in the final text: his Woland (or Faland) still acts in the classical role of a tempter and provocateur (he, for example, teaches Ivanushka to trample the image of Christ), but the writer’s “super task” is already clear: both Satan and Christ are necessary for the author of the novel as representatives of absolute (albeit “multipolar”) truth opposed to the moral relativism of the world of Berlioz, Mogarych, Latunsky, Lavrovich ... For Bulgakov not only denies, but also affirms.
Work on the novel resumed in 1931. The idea of ​​the work significantly changes and deepens - Margarita appears and her companion - the Poet, who will later be called the master and will take the central place. But so far this place still belongs to Woland, and the novel itself is planned to be called: "The Consultant with a Hoof." Bulgakov is working on one of the last chapters ("Woland's Flight") and in the upper right corner of the sheet with sketches of this chapter writes: “Help, Lord, to finish the novel. 1931 ". This edition, the second in a row, was continued by Bulgakov in the fall of 1932 in Leningrad, where the writer arrived without a single draft - not only the idea, but also the text of this work was so thought out and endured by that time. Almost a year later, on August 2, 1933, he informed the writer V.V. Veresaev about the resumption of work on the novel: “A demon has possessed me ... Already in Leningrad and now here, suffocating in my little rooms, I began to smudge page after page of my newly destroyed novel three years ago. What for? Do not know. I am amuse myself! Let it fall into oblivion! However, I will probably give it up soon. " However, Bulgakov no longer abandoned The Master and Margarita, and with interruptions caused by the need to write custom-made plays, staging, scripts and librettos, continued his work on the novel almost until the end of his life.

By November 1933, 500 pages of handwritten text had been written, divided into 37 chapters. The genre is defined by the author himself as a “fantasy novel” - so it is written at the top of the sheet with a list of possible titles: “The Great Chancellor. Satan. Here I am. Feather hat. Black theologian. Alien horseshoe. He appeared. Coming. Black magician. Consultant's Hoof (Consultant with a Hoof) ”, but Bulgakov did not stop at any of them. All these variants of the title still seem to indicate Woland as the main person. However, Woland is already significantly squeezed by a new hero, who becomes the author of the novel about Yeshua Ha-Nozri, and this inner novel is split in two, and between the chapters that form it (Chapters 11 and 16), the love and misadventures of the "Poet" (or "Faust" , as it is named in one of the drafts) and Margarita. By the end of 1934, this revision was roughly finished. By this time, the word “master” had already been used three times in the last chapters in an appeal to the “Poet” by Woland, Azazello and Koroviev (who had already received permanent names). In the next two years, Bulgakov made numerous additions and compositional changes to the manuscript, including, finally, crossing the lines of the master and Ivan Bezdomny. In July 1936, the last and final chapter of the novel, The Last Flight, was created, in which the fate of the master, Margaret, and Pontius Pilate was determined.
The third edition of the novel was started in late 1936 - early 1937. In the first, unfinished version of this edition, brought to the fifth chapter and occupying 60 pages, Bulgakov, in contrast to the second edition, moved the story of Pilate and Yeshua again to the beginning of the novel, composing a single second chapter called "The Golden Spear". In 1937, the second, also incomplete version of this edition was written, brought to the thirteenth chapter (299 pages). It is dated 1928-1937 and is entitled "Prince of Darkness". Finally, the third and only completed version of the third edition of the novel was written between November 1937 and the spring of 1938. This edition takes 6 thick notebooks; the text is divided into thirty chapters. In the second and third versions of this edition, the scenes from Yershalaim were introduced into the novel in exactly the same way as in the published text, and in the third version the well-known and final title “The Master and Margarita” appeared.
From the end of May to 24 June 1938, this edition was retyped on a typewriter under the dictation of the author, who often changed the text along the way. Bulgakov's editing of this typewriting began on September 19, with individual chapters being rewritten. The epilogue was written on May 14, 1939, immediately in the form that we know.

At the same time, a scene was written about the appearance of Matthew Levi to Woland with a decision on the fate of the master. When Bulgakov fell mortally ill, his wife Elena Sergeevna continued editing under the dictation of her husband, while this correction was partly entered into typescript, partly in a separate notebook. On January 15, 1940, E. S. Bulgakova wrote in her diary: “Misha, how much strength is enough, the novel rules, I am rewriting,” and the episodes with Professor Kuzmin and the miraculous movement of Styopa Likhodeev to Yalta were recorded (before that the director of the Variety was Garasei Pedulaev , and Woland sent him to Vladikavkaz). Editing was stopped on February 13, 1940, less than four weeks before Bulgakov's death, on the phrase: “So this is, therefore, the writers are following the coffin?”, In the middle of the nineteenth chapter of the novel ...
The last thoughts and words of the dying writer were directed to this work, which contained his entire creative life: “When at the end of his illness he almost lost his speech, sometimes only the ends and beginnings of words came out,” E. S. Bulgakova recalled. - There was a case when I sat next to him, as always, on a pillow on the floor, near the head of his bed, he made me understand that he needed something, that he wanted something from me. I offered him medicine, drink - lemon juice, but I realized clearly that this was not the point. Then I guessed and asked: "Your things?" He nodded with a look that was both "yes" and "no." I said: "Master and Margarita?" He, terribly delighted, made a sign with his head that "yes, it is." And he squeezed out two words: “To know, to know ...” But it was very difficult then to fulfill this dying will of Bulgakov - to print and convey to people, readers the novel he wrote.
One of Bulgakov's closest friends and the first biographer of Bulgakov, PS Popov (1892-1964), having reread the novel after the death of its author, wrote to Elena Sergeevna: “Ingenious skill always remains ingenious skill, but now the novel is unacceptable. It will take 50-100 years ... "Now, he believed," the less they know about the novel, the better. " Fortunately, the author of these lines was mistaken in the timing, but in the next 20 years after Bulgakov's death, we do not find in the literature any mention of the existence of this work in the writer's legacy, although Elena Sergeevna from 1946 to 1966 made six attempts to break through the censorship and print the novel ...
Only in the first edition of Bulgakov's book "The Life of M. de Moliere" (1962) VA Kaverin managed to break the conspiracy of silence and mention the existence of the novel "The Master and Margarita" in the manuscript. Kaverin firmly stated that “an inexplicable indifference to the work of Mikhail Bulgakov, sometimes inspiring a deceptive hope that there are many like him and that, therefore, his absence from our literature does not constitute a big trouble, this is harmful indifference ...” Four years later, the magazine “ Moscow ”(No. 11 for 1966 and No. 1 for 1967) published the novel in an abridged version with numerous censorship cuts and edits that distort the meaning of the text in comparison with the final, fourth and first posthumous editions of the novel presented by E. Bulgakova. The magazine version of the book with censorship omissions and distortions and abbreviations made at the initiative of the leadership of the editorial office of “Moscow” (E.S. Bulgakov was forced to agree to all this, just to keep the word given to the dying author, to publish this work), was thus , the fifth edition, which was published abroad as a separate book.

The answer to this publisher's arbitrariness was the appearance in “samizdat” of the typewritten text of all the places published or distorted in the journal publication, with a precise indication of where the missing should be inserted or the distorted one should be replaced. Elena Sergeevna herself and her friends were the author of this "bills" edition. Such a text, which constituted one of the versions of the fourth (1940-1941) edition of the novel, was published in 1969 in Frankfurt am Main by the Posev publishing house. Sections removed or “edited” in a journal publication were in italics in the 1969 edition. What was this censoring and voluntaristic “editing” of the novel? What goals did it pursue? This is quite clear now. 159 bills were made: 21 in the 1st part and 138 - in the 2nd; In total, more than 14,000 words were removed (12% of the text!). Bulgakov's text was grossly distorted, phrases from different pages were arbitrarily combined, sometimes completely meaningless sentences arose. The reasons related to the literary and ideological canons that existed at that time are obvious: most of all, the places that describe the actions of the Roman secret police and the work of “one of the Moscow institutions”, the similarities between the ancient and modern worlds, were seized. Further, the “inadequate” reaction of “Soviet people” to our reality and some of their very unattractive features were weakened. The role and moral strength of Yeshua was weakened in the spirit of vulgar anti-religious propaganda. Finally, the "censor" in many cases displayed a kind of "chastity": some persistent references to the nudity of Margarita, Natasha and other women at the ball at Woland's were removed, a naked fat man, a keeper of a brothel in Strasbourg and an enterprising Moscow dressmaker was removed, the witch's rudeness of Margarita was weakened and etc.

When preparing a complete uncensored domestic edition, published in 1973, the revision of the early 1940s was restored with its subsequent textual revision by A. A. Saakyants, editor of the Khudozhestvennaya Literatura publishing house (where the novel was published). Published after the death of E.S.Bulgakova (in 1970), this actually sixth edition of the novel was permanently fixed as canonical by numerous reprints, and in this capacity was introduced into the literary turnover of 1970-1980. Finally, for the Kiev edition of 1989 and for the Moscow collected works of 1989-1990, the seventh and last edition of the text of the novel was made with a new reconciliation of all the surviving author's materials, made by the literary critic L.M. Yanovskaya. At the same time, however, it should be remembered that, as in many other cases in the history of literature, when there is no definitive author's text, the novel remains open to clarifications and new readings. And such a case with "The Master and Margarita" is almost classic in its way: Bulgakov died while working on the finishing of the text of the novel, he was unable to fulfill his own textual task on this work. Therefore, there were obvious traces of the novel's flaws even in its plot part (Woland limps and does not limp; Berlioz is called either the chairman or the secretary of Massolit; the white bandage with a strap on Yeshua's head is unexpectedly replaced by a turban; Margarita and Natasha's “pre-Witch status” disappear somewhere; Aloisy appears without explanation; he and Varenukha fly out first from the bedroom window, and then from the stairwell window; Gella is absent in the “last flight”, although he leaves the “bad apartment”, etc., and this cannot be explained as “on purpose conceived ”), some stylistic errors are also noticeable. So the story of the publication of the novel did not end there, especially since all of its early editions were published.

Illustrations

By the way, about the Rushevs. Nikolai Konstantinovich Rushev was an artist and the father of the brilliant girl Nadia. Nadia, who inherited the ability to draw from her father, made completely unique series of drawings for various works of art. When the filing of that very "Moscow" with the novel fell into her hands, the girl literally became obsessed with the book and began a new series of drawings illustrating "The Master and Margarita". For a year she made more than 160 compositions ... But the novel, they say, is damned ... “Once at the exhibition, an old artist approached me and Nadia, wishing to remain anonymous. He said that he knew the widow of Mikhail Bulgakov, Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova, that Nadya needed to get to know her in order to continue her successfully started work, because she also kept all the bills (cut pieces - author's note) issued at the first publication. ” (NK Rushev "The Last Year of Hope") Such an exemplary artist, don't you think? Nikolai Rushev met with Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova, but without Nadia. On March 6, 1969, a completely healthy 16-year-old girl suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. Doctors could not save. When my father brought the drawings to Elena Sergeevna, an amazing thing became clear: the portrait of Margarita, made by Nadya, conveyed a complete resemblance to the writer's wife, who was the prototype of Margarita. Of course, Nadia never saw either Elena Sergeevna or her photographs.

Screen adaptations

In our country, the full version of the novel in print has not yet been released, but in Poland they have already made a film adaptation. Andrzej Wajda was the first to strike at The Master and Margarita, having released the film Pilate and Others in 1971. They took it off without much tragedy, was released, all tip-top. And the only oddity is that this film was never shown in Russia.

In 1972, the Italian-Yugoslav version of The Master and Margarita was filmed. Directed by Alexander Petrovich. In 1988, another Pole, Maczek Voytyszko, created an eight-part television film based on the novel. And in no case were there any mystical circumstances that hindered the filming, budgets did not disappear without a trace, the only copies did not evaporate, and the showing of films was not prohibited. True, in the 80s, Roman Polanski in Hollywood took on the adaptation of the novel, and the project was shut down, but for quite earthly reasons - the project seemed simply unprofitable to the producers.

Our directors turned out solid mysticism. They also remembered that Woland could not stand electricity, and I even read from someone a version that Bulgakov did not like cinema, and therefore, it means that we cannot do anything with film adaptations ...

Igor Talankin, Elem Klimov, Eldar Ryazanov and a number of other talented directors dreamed of making a film based on the novel, and none of them managed to make their dream come true.

Vladimir Naumov wanted to film "The Master and Margarita" together with his friend Alexander Alov. Naumov was familiar with the widow of the writer Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova since the time of work on "Run". She worked as a literary consultant on the set, and she gave Naumov the full version of the novel to read. When he started working on the film, Elena Sergeevna had already died. And one night Naumov had a dream that the bell rang at the front door. The director went to the door and looked through the peephole. "I look: Elena Sergeevna in a fur coat." He opened the door, invited the guest to come in. She only said: “I’m just for a minute - Mikhail Afanasevich is waiting downstairs. I wanted to inform you, Volodya, that there will be no film. " The dream turned out to be prophetic.

Ryazanov was simply forbidden to make a film from above. No explanation. He was never able to get to the bottom of the truth, who exactly forbade and why.

In 1991, the original script based on the novel was written by Elem Klimov (co-authored with his brother German Klimov) and, being the chairman of the Union of Cinematographers, received the right to shoot. The newspapers already wrote about the future picture. But it was never removed, because there were no technologies, they required a lot of money to develop them, which he never found.

But Yuri Kara found them somewhere. About $ 15 million was spent on his project. And it is with this film that most of the mysteries are connected. The picture was filmed in 1994, but never appeared on the screens. The director himself recalled that during the filming there were so many obstacles, as if the novel resisted with all his might. “We made expensive decorations of ancient Jerusalem at the beginning of autumn in Sudak,” Kara recalled. - But as soon as we were about to start shooting, it snowed. The shooting had to be canceled, and the scenery had to be redone. " When the film was finally shot, a conflict broke out between the director and the producer, which ended in court proceedings. Then the film with the film disappeared, and the person to whom it was transferred for storage suddenly died. Then it seemed that they found the film and came to a compromise with the producer, but suddenly Bulgakov's relatives appeared and banned the release of the picture ... obstacles.

Vladimir Bortko shot the film on the second try. The first was undertaken in 2000, but the project was canceled. Starting work on the film for the second time, Bortko banned all talk about mysticism on the set. Although he admitted that he once met a strange gentleman at the Patriarch's, who casually said: "You won't succeed." However, it worked out. Not a masterpiece, of course, but now we're not talking about the artistic value of the paintings. The film was shot and even shown on television!

Here is a selection of facts from the Internet about mysticism on set:

People's Artist of Russia Oleg Basilashvili lost his voice on the set of The Master and Margarita. Doctors diagnosed him with ligament hemorrhage. Colleagues of the artist in the St. Petersburg theater BDT unanimously claim that on the eve of the ill-fated filming Oleg Valerianovich felt great. He rehearsed in the performance "The Quartet" and in a good mood was preparing to work on "The Master and Margarita", where he played the Satan of Woland. Problems with his voice began already on the set, when Basilashvili pronounced the famous Bulgakov phrases with his inimitable bass. His throat seemed to have a spasm, the actor began to wheeze and lost consciousness for a few seconds. The next day, having appeared at the theater, Basilashvili practically could not speak. The urgently called doctor prescribed him complete rest and absolute silence for at least a month.

Alexander Kalyagin, who was preparing to play Berlioz, had two heart attacks in a row.

Viktor Avilov played in the Woland Theater with two pectoral crosses. But at the same time, on tour in Germany, his heart stopped twice. The young, energetic actor died of cancer.

The artist Valery Ivakin, who replaced Avilov in the play, had a heart attack at the second performance.

Alexander Abdulov, who played Fagot, sadly states: "For the fifth time I am playing Koroviev with the fifth director, but none of these films have seen the light yet."

Nda .. And even if the fate of Alexander Abdulov somehow painfully echoes the words of Woland about lung sarcoma, but here is an excerpt from an interview with Abdulov:

Have you seen the film adaptations of Yuri Kara and Andrzej Wajda, which never reached a wide audience? Are they worth the conversations that arise around them year after year?

Saw. Not worth it. It is not interesting. Vaida, in my opinion, simply did not understand Bulgakov. I have no right to dispute the great director, but it was not his business. And not Kara's business. His picture was helped by my friend producer. The film is under his covers, and he does not show it to anyone. He tried to remount it, offered to do it to great directors - everyone refused, even for a lot of money.

That is, there is no mysticism in the fact that Kara's picture did not come out, no?

The mystery begins when your brother starts discussing this picture. This is where the Sabbath begins, the ball of Satan. You can invent all the mysticism. When we filmed, there was no devilry.

Quotes from the work "The Master and Margarita":

Yes, man is mortal, but that would be half the trouble. The bad news is that he is sometimes suddenly mortal, that's the trick! (Woland)

Brick will never fall on anyone's head for no reason. (Woland)

It is easy and pleasant to tell the truth. (Yeshua Ha-Nozri)

People are like people. They love money, but it has always been ... Humanity loves money, no matter what it is made of, whether it is leather, paper, bronze or gold. Well, they are frivolous ... well, well ... ordinary people ... in general, they resemble the old ones ... the housing issue only spoiled them ... (Woland)
Congratulations, citizen, you have lied! (Bassoon)

Have mercy ... would I allow myself to pour a lady of vodka? This is pure alcohol! (cat Behemoth)
The most interesting thing about this lie is that it is a lie from the first to the last word. (Woland)

... never ask for anything! Never and nothing, and especially with those who are stronger than you. They themselves will offer and they themselves will give everything! (Woland)

(Woland - Behemoth: Get out.) I haven't had coffee yet, how can I leave? (cat Behemoth)

Manuscripts don't burn. (Woland)

It's good to hear that you are being so polite with your cat. For some reason they usually say “you” to cats, although not a single cat has ever drunk broodershaft with anyone. (cat Behemoth)

There is no document, no person. (Koroviev)

Maestro! Cut your march! (Cat)

Ask them to leave me a witch! .. I will not go for an engineer or a technician! (Natasha)
Festive midnight is sometimes pleasant to delay. (Woland)

... he wasn't verbose this time. The only thing he said was that among human vices, he considers cowardice to be one of the most important. (Afranius, about Yeshua)

I'm not naughty, I'm not bothering anyone, I'm fixing a primus. (cat Behemoth)

Well, the one who loves must share the fate of the one he loves. (Woland)

There is only one freshness - the first, it is also the last. And if the sturgeon is of the second freshness, it means that it is rotten! (Woland)

In a white cloak with a bloody lining, a shuffling cavalry gait, in the early morning of the fourteenth of the spring month of Nisan, the procurator of Judea, Pontius Pilate, entered the covered colonnade between the two wings of the palace of Herod the Great. (Author)

Each will be rewarded according to his faith. (Woland)

History will judge us. (cat Behemoth)

Housekeepers know everything - it is a mistake to think that they are blind. (cat Behemoth)

I will be a silent hallucination. (cat Behemoth)

After all, you think how you can be dead. (Azazello).

He did not deserve light, he deserved peace. (Levi about the Master).

Why chase in the footsteps of what is already over. (Woland).

Love jumped out in front of us, like a murderer jumps out of the ground in an alley, and hit both of us at once! this is how lightning strikes, this is how a Finnish knife strikes! (Master).

Yes, I give up, - said the cat, - but I give up solely because I cannot play in an atmosphere of persecution by envious people! (cat Behemoth)

The time will come when there will be no authority of either the Caesars or any other authority. A person will pass into the kingdom of truth and justice, where no power will be needed at all.

All power is violence against people.

The cat turned out to be not only a solvent, but also a disciplined beast. at the very first shout from the conductor he stopped the offensive, got off the bandwagon and sat down at a stop, rubbing his mustache with a dime. But only the conductor pulled the rope and the tram started, the cat acted like anyone who is expelled from the tram, but who still needs to go. Having passed all three carriages, the cat jumped on the back arc of the last one, grabbed some gut protruding from the wall with its paw, and drove off, thus saving a dime.

Understood! - Ivan said resolutely, - please give me paper and a pen.
“Give me paper and a short pencil,” Stravinsky ordered the fat woman, and to Ivan he said: “But today I advise you not to write.
“No, no, today, certainly today,” Ivan cried alarmedly.
- OK then. Just don't strain your brain. It will not come out today, it will come out tomorrow ... And remember that here we will help you in every possible way, and without this you will not succeed. Do you hear? .. They help you here ... can you hear me? .. They help you here ... they help you here ... You will get relief. It's quiet here, everything is calm ... You will be helped here ...

You know, I hate noise, fuss, violence and all kinds of things like that. Especially I hate human cry, be it a cry of suffering, rage, or some other cry.

Love jumped out in front of us, like a murderer jumps out of the ground in an alley, and hit both of us at once!
This is how lightning strikes, this is how a Finnish knife strikes!

No no no! Not a word more! In no case and never! I won't put anything in your mouth in your buffet! I, most respectable, passed your counter yesterday and still can not forget either sturgeon or feta cheese. My precious! Cheese is never green, someone deceived you. She's supposed to be white. Yes, tea? After all, this is slop! I saw with my own eyes how some unkempt girl poured raw water from a bucket into your huge samovar, while tea continued to be poured. No, my dear, that's impossible!
Second freshness is what nonsense! There is only one freshness - the first, it is also the last. And if the sturgeon is of the second freshness, it means that it is rotten!

Something unkind lurks in men who avoid wine, games, the company of lovely women, table conversation. Such people are either seriously ill, or secretly hate others. However, exceptions are possible. Among the people who sat down with me at the banquet table, sometimes amazing scoundrels came across!

... the darkness that came from the Mediterranean covered the city hated by the procurator. The suspension bridges connecting the temple with the terrible Anthony tower disappeared, an abyss fell from the sky and flooded the winged gods over the hippodrome, the Hasmonean palace with loopholes, bazaars, caravanserais, lanes, ponds ... Yershalaim disappeared - a great city, as if it did not exist in the world ...

Trousers are not supposed to be for a cat, Messire, - answered the cat with great dignity, - won't you order me to put on a boot too? Puss in boots is only in fairy tales, Messire. But have you ever seen someone without a tie at a ball? I do not intend to find myself in a comic position and risk being pushed in the neck!

I honestly don't like the latest radio news. They are always reported by some girls, indistinctly pronouncing the names of places. besides, every third of them is tongue-tied, as if they were being picked up on purpose.

What to chop wood, - said the talkative cat, - I would like to serve as a conductor on a tram, and there is nothing worse than this work in the world.

I am in admiration, - Koroviev sang monotonously, - we are in admiration, the queen is in admiration.
“The Queen is in admiration,” Azazello abhorred behind his back.
“I'm delighted,” the cat cried.

Never ask for anything, Never ask for anything, and especially from those who are stronger than you. They themselves will offer and they themselves will give everything!

I hereby certify that the bearer of this, Nikolai Ivanovich, spent the aforementioned night at a ball with Satan, being drawn there as a means of transportation ... put a parenthesis, Hella! Write "hog" in parentheses. Signature - Behemoth.
- And the number? - Nikolai Ivanovich squeaked.
“We don’t put numbers, with the number the paper will become invalid,” the cat responded, flicked the paper, got a seal from somewhere, breathed on it according to all the rules, stamped the word “sealed” on the paper and handed the paper to Nikolai Ivanovich.

Listen to the soundless, - said Margarita to the master, and the sand rustled under her bare feet, - listen and enjoy what you were not given in life - silence. Look, ahead of you is your eternal home, which you were given as a reward. I can already see the Venetian window and the climbing grapes, it rises to the very roof. This is your home, your eternal home. I know that in the evening those whom you love, whom you are interested in and who will not disturb you will come to you. They will play for you, they will sing to you, you will see what kind of light is in the room when the candles are burning. You will fall asleep, putting on your greasy and eternal cap, you will fall asleep with a smile on your lips. Sleep will strengthen you, you will begin to reason wisely. And you won't be able to drive me away. I will take care of your sleep….

"However," Koroviev continued to chatter, "I knew people who had no idea not only about the fifth dimension, but who had no idea about anything at all, and nevertheless performed the most perfect miracles ..."

M.A. Bulgakov, "The Master and Margarita"

Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov is an artist who left a rich literary heritage in almost all genres: he began with a feuilleton, story, sketch, created a cycle of original plays and stage performances that had audience success, wrote novels, librettos, deep and brilliant novels - “White Guard ”,“ The Life of Monsieur de Moliere ”,“ Notes of a Dead Man ”and“ The Master and Margarita ”are the pinnacle of his creativity. This last work of the writer, his "sunset novel", completes the significant for Bulgakov theme - the artist and power, this is a novel of difficult and sad thoughts about life, where philosophy and science fiction, mysticism and soulful lyrics, soft humor and well-aimed deep satire.

The history of the creation and publication of this most famous novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, one of the most outstanding works in contemporary Russian and world literature, is complex and dramatic. This final work, as it were, summarizes the writer's ideas about the meaning of life, about man, about his mortality and immortality, about the struggle between good and evil principles in history and in the moral world of man. The foregoing helps to understand Bulgakov's own assessment of his offspring. “When he was dying, he spoke,” recalled his widow, Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova: “Maybe this is right ... What could I write after the Master? ..”

How the Master and Margarita novel was created (11 photos)

The creative history of “The Master and Margarita” in the most general terms boils down to the following. Bulgakov attributed the idea of ​​the novel and the beginning of work on it to 1928, however, according to other sources, it is obvious that the idea of ​​writing a book about the adventures of the devil in Moscow came to him several years earlier. early-middle 1920s.

The first chapters were written in the spring of 1929. On May 8 of this year Bulgakov handed over to the Nedra publishing house for publication in the almanac of the same name a fragment of the future novel - its separate independent chapter called Furibunda's Mania, which in Latin means “violent insanity, rage mania”. This chapter, from which only fragments not destroyed by the author have come down to us, in content approximately corresponded to the fifth chapter of the printed text "It was in Griboyedov." In 1929, the main parts of the text of the first edition of the novel were created (and, possibly, its finalized draft version of the appearance and tricks of the devil in Moscow).

M. Bulgakov wrote a novel, which he read in a certain society, where he was told that they would not let him pass in this form, since he is extremely harsh with attacks, then he remade it and thought to publish it, and in the original to let the editorial board into society as a manuscript and this at the same time with the publication in a truncated censorship ". Probably, in the winter of 1928-29, only individual chapters of the novel were written, which were distinguished by an even greater political acuteness than the surviving fragments of the earlier edition. Perhaps, given to "Nedra" and not fully extant, "Furibunda Mania" was already a softened version of the original text. It is also plausible that Bulgakov's intention is to put the manuscript into free circulation on the basis of “samizdat” rights: after all, there have already circulated among the interested public lists of “Kabbalah saints”, “Heart of a Dog”, and the story “Fatal Eggs” with unprinted in the collection "Nedr" a different version of the ending. In this first edition of the novel, there were at least 15 chapters, of which 10 had titles, occupying about 160 pages of handwritten text in a thick school-format notebook (this is how the handwritten editions of the novel survived).
In the first edition, the author went through several versions of the titles of his work: "Black Magician", "Engineer's Hoof", "Woland's Tour", "Son of Doom", "Juggler with a Hoof", but he did not stop at any of them. This first edition of the novel was destroyed by Bulgakov on March 18, 1930, after receiving news of the ban on the play

We are making great progress and are gradually approaching the final of the workshop. What we just talked about! And about the structure of the work, and about the dynamics of the text, and even about how to find your audience. If at the beginning of the workshop (or at some stage of the workshop) you started working on a big thing, you are great. And if you came here with the thought “this workshop will help me start working on a large form”, but still have not done anything, and all collect tasks in a piggy bank and put things on the back burner, alas, alas. You will not begin your romance soon. If you start at all. However, everyone - and his choice. From myself I can say: participation in the workshop is very important. “I will collect, and then apply” - this is not here. And this is not about writing at all.

So, we are gradually approaching the final. Actually ... yes, we are already at the home stretch! We are left with two materials, today and the next, which will be devoted to the types of drafts and editing. Now do you understand why I often ask "are you doing assignments"? Because the workshop is coming to an end. A workshop is an event where people do not read, but first of all practice. But I truly believe that you have begun work on your novel. Perhaps not from the first task and not even from the second, but they started. And this gives you a huge advantage over those who just came to read.

Structure of the piece: split the text and not die

When you write your first novel, you have tons of questions. And not all of them relate to the planning of the work and work as such: the climax, "hooks", characters. Sometimes purely technical details become a stumbling block. What chapters are accepted in the literature? How is the work divided into parts? Why are some writers so loose with both the former and the latter, and what position should I take as a budding author? Safe or risky, but free? ..

I am one of those writers who say that the most boring thing in literature is stereotypes. No, not cliches, but what is called the beautiful word "ideal". When I hear “there should be twenty thousand characters in an ideal chapter,” my eye twitches. No, not because it's too big or too small a chapter. But because such an "ideal" fetters us hand and foot. What if you, like me, have a verbose style, and your heads are under twenty-five thousand? But what if you, like Anya's, rarely exceed ten thousand heads? No, no and NO. No ideals. Let's leave it to others - and let them sit to themselves, checking the number of signs in the pieces of meaning.

I cannot say that there are no rules in planning the structure of a novel. They are. More precisely, it is one rule. And it consists in the following: the structure ALWAYS serves the plot. Not the other way around. Your chapters begin and end in certain places and at certain events because the plot requires it, and not because the slider on the invisible ruler has reached the "ideal". But ... let's go in order.

Let's define the concepts

You and I are already adult and serious writers, within the framework of the workshop we write a major thing, and, therefore, we have something in common with the writers' crowd. God forbid you from actually getting into it, but there is a fact that cannot be dismissed. The world of literature has its own language, and in order to feel at home among colleagues from the pen, we need to learn it.

Standard Word Document View

I suppose almost everyone uses this editor, and therefore I will talk about it. What is a Standard Word Document? It is a Times New Roman font of size 12 with line spacing of 1, 15 lines and standard (the program gives them yourself) margins. It is generally accepted that it is this view that is most convenient for both reading and typing. I use wider margins, indent 1, 5 lines, add spacing before and after the paragraph and indent the red lines 1, 25, because I love the "air" in the document, but to each his own. Now you will not be lost when you hear the "standard type document".

"How much is half a page of text?"

Adult and serious writers consider what is written not in pieces of meaning, but in words or signs. Word has a Statistics tab that allows us to determine this.

Word count. This method is popular in the English-speaking environment due to the peculiarities of the language, but it is beginning to come into vogue here too. Many writers today consider what is written in words. But personally, I prefer to count signs in everyday life. Again, in view of the fact that in Russian, due to its peculiarities, it is not very convenient to count words.

Number of signs. The most popular way to measure the amount of writing. If we are talking about non-fiction, then they count signs without spaces. If we are talking about fictional prose, then signs with spaces are considered (with very rare exceptions). The author's sheet (a. L., Or alka, if we turn to the writer's jargon) is 40,000 characters with spaces. The size of the manuscript is measured in the author's sheets. Suppose a novel of 800,000 characters is, divide 800,000 by 40,000, 20 author's sheets. Not a bad fantasy novel of a traditional size, neither small nor large.

Chapters

Before we start talking about the chapters, let's turn to our favorite (and not so) works and remember what these very chapters look like there. We will notice that their size varies from book to book and from genre to genre. Moreover: there are works where chapters do not have a fixed size at all.

What unites them? Semantic completeness, logical completeness of a piece of text. Why does the author use different chapter lengths?

To create tension

Stephen King is a great master in this business. In his works, sometimes there are very short, less than one page, chapters, clearly verified pieces of text that do not carry a special semantic load, but add tension to the narrative. Chapters can also consist of one sentence spoken by another character (or an impersonal narrator), a kind of insert between the main chapters.

Changing the pace of the story

Sometimes authors alternate between long “canvases” chapters with short chapters, alternating between leisurely narrative descriptions and “quick”, spectacular scenes that move the plot. This can be found in detective stories and in mystical novels, these are genres where a change of pace is an artistic means in itself.

What to do if a chapter, in your opinion, comes out “too big”, and breaking it down into smaller ones does not suit your face? Put the magic sign "***". I call this "camera switching" because it gives the work a cinematic effect, which I really like.

Attention: the reader loves the small pieces separated by three stars!

Parts

In the case of parts, things are not nearly as obvious as with chapters. If only because every writer understands by the word "part" something of his own. Here is a definition that you can rely on at the very beginning, when you still have little understanding of what you want from the manuscript. A part is a large semantic piece, separated from other pieces by a clear boundary: for example, temporal or plot. The time limit is “so much time has passed (a month, three months, a year, two hundred years). A plot boundary is a switch to another storyline or something related in one way or another to this switch: for example, the introduction of a new character or the introduction of a new storyline.

Are the parts in the work really necessary? .. Honestly, you can do without them. Especially if your thing does not stretch in time. For example, my novel The Night She Died has two timelines, past and present. I introduce the lines chapter by chapter, alternating between the past and the present, but I have dispensed with the parts, because the story in this case is a single canvas, and it does not need to be broken. In the "Counselor" dilogy, I acted differently. The chapters there in the overwhelming majority of cases are parts - there are temporary breaks in the narrative. And the parts were introduced in order to focus on the stages of the hero's development, on events that are important to him. Here are two examples where parts and chapters are used as artistic means, and not because "it is necessary".

Interludes

A thing that, in an amicable way, should be attributed to the chapters, but at the same time is not worth it, because they are not the same thing. An interlude is a kind of interspersing the text of the main manuscript. Not a full chapter, but rather an appendage. It is also a wonderful artistic tool. This is what interludes can be.

Poetic

In "The Saga of Prince Grywald," I have them just like that. As interludes, I used the poems of the characters - their thoughts, as it were, between the lines, in poetic form. In this case, poetry supplemented prose, revealed it and gave new shades, making it sound different.

Impersonal narrator inserts

We remember that the impersonal storyteller is the all-seeing eye that knows everything. With the help of such interludes, you can give short explanations and detail some points that are hidden from the rest of the characters. But it would be better to use not an impersonal narrator, but ...

Faces of other characters

The difference between the interlude on behalf of other characters and the change of the narrator (change of point of view) is that in the interlude we introduce the hero one-time (or multiple times, but he is not included in the number of narrators in any case). By the way, this is not necessarily an existing living character. Such an interlude can just as well be written "from the perspective" of an animal or a chair, such cases.

Dreams and flashbacks

Let us not forget them, our dear, glorious and loved ones. Most often, interludes do not highlight dreams or even flashbacks, but memories. Sometimes, on their basis, a whole line is built about the character's past, albeit a small one. But in the case of dreams and flashbacks as interludes, there is something very important to keep in mind. The passage should be independent and complete in terms of meaning. Yes, of course, this is not a chapter, but it is not part of a chapter either. Remember this!

Practice time

We divide our novel into chapters and parts, friends. Where do you plan to use long chapters and where short ones? Do you like the idea of ​​interludes?

I wish you good luck with your assignments - and see you next Friday for the latest material from the Writing a Novel workshop!

The novel is a prosaic narrative literary genre that reflects fictional reality, revealing the deepest layers of human life. No matter what type of novel you want to write - literary or commercial, romantic or sci-fi, war epic or family drama - you will need unlimited creative energy and the ability to express yourself through your novel, patience to carry out your plan, since creating a novel is it is a painstaking and lengthy process that requires special perseverance and consistency in the editing and revision process.

Steps

Creation of a fictional world

1. Inspiration. Writing a novel is a creative process, and you never know when a good idea might hit you. Therefore, you must always be fully armed and carry a notebook and pen so that you can write down ideas as they arise. You can get inspired during your morning commute to work, or over a cup of coffee. Inspiration is unpredictable, so listen to your thoughts and try to capture them on paper so you don't forget.

   • To be a writer, you need to be in a state of inspiration as long as possible. Sometimes, it is difficult for writers to generate ideas. This problem is faced by almost all writers, and inspiration is the best way to solve it.
   • Books don't have to be the source of inspiration. It could be a TV show, a movie, or even a visit to an exhibition or art gallery. Inspiration comes in endless forms!
   • Use your laptop to jot down whatever comes into your head. These can be notes describing your observations, a few paragraphs, or even just fragmentary sentences that will later form the basis of your novel.
   • Try to think about all the stories that you have heard from people you know and are close to, from the stories of your great-grandmother to stories from TV news and even your childhood memories.
   • Try to think about an event that happened in childhood or in the recent past that somehow stuck in your memory. It could be the mysterious death of a woman in your city, your neighbor's strange affection for pets, or your trip to London that you keep thinking about. For example, the famous scene in which the colonel, before being shot, recalls how his father took him to look at the ice from the novel One Hundred Years of Solitude was based on the childhood memories of Marquez.
   • Some say that "you need to write about what you know well." Others feel that you should "write about what you don't know." Think or think of something from your own life that does not leave you indifferent, what excites you, awakens your inspiration, interests you, turns you on, and try to develop this topic in more detail in the novel.

2. Choose a genre. Not all novels have a clear attachment to specific categories, but it is very useful to determine from the outset which genre your work will belong to and what audience it will target. Try to read as many classics of the chosen genre as possible. This will give you an idea of ​​how to build a novel according to existing standards. And if you have not settled on a specific genre or are going to create something new, located at the intersection of different genres, then you will simply need to study all these styles and their characteristic features. Let's consider several possible options:

   • The novel is a literary work permeated with a deep understanding of life, symbolism, which uses complex literary techniques. Read more of the classics of the great novelists, guided by The Guardian's 100 Greatest Novels of All Time list of The 100 Greatest Books in World Literature.
   • Commercial (or tabloid) novels are created in order to entertain the audience, and on the other, with the expectation of selling the maximum number of copies in a wide range of genres, from science fiction, mysticism and fantasy, to thrillers, romance or history novels. Many novels of this type are produced in series and have predictable outcomes.
   • There is no clear line between commercial and non-commercial novels. Many science fiction writers and thriller authors have created complex and profound works that can rightfully be considered the pearls of classical literature. The fact that the novel is popular does not mean that it is of low quality and belonging to pop culture.
   • You just need to read as much of the literature of the genre in which you are going to write your novel. This will allow you to get a complete picture of the traditions, rules and style of the genre in which you intend to self-actualize and will help you in your work.

3. Consider the setting. After choosing a genre, you need to move on to choosing a place that should not be limited by the boundaries of a city or village. It's all about your imagination, which is limitless and can take characters outside the universe. Choosing the right setting will determine the mood and tone of your novel, and will serve as the setting against which the story unfolds. Think carefully about the following questions:

   • Will the events of the novel unfold in a setting you know well?
   • What time continuum is the plot of your novel based on? In the past, present or future?
   • Will the events of your novel take place on Earth, or in space?
   • Will the events take place in one city or area, or in several places?
   • Define the time range of your plot: month, year, decade, etc.?
   • Will the ending be optimistic, or will the novel be full of pessimism?

4. Come up with character imagery. The most important and basic will be the main character, who should be as specific as possible, with recognizable features and worldview. The main characters do not have to be positive at all, but they must be connected with each other, and they must be described in such a way that they become memorable. The reader must somehow associate himself with the main characters, find points of contact with them. This is what attracts readers to literature.

   • Remember, heroes don't have to be liked, but they should interest you. For example, Humbert from the novel "Lolita", which may cause contempt, but he somehow attracts and his personality is interesting to readers.
   • There should be several main characters in the novel. Don't limit yourself to just one. Of interest is the same event, told from different points of view.
   • The supporting characters are designed to reveal and strengthen the personality of the protagonist, showing the environment in which he exists, in which he was formed as a person. Think about how you want the main characters to be when you surround them with supporting characters.
   • At the same time, all the characters in your novel do not have to be fixed from the very beginning. They can appear as you write the novel, as you create your creation. Sometimes it turns out that you start writing about someone whom you consider the main character, but he gradually fades into the background, giving way to another character. It all depends on your inner voice and inspiration. Trust him.
   • Many writers write off their heroes from real people, trying to imagine themselves in their place, even mentally turning into their heroes for a while. Your characters must be detailed and must exist in your mind as if they were alive. Then the reader will have a similar feeling that they see them in their mind's eye.

5. Write down the plot. Most novels, regardless of genre and style, are based on some kind of conflict, which is aggravated, reaching the apogee and climax, and then resolved, passing into the denouement. This, however, does not mean that all novels should end with a happy end. Rather, the conflict helps to better reveal the character of the characters, motivating their behavior throughout your novel.

   • There are no ready-made formulas for plotting. Although there is one win-win option, according to the scheme of exposure, setting, development, culmination, denouement and post-position, prologue and epilogue (optional).
   • You can also start with the main conflict and work backwards to show exactly why this conflict arose. For example, you can start with how a girl returns home from her father's funeral, and the reader travels in a kind of time machine, gradually immersing himself in the events leading to the death of her father.
   • Likewise, the conflict does not have to be resolved. You can end the novel with three dots, leaving a certain veil of understatement. This is a very interesting trick.
   • The main thing is that the novel is not primitive and predictable. You can start a story in the present, then move to the future, periodically sending readers to the past, or you can start in the past, then move to the future and end the action in the present. Julio Cortazara's "Hopscotch" (Game of the classics) is a good one for such a "non-linear" novel.
   • Reread some of your favorite novels and try to figure out what type of story they relate to. Follow the novel's development and notice how much more fun it is to read novels with a non-linear storyline.

6. Decide on whose behalf the story will be told. Novels are usually written in the third or first person, although sometimes there are also works written in the second person, or in a combined version. If you settled on a first-person narrative, then you should tell everything as if you are one of the characters, using the pronouns "I" and "We". Second-person narratives also give the impression that the author is a character, but the pronouns "you" and "you" are used. A striking example of such a story is the works of Yevgeny Grishkovets. And finally, third-person storytelling allows you to be completely free, not limited by linguistic frameworks, use symbols and be like an outside observer.

   • It is not at all necessary from the very beginning to decide on whose behalf the story will be conducted. You can write the first sentence, even a few paragraphs or chapters, before you figure out which style works best for you.
   • There are no rigid ties between the style of the novel and the method of storytelling. But if you are writing a voluminous, monumental panoramic novel with a wide range of numerous characters, then third-person storytelling can be very convenient and allows for the use of symbols, lyrical digressions and similar literary devices.

7. You can start from scratch. Although it is sometimes useful to first come up with a plot, define for yourself the characters, heroes and the location of the event. However, this is not a necessary preparatory procedure. if you start getting hung up on preparation, you can get bogged down in details and trivia without moving forward. Try to follow your inspiration, which may come from a conversation overheard in the grocery store, a historical fact, or a grandmother's story. This may be enough to start writing a novel, using this fact as the tip of a thread in a ball, which you will gradually unwind, drawing readers into the maelstrom of events.

   • If you devote too much time to the preparatory stage, trying to think through everything to the smallest detail, then you simply stifle inspiration in yourself, squandering all your potential, before starting to write a novel.

   Drafting a novel

   1. First of all, make a plan or outline. Every writer has his own system for writing a plan. Creating a plan will help you identify the main ideas and identify a chain of intermediate goals that will lead you to the realization of the final result. But if you prefer to write based solely on inspiration, then you can safely rely on your intuition until you find that you need to organize what you write in some way. All in your hands.

      • Your plan shouldn't be too straightforward. You can make short sketches of the characters of all the characters, or draw up so-called Euler-Venn diagrams that clearly show the common areas in which the interests of different characters intersect.
      • Don't try to blindly follow your plan. Its function lies in a certain organization of the creative process, in giving it a gradient, which will give a certain acceleration to the process of creating a novel. The plan can be adjusted at any time.
      • Sometimes the plan turns out to be much more useful in the later stages of writing a novel, turning into a kind of second wind if the writing is at a dead end. Using the plan in this case, you can better understand the structure of the novel, where to move on, what is better to shorten and where something needs to be added.

   2. Do your best to organize your writing process. Set aside a specific place and time for where and when you will work on your novel. It all depends on your priorities and preferences, and you can do it at any time convenient for you. The most important thing is to understand that writing a novel is painstaking and difficult work, and that inspiration comes only in the process, and not while idly waiting for a mythical insight.

      • Whenever possible, create a workspace that will make you feel most comfortable and that will be most beneficial to your creativity, without distractions. Make sure you have a chair and desk that won't hurt your back for hours on end. Remember that writing a novel is a long process and often takes several months.
      • Some prefer to have a snack while they work, while others drink coffee or tea. Try to determine what exactly your body needs to be most productive: a hearty breakfast or, on the contrary, a light dinner. Again, everything is purely individual.

   3. Do your own research. Try to find out as much as possible about the subject and object of your novel. Study the era you are writing about, the culture of the countries and traditions of the peoples mentioned in the novel, and so on). If you are writing a science fiction novel, then try to grasp the essence of scientific concepts, read the works of futurists. A little less research effort is required if you are writing a novel based on a true story in your life, but accuracy and believability are encouraged anyway.

      • Go to the library. There you can find a lot of interesting unique books and, in addition, it is very convenient to work on writing a book in the library.
      • Communicate with interesting and knowledgeable people in the matter of interest to you. If you cannot find the literature you need, even in the library, then turn to knowledgeable people who can advise you. Prepare the necessary questions in advance.
      • Sometimes the study process may include reading other novels similar to the one you are working on. For example, if you are writing a WWII novel with a French army soldier as the protagonist, read other novels written about the subject and from a different perspective. This, on the one hand, will avoid repetition, and on the other hand, it will enrich you with new information.
      • Studying the material can also affect the length and content of your novel. It is possible that in the process of studying you will have new storylines, or even whole chapters, complementing the image of the main character.

   4. Write the first draft of your novel. When you feel ready to start work, do not delay it, immediately start writing a novel. There is no need to worry about the imperfection of the language, since this is only a draft, which will subsequently be polished and refined. Write without self-criticism. The first draft doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to be done. Remember, this is a blank, but it is quite possibly the most compelling version.

      • Get in the habit of writing every single day. The bigger, the better. You need to understand what you are doing. Many wonderful writers go unnoticed and unknown only because they did not bother to bring the matter to its logical conclusion and write, as they say, in a box.
      • Set intermediate goals for yourself: write a chapter, several pages, or a certain number of words each day. This will push you to be productive on a regular basis.
      • Plus, you can set long-term goals for yourself. For example, you can finish writing the first draft in a year, or in half a year. Define the "End Date" and be guided by it.

   Editing a novel

   1. You can write as many drafts of the novel as you like. If you are lucky, you will be able to achieve the desired result in three passes. Or maybe you need more than a dozen different versions to achieve the necessary plausibility. It is very important to stop on time and first evaluate what you have written yourself, and then consult with others if you find it difficult to decide whether the novel is ready, or whether it makes sense to continue working. But if you rush and show the novel to others too early, you risk losing inspiration. Once you've written enough drafts, you can start editing.

      • When Hemingway was asked what was the most difficult part of writing A Farewell to Arms (after he rewrote it thirty-nine times), he replied, "Put the words right."
      • After you've written the first version, take a break, take a break from the novel for a few weeks or even a few months, and try to relax and read your creation as if you were the reader. Which parts require more detail and further explanation? Which parts are too tight and cause boredom?
      • Experience has shown that if you skip too long and tedious sections while reading, ordinary readers will do the same. Think about how you can make the novel more attractive to your readers by shortening or editing some parts that are too cumbersome.
      • Each new draft or new revision may be aimed at eliminating one or more specific deficiencies. For example, you can write one completely new version with an emphasis on what will make it more attractive to the reader, and write another version taking into account the development and improvement of the plot series. The third version can be aimed at polishing the central part of the novel.
      • Repeat the process of creating revised versions over and over until you have a piece of text that you can proudly show to others. This may take several months or several years, but it certainly needs to be done. Please be patient.

   2. Train your editing skills. When you feel that you have reached perfection, proceed to the next stage - to shorten paragraphs or uninteresting sentences, from standard or repetitive phrases, or simply organize the lexical structure of the text. It is not at all necessary to edit and change every phrase - in any case, you will have to change them in later editions. Stick to the general editing line until you get the desired result.

      • Print out your novel and read it out loud. Delete or revise anything that seems wrong to you.
      • Be generous in deleting paragraphs or entire chapters from the text. Get rid of unnecessary things mercilessly. remember the proverb: "what is written with a pen cannot be cut down with an ax." In the sense that you can always use blocks that are unnecessary in this context in other texts.

   3. Show the printed text to other people. Start with a manuscript that you can trust and are your authorities, and only then move on to familiarize yourself with the novel of other readers. However, you will have to face a situation where family and friends will not be completely frank with you, leaving their feedback, because they do not want to hurt you with their criticism. Therefore, it is recommended to resort to one of the following options:

      • Sign up to attend Writing Workshops hosted by colleges and education centers. The seminar program includes acquaintance with new works written by other writers, as well as discussion and careful analysis of the read works. Here you can get a full-fledged healthy criticism of your work.
      • Start a writers club. If you know other people who are also writing novels, you can arrange with them to meet regularly to discuss and share experiences.
      • Don't take all criticism at face value. Before making your final decision, listen to a few critics.
      • If you are looking to write novels and you feel like it could be your life's work, try to get a professional university degree with a degree in fiction. You will not only receive the necessary knowledge from the best specialists in the field of literature and art, but you will also be able to get a detailed overview and analysis of your work.

   4. Try to get your novel published. Many aspiring writers perceive their creation as a touchstone, the first pancake, which is lumpy, and hesitate to even send it to publishers. However, if you feel confident enough in your abilities, you can contact a traditional book publisher, an electronic online publishing house, or resort to services

      • If you decide to go the traditional route, it is very helpful to find a literary agent who will present your novel to various publishers. To do this, you will need to submit an application to a special organization with an annotation of your manuscript.
      • As for samizdat, there are a great many companies providing print services, and they all have different levels and different specializations. Carefully read the product samples and only then choose the one that suits you best.
      • And if you do not want to publish your novel, then you can put off work, take a break and, with a sense of accomplishment before you, start writing a new work.
   • If you do not know how to continue the work you have begun, in which direction to develop the plot, imagine one of your characters who is standing behind your back and tells what he will do next.
   • Write about what you like, let your imagination run wild. For example, if you are a science fiction lover, then you are unlikely to like the idea of ​​writing a historical novel.
   • "It is much better to write for yourself and publish your work than to write for publication and read your novel yourself." Write as you like, enjoying the process without thinking about the opinions of critics. Believe me, the readership is vast and diverse and there is always a chance that if a work is written from the heart, sincerely, with love and interesting, then it will find its niche.
   • Read a lot of books (especially those related to your chosen genre or the theme of your novel). Read before you start, in the process, and after you finish. It is very helpful and effective.
   • Do not forget that your characters and heroes should be interesting, different and with life attitudes that differ from your own. Another Mary Sue is not needed by anyone, and although readers may accept some kind of repetition, the author of a new novel should avoid this and strive for variety and originality.
   • Don't wait for inspiration. It doesn't come out of nowhere. Writing is like digestion; if you haven't eaten anything, the system doesn't work. For example, do you know when a writer suddenly has an idea, seemingly from a completely empty space? When he has a certain accumulation of observations, rotating and processed in the subconscious, and popping out in the form of an idea, taking on a verbal form. It may seem spontaneous, but it actually works for 100%, since such ideas are always original and interesting.
   • There are tons of different apps (e.g. Google Keep, Astrid Tasks) for smartphones, tablets, iPods that can be very useful for recording and documenting these random ideas wherever they come. For some mobile devices, even suites or word office software packages have been developed that make it possible to write on the go.
   • Take some time to select music that can be a source of inspiration, creating a special atmosphere and emotion that resonates with your narration. Listen to your music library trying to catch the right intonation. Make a list of songs and musical compositions that sound like a movie soundtrack to fit the concept of your novel or story. This will help add the necessary emotional notes to the novel. Alternatively, you can try writing a chapter or part of it to try to verbalize your feelings of the emotion that comes from listening to this music.
   • After some time after starting work, you should feel how well you are doing all this, how much writing a novel captures your imagination and captivates. If you don't feel it right away, keep trying different options. Sometimes it helps to listen to music not while writing a novel, but during breaks. Good and well-chosen music can become a kind of generator of ideas for a storyline, adding new colors and rhythm to your work.
   • Start keeping a diary, keep a notebook or notebook in which you can write down all your current thoughts. This is great for developing your writing skills. Remember that this is your novel and if you want to radically change its theme, then feel free to do it, change the storyline from the war in the Middle East to the conflict in high school. This can be done at any stage of the writing of a novel. Therefore, before you start a novel, make sure that what you are about to tell is really interesting to you.
   • Adhere to the principle of "not a day without a page", regardless of the presence of inspiration.
   • If you are having trouble developing a realistic character from your novel, do this: Communicate with him constantly in your mind. Wherever you are: in a grocery store, at work, in a shopping mall, or even on the street, imagine that this character is with you and how he would behave in a particular situation. At the same time, note to yourself what they would do the same way as you and how your behavior would be different.
   • Sometimes everything in a character is perfect, except for his name, which suits him like a cow - a saddle. Buy a parenting book that contains a wide variety of names. In addition, there are numerous sites on the Internet that can generate names and / or explain their meaning. You can also try using an online translator to create new original names formed as a translation of a famous word in English. This often gives the character a special charm and flair.
   • To become a writer you have to be a reader, listener to radio programs, and watch TV shows. In addition, you have to travel, socialize a lot, go to parties, wander around the city ... That is, you have to live a full life. Inspiration, how love can "come unwittingly" at any moment.
   • Just because you like your story doesn't mean that others will like it. Let at least three or four trusted, trusted friends and acquaintances read the finished work before sending the novel to the publisher. Don't forget to copyright your work, even if it's not finished yet.
   • "Avoid cliches like the plague" (ironically, this useful and kind advice is used so often that it has become a cliche itself). Using formulaic expressions and overused phrases is always boring and annoying.
   • If you are a procrastinator, that is, you like to put everything on the back burner, try taking part in the NaNoWriMo event, which brings together writers from the country who commit to write 50,000 words within a month. This is a good incentive to complete the romance. And, in general, writers tend to perform better when they have a specific deadline for a novel.

M.A. Bulgakov, "The Master and Margarita" "/>

How the Master and Margarita novel was created

An interesting informative article. There are boobs!

"However," Koroviev continued to chatter, "I knew people who had no idea not only about the fifth dimension, but who had no idea about anything at all and nevertheless performed the most perfect miracles ..."

M.A. Bulgakov, "The Master and Margarita"

Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov is an artist who left a rich literary heritage in almost all genres: he began with a feuilleton, story, sketch, created a cycle of original plays and stage performances that had audience success, wrote novels, librettos, deep and brilliant novels - “White Guard ”,“ The Life of Monsieur de Moliere ”,“ Notes of a Dead Man ”and“ The Master and Margarita ”are the pinnacle of his creativity. This last work of the writer, his "sunset novel", completes the significant topic for Bulgakov - the artist and power, this is a novel of difficult and sad thoughts about life, where philosophy and science fiction, mysticism and heartfelt lyrics, soft humor and well-aimed deep satire are combined.
The history of the creation and publication of this most famous novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, one of the most outstanding works in contemporary Russian and world literature, is complex and dramatic. This final work, as it were, summarizes the writer's ideas about the meaning of life, about man, about his mortality and immortality, about the struggle between good and evil principles in history and in the moral world of man. The foregoing helps to understand Bulgakov's own assessment of his offspring. “When he was dying, he spoke,” recalled his widow, Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova: “Maybe this is right ... What could I write after the Master? ..”

The creative history of “The Master and Margarita” in the most general terms boils down to the following. Bulgakov attributed the idea of ​​the novel and the beginning of work on it to 1928, however, according to other sources, it is obvious that the idea of ​​writing a book about the adventures of the devil in Moscow came to him several years earlier, in the early to mid-1920s.

The first chapters were written in the spring of 1929. On May 8 of this year Bulgakov handed over to the Nedra publishing house for publication in the almanac of the same name a fragment of the future novel - its separate independent chapter called Furibunda's Mania, which in Latin means “violent insanity, rage mania”. This chapter, from which only fragments not destroyed by the author have come down to us, in content approximately corresponded to the fifth chapter of the printed text "It was in Griboyedov." In 1929, the main parts of the text of the first edition of the novel were created (and, possibly, its finalized draft version of the appearance and tricks of the devil in Moscow).

M. Bulgakov wrote a novel, which he read in a certain society, where he was told that they would not let him pass in this form, since he is extremely harsh with attacks, then he altered it and thought to publish it, and in the initial edition to put it into society as a manuscript and this is simultaneously with the publication in a truncated censorship form ”. Probably, in the winter of 1928-29, only individual chapters of the novel were written, which were distinguished by an even greater political acuteness than the surviving fragments of the earlier edition. Perhaps, given to "Nedra" and not fully extant, "Furibunda Mania" was already a softened version of the original text. Also plausible is Bulgakov's intention to put the manuscript into free circulation on the rights of “samizdat”: after all, there were already circulating among the interested public lists of “Cabal of saints”, “Heart of a Dog”, the story “Fatal Eggs” with another version of the ending unpublished in the collection “Subsoil”. In this first edition of the novel, there were at least 15 chapters, of which 10 had titles, occupying about 160 pages of handwritten text in a thick school-format notebook (this is how the handwritten editions of the novel survived).
In the first edition, the author went through several versions of the titles of his work: “Black Magician”, “Engineer's Hoof”, “Woland's Tour”, “Son of Doom”, “Juggler with a Hoof”, but he did not stop at any of them. This first edition of the novel was destroyed by Bulgakov on March 18, 1930, after receiving news of the ban on the play "Cabal of the Sanctified". The writer reported this in a letter to the government on March 28, 1930: “And personally, I, with my own hands, threw into the stove a draft of the novel about the devil ...” compositional juxtaposition of the two novels in the novel ("antique" and "modern"), which is the genre feature of "The Master and Margarita".

Actually, the “novel about Pontius Pilate”, written by the hero of this book, the master, does not exist; “Simply” the “strange foreigner” tells Vladimir Mironovich Berlioz and Antosha (Ivanushka) Bezrodny about Yeshua Ha-Notsri at the Patriarch's Ponds, and all the “New Testament” material is presented in one chapter (“The Gospel of Woland”) in the form of a live conversation of the “foreigner” and his listeners. There are no future main characters - the master and Margarita. So far, this is a novel about the devil, and in the interpretation of the image of the devil, Bulgakov is at first more traditional than in the final text: his Woland (or Faland) still acts in the classical role of a tempter and provocateur (he, for example, teaches Ivanushka to trample the image of Christ), but the writer’s “super task” is already clear: both Satan and Christ are necessary for the author of the novel as representatives of absolute (albeit “multipolar”) truth opposed to the moral relativism of the world of Berlioz, Mogarych, Latunsky, Lavrovich ... For Bulgakov not only denies, but also affirms.
Work on the novel resumed in 1931. The idea of ​​the work significantly changes and deepens - Margarita appears and her companion - the Poet, who will later be called the master and will take the central place. But so far this place still belongs to Woland, and the novel itself is planned to be called: "The Consultant with a Hoof." Bulgakov is working on one of the last chapters ("Woland's Flight") and in the upper right corner of the sheet with sketches of this chapter writes: “Help, Lord, to finish the novel. 1931 ". This edition, the second in a row, was continued by Bulgakov in the fall of 1932 in Leningrad, where the writer arrived without a single draft - not only the idea, but also the text of this work was so thought out and endured by that time. Almost a year later, on August 2, 1933, he informed the writer V.V. Veresaev about the resumption of work on the novel: “A demon has possessed me ... Already in Leningrad and now here, suffocating in my little rooms, I began to smudge page after page of my newly destroyed novel three years ago. What for? Do not know. I am amuse myself! Let it fall into oblivion! However, I will probably give it up soon. " However, Bulgakov no longer abandoned The Master and Margarita, and with interruptions caused by the need to write custom-made plays, staging, scripts and librettos, continued his work on the novel almost until the end of his life.

By November 1933, 500 pages of handwritten text had been written, divided into 37 chapters. The genre is defined by the author himself as a “fantasy novel” - so it is written at the top of the sheet with a list of possible titles: “The Great Chancellor. Satan. Here I am. Feather hat. Black theologian. Alien horseshoe. He appeared. Coming. Black magician. Consultant's Hoof (Consultant with a Hoof) ”, but Bulgakov did not stop at any of them. All these variants of the title still seem to indicate Woland as the main person. However, Woland is already significantly squeezed by a new hero, who becomes the author of the novel about Yeshua Ha-Nozri, and this inner novel is split in two, and between the chapters that form it (Chapters 11 and 16), the love and misadventures of the "Poet" (or "Faust" , as it is named in one of the drafts) and Margarita. By the end of 1934, this revision was roughly finished. By this time, the word “master” had already been used three times in the last chapters in an appeal to the “Poet” by Woland, Azazello and Koroviev (who had already received permanent names). In the next two years, Bulgakov made numerous additions and compositional changes to the manuscript, including, finally, crossing the lines of the master and Ivan Bezdomny. In July 1936, the last and final chapter of the novel, The Last Flight, was created, in which the fate of the master, Margaret, and Pontius Pilate was determined.
The third edition of the novel was started in late 1936 - early 1937. In the first, unfinished version of this edition, brought to the fifth chapter and occupying 60 pages, Bulgakov, in contrast to the second edition, moved the story of Pilate and Yeshua again to the beginning of the novel, composing a single second chapter called "The Golden Spear". In 1937, the second, also incomplete version of this edition was written, brought to the thirteenth chapter (299 pages). It is dated 1928-1937 and is entitled "Prince of Darkness". Finally, the third and only completed version of the third edition of the novel was written between November 1937 and the spring of 1938. This edition takes 6 thick notebooks; the text is divided into thirty chapters. In the second and third versions of this edition, the scenes from Yershalaim were introduced into the novel in exactly the same way as in the published text, and in the third version, the well-known and final title “The Master and Margarita” appeared.
From the end of May to 24 June 1938, this edition was retyped on a typewriter under the dictation of the author, who often changed the text along the way. Bulgakov's editing of this typewriting began on September 19, with individual chapters being rewritten. The epilogue was written on May 14, 1939, immediately in the form that we know.

At the same time, a scene was written about the appearance of Matthew Levi to Woland with a decision on the fate of the master. When Bulgakov fell mortally ill, his wife Elena Sergeevna continued editing under the dictation of her husband, while this correction was partly entered into typescript, partly in a separate notebook. On January 15, 1940, E. S. Bulgakova wrote in her diary: “Misha, how much strength is enough, the novel rules, I am rewriting,” and the episodes with Professor Kuzmin and the miraculous movement of Styopa Likhodeev to Yalta were recorded (before that the director of the Variety was Garasei Pedulaev , and Woland sent him to Vladikavkaz). Editing was stopped on February 13, 1940, less than four weeks before Bulgakov's death, on the phrase: “So this is, therefore, the writers are following the coffin?”, In the middle of the nineteenth chapter of the novel ...
The last thoughts and words of the dying writer were directed to this work, which contained his entire creative life: “When at the end of his illness he almost lost his speech, sometimes only the ends and beginnings of words came out,” E. S. Bulgakova recalled. - There was a case when I sat next to him, as always, on a pillow on the floor, near the head of his bed, he made me understand that he needed something, that he wanted something from me. I offered him medicine, drink - lemon juice, but I realized clearly that this was not the point. Then I guessed and asked: "Your things?" He nodded with a look that was both "yes" and "no." I said: "Master and Margarita?" He, terribly delighted, made a sign with his head that "yes, it is." And he squeezed out two words: “To know, to know ...” But it was very difficult then to fulfill this dying will of Bulgakov - to print and convey to people, readers the novel he had written.
One of Bulgakov's closest friends and the first biographer of Bulgakov, PS Popov (1892–1964), having reread the novel after the death of its author, wrote to Elena Sergeevna: “Ingenious skill always remains ingenious skill, but now the novel is unacceptable. 50-100 years will have to pass ... ”Now - he believed -“ the less they know about the novel, the better ”. Fortunately, the author of these lines was mistaken in the timing, but in the next 20 years after Bulgakov's death, we do not find in the literature any mention of the existence of this work in the writer's legacy, although Elena Sergeevna from 1946 to 1966 made six attempts to break through the censorship and print the novel ...
Only in the first edition of Bulgakov's book "The Life of M. de Moliere" (1962) VA Kaverin managed to break the conspiracy of silence and mention the existence of the novel "The Master and Margarita" in the manuscript. Kaverin firmly stated that “an inexplicable indifference to the work of Mikhail Bulgakov, sometimes inspiring a deceptive hope that there are many like him and that, therefore, his absence from our literature does not constitute a big trouble, this is harmful indifference ...” Four years later, the magazine “ Moscow ”(No. 11 for 1966 and No. 1 for 1967) published the novel in an abridged version with numerous censorship cuts and edits that distort the meaning of the text in comparison with the final, fourth and first posthumous editions of the novel presented by E. Bulgakova. The magazine version of the book with censorship omissions and distortions and abbreviations made at the initiative of the leadership of the editorial office of “Moscow” (E.S. Bulgakov was forced to agree to all this, just to keep the word given to the dying author, to publish this work), was thus , the fifth edition, which was published abroad as a separate book.
The answer to this publisher's arbitrariness was the appearance in “samizdat” of the typewritten text of all the places published or distorted in the journal publication, with a precise indication of where the missing should be inserted or the distorted one should be replaced. Elena Sergeevna herself and her friends were the author of this "bills" edition. Such a text, which constituted one of the versions of the fourth (1940–1941) edition of the novel, was published in 1969 in Frankfurt am Main by the Posev publishing house. Sections removed or “edited” in a journal publication were in italics in the 1969 edition. What was this censoring and voluntaristic “editing” of the novel? What goals did it pursue? This is quite clear now. 159 bills were made: 21 in the 1st part and 138 - in the 2nd; In total, more than 14,000 words were removed (12% of the text!). Bulgakov's text was grossly distorted, phrases from different pages were arbitrarily combined, sometimes completely meaningless sentences arose. The reasons related to the literary and ideological canons that existed at that time are obvious: most of all, the places that describe the actions of the Roman secret police and the work of “one of the Moscow institutions”, the similarities between the ancient and modern worlds, were seized. Further, the “inadequate” reaction of “Soviet people” to our reality and some of their very unattractive features were weakened. The role and moral strength of Yeshua was weakened in the spirit of vulgar anti-religious propaganda. Finally, the "censor" in many cases displayed a kind of "chastity": some persistent references to the nudity of Margarita, Natasha and other women at the ball at Woland's were removed, a naked fat man, a keeper of a brothel in Strasbourg and an enterprising Moscow dressmaker was removed, the witch's rudeness of Margarita was weakened and etc.

When preparing a complete uncensored domestic edition, published in 1973, the revision of the early 1940s was restored with its subsequent textual revision by A. A. Saakyants, editor of the Khudozhestvennaya Literatura publishing house (where the novel was published). Published after the death of E. Bulgakova (in 1970), this virtually sixth edition of the novel was permanently fixed as canonical by numerous reprints, and in this capacity was introduced into the literary turnover of 1970-1980. Finally, for the Kiev edition of 1989 and for the Moscow collected works of 1989-1990, the seventh and last to date edition of the text of the novel was made with a new reconciliation of all the surviving author's materials, made by the literary critic L. M. Yanovskaya. At the same time, however, it should be remembered that, as in many other cases in the history of literature, when there is no definitive author's text, the novel remains open to clarifications and new readings. And such a case with "The Master and Margarita" is almost classic in its way: Bulgakov died while working on the finishing of the text of the novel, he was unable to fulfill his own textual task on this work. Therefore, there were obvious traces of the novel's flaws even in its plot part (Woland limps and does not limp; Berlioz is called either the chairman or the secretary of Massolit; the white bandage with a strap on Yeshua's head is unexpectedly replaced by a turban; Margarita and Natasha's “pre-Witch status” disappear somewhere; Aloisy appears without explanation; he and Varenukha fly out first from the bedroom window, and then from the stairwell window; Gella is absent in the “last flight”, although he leaves the “bad apartment”, etc., and this cannot be explained as “on purpose conceived ”), some stylistic errors are also noticeable. So the story of the publication of the novel did not end there, especially since all of its early editions were published.

Illustrations

By the way, about the Rushevs. Nikolai Konstantinovich Rushev was an artist and the father of the brilliant girl Nadia. Nadia, who inherited the ability to draw from her father, made completely unique series of drawings for various works of art. When the filing of that very "Moscow" with the novel fell into her hands, the girl literally became obsessed with the book and began a new series of drawings illustrating "The Master and Margarita". For a year she made more than 160 compositions ... But the novel, they say, is damned ... “Once at the exhibition, an old artist approached me and Nadia, wishing to remain anonymous. He said that he knew the widow of Mikhail Bulgakov, Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova, that Nadya needed to get to know her in order to continue her successfully started work, because she also kept all the bills (cut pieces - author's note) issued at the first publication. ” (NK Rushev "The Last Year of Hope") Such an exemplary artist, don't you think? Nikolai Rushev met with Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova, but without Nadia. On March 6, 1969, a completely healthy 16-year-old girl suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. Doctors could not save. When my father brought the drawings to Elena Sergeevna, an amazing thing became clear: the portrait of Margarita, made by Nadya, conveyed a complete resemblance to the writer's wife, who was the prototype of Margarita. Of course, Nadia never saw either Elena Sergeevna or her photographs.

Screen adaptations

In our country, the full version of the novel in print has not yet been released, but in Poland they have already made a film adaptation. Andrzej Wajda was the first to strike at The Master and Margarita, having released the film Pilate and Others in 1971. They took it off without much tragedy, was released, all tip-top. And the only oddity is that this film was never shown in Russia.

In 1972, the Italian-Yugoslav version of The Master and Margarita was filmed. Directed by Alexander Petrovich. In 1988, another Pole, Maczek Voytyszko, created an eight-part television film based on the novel. And in no case were there any mystical circumstances that hindered the filming, budgets did not disappear without a trace, the only copies did not evaporate, and the showing of films was not prohibited. True, in the 80s, Roman Polanski in Hollywood took on the adaptation of the novel, and the project was closed, but for quite earthly reasons - the project seemed simply unprofitable to the producers.

Our directors turned out solid mysticism. They also remembered that Woland could not stand electricity, and I even read from someone a version that Bulgakov did not like cinema, and therefore, it means that we cannot do anything with film adaptations ...

Igor Talankin, Elem Klimov, Eldar Ryazanov and a number of other talented directors dreamed of making a film based on the novel, and none of them managed to make their dream come true.

Vladimir Naumov wanted to film "The Master and Margarita" together with his friend Alexander Alov. Naumov was familiar with the widow of the writer Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova since the time of work on "Run". She worked as a literary consultant on the set, and she gave Naumov the full version of the novel to read. When he started working on the film, Elena Sergeevna had already died. And one night Naumov had a dream that the bell rang at the front door. The director went to the door and looked through the peephole. "I look: Elena Sergeevna in a fur coat." He opened the door, invited the guest to come in. She only said: “I’m just for a minute - Mikhail Afanasevich is waiting downstairs. I wanted to inform you, Volodya, that there will be no film. " The dream turned out to be prophetic.

Ryazanov was simply forbidden to make a film from above. No explanation. He was never able to get to the bottom of the truth, who exactly forbade and why.

In 1991, the original script based on the novel was written by Elem Klimov (co-authored with his brother German Klimov) and, being the chairman of the Union of Cinematographers, received the right to shoot. The newspapers already wrote about the future picture. But it was never removed, because there were no technologies, they required a lot of money to develop them, which he never found.

But Yuri Kara found them somewhere. About $ 15 million was spent on his project. And it is with this film that most of the mysteries are connected. The picture was filmed in 1994, but never appeared on the screens. The director himself recalled that during the filming there were so many obstacles, as if the novel resisted with all his might. “We made expensive decorations of ancient Jerusalem at the beginning of autumn in Sudak,” Kara recalled. - But as soon as we were about to start shooting, it snowed. The shooting had to be canceled, and the scenery had to be redone. " When the film was finally shot, a conflict broke out between the director and the producer, which ended in court proceedings. Then the film with the film disappeared, and the person to whom it was transferred for storage suddenly died. Then it seemed that they found the film and came to a compromise with the producer, but suddenly Bulgakov's relatives appeared and banned the release of the picture ... obstacles.

Vladimir Bortko shot the film on the second try. The first was undertaken in 2000, but the project was canceled. Starting work on the film for the second time, Bortko banned all talk about mysticism on the set. Although he admitted that he once met a strange gentleman at the Patriarch's, who casually said: "You won't succeed." However, it worked out. Not a masterpiece, of course, but now we're not talking about the artistic value of the paintings. The film was shot and even shown on television!

Here is a selection of facts from the Internet about mysticism on set:

People's Artist of Russia Oleg Basilashvili lost his voice on the set of The Master and Margarita. Doctors diagnosed him with ligament hemorrhage. Colleagues of the artist in the St. Petersburg theater BDT unanimously claim that on the eve of the ill-fated filming Oleg Valerianovich felt great. He rehearsed in the performance "The Quartet" and in a good mood was preparing to work on "The Master and Margarita", where he played the Satan of Woland. Problems with his voice began already on the set, when Basilashvili pronounced the famous Bulgakov phrases with his inimitable bass. His throat seemed to have a spasm, the actor began to wheeze and lost consciousness for a few seconds. The next day, having appeared at the theater, Basilashvili practically could not speak. The urgently called doctor prescribed him complete rest and absolute silence for at least a month.

Alexander Kalyagin, who was preparing to play Berlioz, had two heart attacks in a row.

Viktor Avilov played in the Woland Theater with two pectoral crosses. But at the same time, on tour in Germany, his heart stopped twice. The young, energetic actor died of cancer.

The artist Valery Ivakin, who replaced Avilov in the play, had a heart attack at the second performance.

Alexander Abdulov, who played Fagot, sadly states: "For the fifth time I am playing Koroviev with the fifth director, but none of these films have seen the light yet."

Nda .. And even if the fate of Alexander Abdulov somehow painfully echoes the words of Woland about lung sarcoma, but here is an excerpt from an interview with Abdulov:

Have you seen the film adaptations of Yuri Kara and Andrzej Wajda, which never reached a wide audience? Are they worth the conversations that arise around them year after year?

Saw. Not worth it. It is not interesting. Vaida, in my opinion, simply did not understand Bulgakov. I have no right to dispute the great director, but it was not his business. And not Kara's business. His picture was helped by my friend producer. The film is under his covers, and he does not show it to anyone. He tried to remount it, offered to do it to great directors - everyone refused, even for a lot of money.

That is, there is no mysticism in the fact that Kara's picture did not come out, no?

The mystery begins when your brother starts discussing this picture. This is where the Sabbath begins, the ball of Satan. You can invent all the mysticism. When we filmed, there was no devilry.

Quotes from the work "The Master and Margarita":

Yes, man is mortal, but that would be half the trouble. The bad news is that he is sometimes suddenly mortal, that's the trick! (Woland)

Brick will never fall on anyone's head for no reason. (Woland)

It is easy and pleasant to tell the truth. (Yeshua Ha-Nozri)

People are like people. They love money, but it has always been ... Humanity loves money, no matter what it is made of, whether it is leather, paper, bronze or gold. Well, they are frivolous ... well, well ... ordinary people ... in general, they resemble the old ones ... the housing issue only spoiled them ... (Woland)
Congratulations, citizen, you have lied! (Bassoon)

Have mercy ... would I allow myself to pour a lady of vodka? This is pure alcohol! (cat Behemoth)
The most interesting thing about this lie is that it is a lie from the first to the last word. (Woland)

... never ask for anything! Never and nothing, and especially with those who are stronger than you. They themselves will offer and they themselves will give everything! (Woland)

(Woland - Behemoth: Get out.) I haven't had coffee yet, how can I leave? (cat Behemoth)

Manuscripts don't burn. (Woland)

It's good to hear that you are being so polite with your cat. For some reason they usually say “you” to cats, although not a single cat has ever drunk broodershaft with anyone. (cat Behemoth)

There is no document, no person. (Koroviev)

Maestro! Cut your march! (Cat)

Ask them to leave me a witch! .. I will not go for an engineer or a technician! (Natasha)
Festive midnight is sometimes pleasant to delay. (Woland)

... he wasn't verbose this time. The only thing he said was that among human vices, he considers cowardice to be one of the most important. (Afranius, about Yeshua)

I'm not naughty, I'm not bothering anyone, I'm fixing a primus. (cat Behemoth)

Well, the one who loves must share the fate of the one he loves. (Woland)

There is only one freshness - the first, it is also the last. And if the sturgeon is of the second freshness, it means that it is rotten! (Woland)

In a white cloak with a bloody lining, a shuffling cavalry gait, in the early morning of the fourteenth of the spring month of Nisan, the procurator of Judea, Pontius Pilate, entered the covered colonnade between the two wings of the palace of Herod the Great. (Author)

Each will be rewarded according to his faith. (Woland)

History will judge us. (cat Behemoth)

Housekeepers know everything - it is a mistake to think that they are blind. (cat Behemoth)

I will be a silent hallucination. (cat Behemoth)

After all, you think how you can be dead. (Azazello).

He did not deserve light, he deserved peace. (Levi about the Master).

Why chase in the footsteps of what is already over. (Woland).

Love jumped out in front of us, like a murderer jumps out of the ground in an alley, and hit both of us at once! this is how lightning strikes, this is how a Finnish knife strikes! (Master).

Yes, I give up, - said the cat, - but I give up solely because I cannot play in an atmosphere of persecution by envious people! (cat Behemoth)

The time will come when there will be no authority of either the Caesars or any other authority. A person will pass into the kingdom of truth and justice, where no power will be needed at all.

All power is violence against people.

The cat turned out to be not only a solvent, but also a disciplined beast. at the very first shout from the conductor he stopped the offensive, got off the bandwagon and sat down at a stop, rubbing his mustache with a dime. But only the conductor pulled the rope and the tram started, the cat acted like anyone who is expelled from the tram, but who still needs to go. Having passed all three carriages, the cat jumped on the back arc of the last one, grabbed some gut protruding from the wall with its paw, and drove off, thus saving a dime.

Understood! - Ivan said resolutely, - please give me paper and a pen.
“Give me paper and a short pencil,” Stravinsky ordered the fat woman, and to Ivan he said: “But today I advise you not to write.
“No, no, today, certainly today,” Ivan cried alarmedly.
- OK then. Just don't strain your brain. It will not come out today, it will come out tomorrow ... And remember that here we will help you in every possible way, and without this you will not succeed. Can you hear? .. They help you here ... can you hear me? .. They help you here ... they help you here ... You will get relief. It's quiet here, everything is calm ... You will be helped here ...

You know, I hate noise, fuss, violence and all kinds of things like that. Especially I hate human cry, be it a cry of suffering, rage, or some other cry.

Love jumped out in front of us, like a murderer jumps out of the ground in an alley, and hit both of us at once!
This is how lightning strikes, this is how a Finnish knife strikes!

No no no! Not a word more! In no case and never! I won't put anything in your mouth in your buffet! I, most respectable, passed your counter yesterday and still can not forget either sturgeon or feta cheese. My precious! Cheese is never green, someone deceived you. She's supposed to be white. Yes, tea? After all, this is slop! I saw with my own eyes how some unkempt girl poured raw water from a bucket into your huge samovar, while tea continued to be poured. No, my dear, that's impossible!
Second freshness is what nonsense! There is only one freshness - the first, it is also the last. And if the sturgeon is of the second freshness, it means that it is rotten!

Something unkind lurks in men who avoid wine, games, the company of lovely women, table conversation. Such people are either seriously ill, or secretly hate others. However, exceptions are possible. Among the people who sat down with me at the banquet table, sometimes amazing scoundrels came across!

The darkness that came from the Mediterranean covered the city hated by the procurator. The suspension bridges connecting the temple with the terrible Anthony tower disappeared, an abyss fell from the sky and flooded the winged gods over the hippodrome, the Hasmonean palace with loopholes, bazaars, caravanserais, lanes, ponds ... Yershalaim disappeared - a great city, as if it did not exist on light ...

Trousers are not supposed to be for a cat, Messire, - answered the cat with great dignity, - won't you order me to put on a boot too? Puss in boots is only in fairy tales, Messire. But have you ever seen someone without a tie at a ball? I do not intend to find myself in a comic position and risk being pushed in the neck!

I honestly don't like the latest radio news. They are always reported by some girls, indistinctly pronouncing the names of places. besides, every third of them is tongue-tied, as if they were being picked up on purpose.

What to chop wood, - said the talkative cat, - I would like to serve as a conductor on a tram, and there is nothing worse than this work in the world.

I am in admiration, - Koroviev sang monotonously, - we are in admiration, the queen is in admiration.
“The Queen is in admiration,” Azazello abhorred behind his back.
“I'm delighted,” the cat cried.

Never ask for anything, Never ask for anything, and especially from those who are stronger than you. They themselves will offer and they themselves will give everything!

I hereby certify that the bearer of this, Nikolai Ivanovich, spent the aforementioned night at a ball with Satan, being attracted there as a means of transportation ... put a parenthesis, Hella! Write "hog" in parentheses. Signature - Behemoth.
- And the number? - Nikolai Ivanovich squeaked.
“We don’t put numbers, with the number the paper will become invalid,” the cat responded, flicked the paper, got a seal from somewhere, breathed on it according to all the rules, stamped the word “sealed” on the paper and handed the paper to Nikolai Ivanovich.

Listen to the soundless, - said Margarita to the master, and the sand rustled under her bare feet, - listen and enjoy what you were not given in life - silence. Look, ahead of you is your eternal home, which you were given as a reward. I can already see the Venetian window and the climbing grapes, it rises to the very roof. This is your home, your eternal home. I know that in the evening those whom you love, whom you are interested in and who will not disturb you will come to you. They will play for you, they will sing to you, you will see what kind of light is in the room when the candles are burning. You will fall asleep, putting on your greasy and eternal cap, you will fall asleep with a smile on your lips. Sleep will strengthen you, you will begin to reason wisely. And you won't be able to drive me away. I will take care of your sleep ...