The Master and Margarita

"A surrealist novel he has included in his reading lists."

"Then you know that Bulgakov is a genius. Bulgakov is the genius of the 20th century. The Master and Margarita is the most mystical and mysterious way of describing the primitive and base sort of simplification of society under the Soviets. Literature and art and society lost its centre because it all became politicised, and the way Bulgakov describes that ugliness is incredible, and hilarious. It is about two characters: the Master is a writer who is writing his piece but never succeeds in getting it published and I think he represents the real artists of the period, and even maybe of all time. Margarita is a symbol of hope and of love, cherishing him and trying to give life to his work. She is a confused but strong character, with more spirit and quality than the Soviet woman should probably have; she is a woman in search for pure love, who finds it in the Master. The book is also about the connection between religion and the regime. Satan, a foreign journalist, comes to Moscow and is symbolic of the Soviets’ fear of the west. He goes around meeting people and his view on the whole Soviet society at that time makes him a rather attractive character. You also see the story of Christ from Satan’s point of view, which is amazing. We know the story of Jesus, but here we see the story from a different perspective, not so much from a Christian perspective. We also see the human story inside Yeshua – his meeting with Pontius Pilate. I think the Jesus story, which seems to run so naturally along with the Moscow story, is Bulgakov bringing lost spirituality back into the Soviet regime, providing the missing ingredient in the lives of the Soviet readers in a human way. February 18, 2010. Updated: February 13, 2025 Five Books aims to keep its book recommendations and interviews up to date. If you are the interviewee and would like to update your choice of books (or even just what you say about them) please email us at [email protected] Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you've enjoyed this interview, please support us by donating a small amount ."

"I think it was in my late teens and I found it very, very unsettling. I’m not going to pretend that I fully understood it. It’s a book that mixes a cat called Behemoth and Pontius Pilate and an anguished writer—the Master—who burns his texts, and this astonishing figure, Margarita. It’s so weird and it’s so unsettling. My memory of it is just of lots of extraordinary images and I defy anyone to read those opening pages—where someone gets killed on the street by a tram and then the cat appears—and not have it slightly get under their skin and haunt them. I believe that there’s been a lot of dispute about whether Mikhail Bulgakov was writing against Soviet atheism or in favour of it, against religion or in favour of it. Like all great art, it’s shot through with ambivalence. But I don’t think he could ever have written this other than through the collision of the creative impulse and the soulless worldview of Soviet communism. I just don’t think it would have been created other than through that rather disfiguring collision between creativity and conformity. And, for that reason alone, I just think it’s an astonishing book."

"Beyond that, in terms of autism, it’s the book that inspired the song ‘Sympathy for the Devil’ and it’s all about compassion for yourself, for others and really how ultimately that’s all that matters. The story is that the Devil comes to Moscow for a week and it’s about what happens. The other part of the book is a conversation between Christ and Pontius Pilate. And, essentially, it’s about compassion. So, as a parent, and long before I became an autism parent, I was getting a crash course in compassion from Mikhail Bulgakov. It stood me in good stead. And anyone who has read that book will find it resonates with you all the time. There were many times, when we were going through all the stuff you go through as autism parents in the early years of autism… He’s eight. He’s actually playing computer games right next to me now. He’s very, very much further along now, but in those early years it was very tough. I would say that having read that book several times, well, it’s a bit like a crash course in practical Buddhism, isn’t it? But it’s compassionate truth. Like the lady who kills her child and is forgiven at the Devil’s ball. Basically, what the devil is doing is extending compassion to sinners and doing what Jesus is telling Pontius Pilate it’s all about and that’s why the Devil gets very upset with people who say they don’t believe in it. Really he’s the enforcer and dispenser of the divine law."

"I read this book in my late teens, before I was a neuroscientist. I have a soft spot for supernatural tales, and — oddly for an atheist — Judeo-Christian extreme stories, by which I mean angel-devil, fallen one stories. A lot of these take a Manichean point of view: light and dark, good versus evil. In the West this is heavily filtered through that Judeo-Christian lens. The Master and Margarita is brilliant, not only for its interweaving of past and present and linking of different timelines with the Pontius Pilate story, but also the complexity of the relationship between good and evil in it. You really feel for the evil characters — you find yourself backing them completely in their worst actions. The Rolling Stones song ‘Sympathy for the Devil’ was heavily inspired by The Master and Margarita . It’s a beautiful commentary and reflection on questions like ‘what are we doing in our lives, why are we here?’ Our interpretation of that story is heavily filtered by the culture in which we’re raised. You take someone who isn’t raised in the Judeo-Christian culture and have them read that book and they’re going to have a totally different perspective on it. A lot of the allusions and allegories in it won’t even make sense. That’s something that fascinates me — how the culture in which we’re raised affects our brain development and our perceptions and interpretations."

"From the first page I was immediately beguiled, leading me to my year of reading Bulgakov, drawing me to venture to Moscow to seek out the landmarks in the book"

"The Master and Margarita, by Mikhail Bulgakov."

"Probably Bulgakov’s “Master and Margarita,” a delicious and disruptive satire of Soviet Russia. I hear a dead man was put on trial in Moscow only this past summer; Woland would have loved it!"