Generate QR code
Open Access
Subscription Access
‘…At odds with heaven and hell, the gods and mankind’. Woland and the Count of Monte Cristo
https://doi.org/10.31425/0042-8795-2022-5-176-192
Abstract
Historians of literature have often studied M. Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita [Master i Margarita] in order to identify the sources that fuelled the author’s imagination. Considered in the context of a common European literary tradition of the 19th and 20th cc., Bulgakov’s oeuvre may reveal parallels with works of other European literatures. The article contains a comparative analysis of characters and plot lines in The Master and Margarita and The Count of Monte Cristo, a novel by A. Dumas (père), which reveals similarities in plot devices and character portrayals. Similar, too, is the period when the novel takes place — shortly after the shock of a revolution. The researcher suggests that both novels may have targeted a post-revolutionary society with ridicule and, at times, censure. The similarities between the two novels may stem from French romanticism’s enduring influence on Russian literature. At the same time, it is not impossible for the parallels with The Count of Monte Cristo to have been inspired, at least in part, by new Russian translations of Dumas’s novels in the 1920s — 1930s.
About the Author
S. A. Zhilyuk
St. Petersburg State University
Russian Federation
Russian Federation
Sergey A. Zhilyuk - Candidate of Philology
7-9 Universitetskaya Emb., St. Petersburg, 199034
References
1. Belinsky, V. (1845). A pocketbook library. ̒The Count of Monte Cristo,’ a novel by A. Dumas. Otechestvennye Zapiski, 43(12), pp. 63-64. (In Russ.)
2. Bulgakov, M. (2021). The Prince of Darkness. The complete story of ‘The Master and Margarita’ [‘Master i Margarita’]. Moscow: Azbuka. (In Russ.)
3. Chudakova, M. (1988). The life of Mikhail Bulgakov. Moscow: Kniga. (In Russ.)
4. Dumas, A. . (1955). The Count of Monte Cristo (2 vols). Translated from French. Moscow: GIKhL. (In Russ.)
5. Gal, N. (1997). I remember. In: D. Kuzmin, ed., Nora Gal: Memoirs. Articles. Poems. Letters. Bibliography. Moscow: ARGO-RISK, pp. 57-64. (In Russ.)
6. Khilkevich, E. (2004). The Count of Monte Cristo is the missing link in the origins of Bulgakov’s Woland. 22, [online] 132. Available at: http://www. sunround.com/club/22/132_chilkevich.htm [Accessed 8 June 2022]. (In Russ.)
7. Kondakova, Y. (2001). Gogol and Bulgakov: Poetics and ontology of the name. Candidate of Philology. A. M. Gorky Ural State University. (In Russ.)
8. Kuraev, A. (2004). ‘The Master and Margarita’ [‘Master i Margarita’]: For or against Christ? Moscow: Sovet Russkoy Pravoslavnoy Tserkvi. (In Russ.)
9. Lesskis, G. (1999). M. A. Bulgakov’s triptych on the Russian Revolution. ‘The White Guard’ [‘Belaya gvardiya’]. ‘Notes of a Dead Man’ [‘Zapiski pokoynika’]. ‘The Master and Margarita’ [‘Master i Margarita’]: Commentary. Moscow: O.G.I. (In Russ.)
10. Losev, V. and Yanovskaya, L., eds. (1990). Elena Bulgakova’s diary. Moscow: Knizhnaya palata. (In Russ.)
11. Mishurovskaya, M. (2015). The struggle for the novel ‘The White Guard’ [‘Belaya gvardiya’] and the publishing intrigues of the 1920s. Moscow: Muzey M. A. Bulgakova. (In Russ.)
12. Nabokov, V. (1998). A. S. Pushkin’s novel ‘Eugene Onegin.’ Commentary. Translated by E. Vidre, G. Dashevsky, N. Zhutovskaya et al. St. Petersburg: Iskusstvo-SPB, Nabokovskiy fond. (In Russ.)
13. Propp, V. (1969). Morphology of the folktale. Moscow: Nauka. (In Russ.)
14. Wright, A. C. (1978). Mikhail Bulgakov: Life and interpretations. Toronto; Buffalo: University of Toronto Press.
15. Yanovskaya, L. (1983). The literary path of Mikhail Bulgakov. Moscow: Sovetskiy pisatel. (In Russ.)
Review
For citations:
Zhilyuk S.A. ‘…At odds with heaven and hell, the gods and mankind’. Woland and the Count of Monte Cristo. Voprosy literatury. 2022;(5):176-192. (In Russ.) https://doi.org/10.31425/0042-8795-2022-5-176-192
Views:
224
Email this article 
