Студопедия

Главная страница Случайная страница

КАТЕГОРИИ:

АвтомобилиАстрономияБиологияГеографияДом и садДругие языкиДругоеИнформатикаИсторияКультураЛитератураЛогикаМатематикаМедицинаМеталлургияМеханикаОбразованиеОхрана трудаПедагогикаПолитикаПравоПсихологияРелигияРиторикаСоциологияСпортСтроительствоТехнологияТуризмФизикаФилософияФинансыХимияЧерчениеЭкологияЭкономикаЭлектроника






The guest made a gesture indicating that he would never tell anyone her name, and went on with his story.






Ivan learned that the Master and the unknown woman fell in love so intensely that they became absolutely inseparable. Ivan could dearly vi-


The Master and Margarita

Sualize the two rooms in the basement apartment, where it was always twilight because of the lilacs and the fence. The shabby red furniture, the writing desk with the clock on it that chimed every half hour, and the books, books that went from the painted floor to the soot-covered ceiling, and the stove.

Ivan learned that his guest and his secret wife had decided, from the very beginning of their intimacy, that it was fate which had brought them together on the corner of Tverskaya and that side street, and that they were meant to be together forever.

Ivan learned from his guest's story how the lovers spent their days. She would arrive, and the first thing she would do was put on an apron and light the oil-stove on the wooden table in the narrow entryway, which also contained the sink that for some reason the poor patient was so proud of. Then she would prepare lunch and serve it on the oval table in the first room. When the May thunderstorms came, and water rushed past the blurred windows and through the gateway, threatening to inundate the lovers' last refuge, they would light the stove and bake potatoes. Steam poured off the potatoes, the charred potato skins made their fingers black. There was laughter in the basement, and after the rain the trees in the garden would shed broken twigs and clusters of white flowers.

When the storms were over and steamy summer arrived, the long-awaited roses they both loved appeared in the vase. The man who called himself the Master worked feverishly on his novel, and the novel also enthralled the unknown woman.

" Really, at times her fascination with it would make me jealous, " whispered Ivan's nocturnal guest who had come from the moonlit balcony.

Running her slender fingers and pointed nails through her hair, she endlessly reread what he had written, and then she sewed the very cap he had shown Ivan. Sometimes she would squat down next to the lower shelves or stand up on a chair next to the upper ones and dust the hundreds of books. She predicted fame, urged him on, and started calling him Master. She waited eagerly for the promised final words about the fifth procurator ofjudea, recited the parts she especially liked in a loud sing-song voice, and said that the novel was her life.

It was finished in August and given to an obscure typist who typed up five copies. And, finally, the time came when they had to leave their secret refuge and go out into the world.

" And I went out into the world, with the novel in my hands, and then my life ended, " whispered the Master, dropping his head-and his sad black cap with the yellow " M" shook for a long time. He went on with his story, but it became somewhat disjointed. The only thing that was clear was that some kind of catastrophe had befallen Ivan's guest.

" It was my first venture into the literary world, but now that it's all over and my ruin is at hand, I think back on it with horror! " said the


Enter the Hero 119

Master in a solemn whisper, raising his hand. " Yes, he dealt me a staggering blow, a staggering blow! "

" Who? " asked Ivan in a barely audible whisper, afraid of interrupting the distraught narrator.

" The editor, I tell you, the editor. Yes, well, he read it. He kept looking at me as if an abscess had blown up my cheek, looked off into the corner, and even giggled with embarrassment. He wheezed and crumpled the manuscript unnecessarily. The questions he asked me seemed insane. He said nothing about the novel itself but asked me who I was, where I came from, whether I'd been writing for a long time, and why nothing had been heard of me before. And then he asked what I thought was a totally idiotic question: who had given me the idea of writing a novel on such a strange subject?

" Finally, I got sick and tired of him, and I asked him straight out whether he was going to publish the novel or not

" He got flustered at this point, began mumbling something and declared that he could not decide the matter alone and that the other members of the editorial board, namely, the critics Latunsky and Ariman and the writer Mstislav Lavrovich, would have to see my work as well. He asked me to come back in two weeks.

" So I went back in two weeks and was greeted by some spinster whose eyes had a cross-eyed squint from chronic lying."

" That's Lapshyonnikova, the editor's secretary, " said Ivan, smiling, only too familiar with the world his guest was describing with such anger.

" Maybe so, " cut in the guest. " In any event, she returned my novel, which was now really tattered and soiled. Trying not to look me in the eye, Lapshyonnikova informed me that they had enough material to last them for two more years and therefore, the question of their publishing my novel was, as she put it, 'not relevant.'

" What do I remember after that? " mumbled the Master, wiping his brow. " Oh yes, the red petals scattered on the title page and my beloved's eyes. Yes, I remember those eyes."

The story of Ivan's guest was becoming more and more muddled and full of gaps. He said something about slanting rain and despair in their basement refuge, and about taking the novel somewhere else. He cried out in a whisper that he didn't blame her for pushing him into the fray, not one bit, oh no, he didn't blame her!

" I remember it, I remember that damned insert page in the newspaper, " muttered the guest, drawing a newspaper page in the air with two fingers, and Ivan guessed from further confused phrases that some other editor had published a large fragment from the novel by the man who called himself the Master.

In his words, not two days passed before an article written by the critic Ariman, entitled " An Enemy under the Editor's Wing, " appeared in another paper, which said that Ivan's guest, taking advantage of the


120 The Master and Margarí a

editor's carelessness and ignorance, had tried to sneak into print an apologia for Jesus Christ.

" Ah, I remember, " cried Ivan, " but I forget your name! "

" Let's leave my name out of it, " replied the guest. " I repeat, it does not exist anymore. That's not what's important. The next day another article appeared in another paper signed by Mstislav Lavrovich, in which the author proposed striking a blow, and a strong one at that, against Pilatism and against that religious freak who had tried to sneak (that damned word again) it into print.

" Stunned by that unheard-of word 'Pilatism, ' I opened a third newspaper. There I saw two articles: one by Latunsky, and the other signed with the initials M. Z. Believe me, Ariman's and Lavrovich's writings seemed like child's play compared with Latunsky's. Suffice it to say, his article was called 'A Militant Old Believer.' I was so absorbed in reading about myself that I didn't even notice her standing in front of me (I'd forgotten to shut the door), holding a wet umbrella and wet newspapers. Her eyes flashed with fire, her hands trembled and were cold. First she rushed over to kiss me, then, pounding her fist on the table, she told me in a hoarse voice that she was going to poison Latunsky."


Поделиться с друзьями:

mylektsii.su - Мои Лекции - 2015-2024 год. (0.009 сек.)Все материалы представленные на сайте исключительно с целью ознакомления читателями и не преследуют коммерческих целей или нарушение авторских прав Пожаловаться на материал