The Master and Margarita

In Moscow, truth needs a little help from the devil.

In Bulgakov’s allegorical masterpiece of Stalin’s regime, the devil is making a personal appearance in Moscow.

He is accompanied by a strange retinue of demons, including a naked girl and a huge black cat. As they move through the city, order gives way to chaos: the asylums fill, officials lose control and the forces of law are left bewildered.

At the centre of the novel are the Master, a writer devoted to truth, and Margarita, the woman who loves him. Against the absurdity, terror and moral compromise around them, their loyalty becomes one of the few powers able to answer the devil’s onslaught.

Behind the demonic spectacle is a novel about what survives when public life is ruled by fear. Bulgakov writes with dazzling comic freedom, but his deepest concern is serious: the courage to love, to imagine and to tell the truth.

TRANSLATED BY MICHAEL GLENNY, INTRODUCED BY WILL SELF