Manuscripts Don't Burn: Mikhail Bulgakov A Life in Letters and Diaries [Hardcover]

J. A. E. Curtis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 2, 1992

In his own lifetime, Russian novelist and playwright Mikhail Bulgakov was scarcely published. A quarter of a century after his death, his novel, "The Master and the Margarita", has become a worldwide bestseller. In this book, J.A.E. Curtis presents a chronicle of Bulgakov's life. She is the only Westerner to have been granted access to either his or his wife's diaries which record the nightmarish precariousness of life during the Stalinist purges. She combines this with extracts from letters to and from Bulgakov and with her own commentary. She also includes letters to Stalin, in which Bulgalov pleads to be allowed to emigrate; letters to his siblings; intimate notes to his second and third wives; and letters to and from other writers such as Gorky and Zamyatin.

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Brilliant satirist of life under Stalin, Soviet novelist-playwright Mikhail Bulgakov (1891-1940) struggled to make a career as a "conservative" writer in the 1920s and 1930s. His household was rife with informers and snoops, and though Stalin made him a director of the Moscow Arts Theatre, his plays were banned in 1929 and most of his writings were neither published nor performed during his lifetime. By the time of his death, Bulgakov had suffered nervous collapse and was afraid to be on the street alone. In this documentary biography, Oxford scholar Curtis ( Bulgakov's Last Decade ) splices together the writer's letters and diary entries, correspondence with friends and family, and interpretive commentary as a way to reveal Bulgakov's frustrations, his revulsion at his early medical career and at Soviet tyranny, his struggle through three marriages and his involvement in Moscow's theatrical-literary circles. Bulgakov's prickly, emotionally charged writings--which are excerpted here--flash with irony and wit. Photos.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Bulgakov, one of the great authors of 20th-century Russian literature, is currently the subject of several excellent biographies (e.g., Lesley Milne's Mikhail Bulgakov: In Dialogue with Time; A Critical Biography , Cambridge Univ. Pr., 1990). This work, however, publishes for the first time letters and a diary that were believed lost. Curtis intersperses chronologically arranged groups of Bulgakov's letters, diaries, and speeches with biographical chapters that provide a context for the primary material. Portions of Bulgakov's third wife's diary, telegrams, and other documents complete a very personal picture of the author. As for Bulgakov's diary, ironically, the KGB is to be thanked for making available a copy of it, only recently discovered and released owing to glasnost. After the agency returned the original, Bulgakov promptly burnt it, never keeping a diary again. As an excellent supplement to standard biographies, this is recommended for most collections.
- Ruth M. Ross, Olympic Coll. Lib., Bremerton, Wash.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Overlook Hardcover; First Edition edition (November 2, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0879514620
• ISBN-13: 978-0879514624
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,526,370 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)