Michail Afanas'evic Bulgakov

The Profile

Born in Kyiv in 1891, Mikhail Bulgakov was a physician turned playwright and novelist who lived and worked in Moscow. He clashed with Soviet censorship, wrote landmark satires like Heart of a Dog and The Fatal Eggs, and completed The Master and Margarita shortly before his death in 1940.

Author of The Master and Margarita; major satirist and playwright; works faced censorship; first publication of his masterpiece appeared posthumously (1966–67) in censored form.

DeBaser’s reviews frame Bulgakov through The Master and Margarita and Heart of a Dog, stressing Soviet censorship, biting satire, and the devil’s gleeful unmasking of hypocrisy. They trace his path from physician to playwright/novelist, his clashes with bureaucracy, and the posthumous, censored publication of his masterpiece in 1966–67. Themes span Pilate’s torment, magic and grotesque humor, and the famous assurance that manuscripts don’t burn.