Mikhail Bulgakov and his house

During his lifetime Mikhail Bulgakov was only known as a playwright, and nobody foresaw that decades later his “problem novel” would be part of school curricula. Today his name has won international acclaim, and all that goes with it: never-ending disputes over his oeuvres, interest in his personality and destiny, and numerous theatrical productions and screen adaptations. For example, last winter Kyiv’s St. Sophia Square saw cantering horses and stern-looking people in military overcoats, while the Turbins’ house was suddenly complemented with a wooden gate and some sheds in the yard – Russian film makers, with director Sergei Sniezhkin at their head, were shooting the series White Guard. Yury Kara’s legendary film The Master and Margarita, banned since it was made in 1994, is now being released.

Bulgakov seems to have chosen the right city to be born in. A school and university student in Kyiv and then a writer in Moscow, he always remembered his Kyiv house whose glow would shed light and cast shadow on his cherished manuscripts. He dreamed of coming back, which is clear from Margarita’s line: “Look, here is your eternal house ahead, which you received as a reward.” And the writer did come back home, to the Bulgakov Museum, now the sanctuary of a true human life – a vanishing phenomenon, typical of Kyiv. To cross the threshold means to sink into the atmosphere of a family without which an integral personality could not be formed.

You can trace the museum’s history and the events dedicated to the “Bulgakov Days” on its website bulgakov.org.ua. On the eve of the anniversary, The Day visited the building on Andriivsky uzviz and spoke to those who breathed life into the writer’s house museum.

“MYSTICAL”

Why did the two worlds – the real one of Bulgakov and the fictional one of the Turbins – settle under the same roof? This is what Kira PITOIEVA, leading specialist, author of the scientific and artistic concepts of the Bulgakov Museum’s exposition, said in this connection:

“Our museum is unusual in that there was a shortage of materials for the exposition, so the building was the main item of the exhibition. We needed to somehow ‘shape’ this empty space, in which, according to the concept, the Bulgakovs and the Turbins live. It is the artist Albert Kryzhopolsky who suggested the way to do this. He said: ‘Let us make a form that looks like real life so that the visitor finds it easy to grasp.’ And we accepted his form of the Turbins’ white world: the space was no longer empty but white. I call this technique ‘allowing for growth’ because white things are more likely to change in the future. It was just like this: once we found the original, we removed the white space. Therefore, in our exposition, things occupy their proper places. The white color that Kryzhopolsky suggested turned out to be mystical – it is like a magnet, attracting the exhibits, and this is also the museum’s peculiarity. The white forms became an important element of a respectful, reverent attitude to this thing of the past – they emphasize it as much as possible, making a ‘box’ for a precious exhibit. The museum introduced a large number of additional features, like color, light, and sound. This is why the whole space became magical and came alive, resulting in an original, museum-staged show. At present it is clear that it was an opportune idea because now, 20 years later, the exposition is still alive and continues to reveal its secrets.

“Bulgakov is ‘mystical’ in that the artist and I managed to find a problem spot in a very short period of time – it was a flash of inspiration that began to grow more and more. I must say I also followed our artist Badri Gubianuri at the The Master and Margarita exhibition and developed an artistic idea into a musical theme. This shows how much an artist matters if he works in tandem with an exhibitor.

“The museum staff, which I keep in high esteem, is also a wish of Bulgakov. On the first pages of The White Guard, the dying mother says to her children: ‘Live in harmony.’ And we live this way – Liudmyla Gubianuri, Anatolii Konchakovsky, Svitlana Burmistrenko, Tetiana Rohozovska, Svitlana Nozhenko, Iryna Sirenko, Valentyna Derid, Tetiana Sheiko, Svitlana Puhach, and Olha Kovalchuk. We invented nothing: Bulgakov inspired all of us and settled the Turbins here. It was all his will, and we are trying to fulfill it.”

FROM A DREAM TO THE BIRTH OF A MUSEUM

Anatolii KONCHAKOVSKY, founder and first director of the Bulgakov Museum, began many years ago to record reminiscences of the writer’s contemporaries and gather archives about Bulgakov’s life, thus starting up the museum’s collection. He is the author of the books Mikhail Bulgakov’s Kyiv (coauthored with Dmytro Malakov); Mikhail Bulgakov’s Library; Mikhail Bulgakov’s Aphorisms, Catchphrases, and Paradoxes; Legends and Facts of the Turbins’ House; et al. He also heads the Kyiv-based literary club “Saturday at Behemoth’s,” which is going to mark its 20th anniversary very soon.

Mr. Konchakovsky, you graduated from the Kyiv Polytechnic and carved out a successful career as a radio engineer at the Kvant research institute. What made you take up the Bulgakov theme?

“I got acquainted with his works when I was young, and The White Guard made the strongest impression on me. I saw real-life people and circumstances in the novel; moreover, it was set in my beloved city, whose topography was before my very eyes. I had begun to love Volodymyr’s Hill without knowing that Bulgakov adored it. Whenever I left, I had a longing for this place, and now I continue to visit it with pleasure. The City is one of The White Guard’s heroes, and it is no coincidence that the writer spells it with a capital letter. This is the way the ancients did: whenever they said ‘City,’ they meant the world’s only and eternal Rome. The same with Bulgakov: the world’s only Kyiv. He not just described these places – he was utterly truthful and never acted against his conscience. I learned from Bulgakov’s books that one should love their heroes – and he himself said that he really loved them.

“And when I read Viktor Nekrasov’s essay The Turbins’ House published in Novy mir in 1967, I came to 13, Andriivsky uzviz, where I met Inna Konchakovska, a daughter of the former owner Vasyl Listovnychy. She welcomed me and showed several photographs of the Bulgakov family. When I was leaving, I felt that this house should turn into a museum. The house has survived and still remembers the family. Inna later acquainted me with Bulgakov’s nieces, Olena Zemska and Varvara Svietlaieva.”

The book Caucasian Letters is an amazing collection of letters that Tatiana Kiselhof, Bulgakov’s first wife, wrote to you. Please tell me about your friendship.

“In 1979 I was on a business trip to Novorossiysk, and she lived close by in Tuapse, so I went to her place to give her a letter from Inna. Tatiana was well over 80 at the time, and I knew she was receiving nobody and did not want to speak about Bulgakov because he had been a White Army officer. But still she received me. I immediately told her why I had come: we hoped even at that moment that there would be a museum in the city Bulgakov was born in. So she agreed to tell me all that she remembered. She was not afraid to give me a few photographs which I took to Kyiv, copied, and mailed back.

“Then I came again several times. We would go to the movies and shops – we even bought her a TV set. Tatiana told me about zemstvo life in Kamianets-Podilsky and Chernivtsi. She remembered all that was described (and not invented) in Notes of a Young Doctor. Bulgakov was a novice doctor. There was nobody to turn to for advice, but he was to assist at childbirths, treat children, combat syphilis, etc. She often accompanied Mikhail in the winter on a sleigh to gravely sick patients, carrying some medical books. He could sometimes say: ‘Open such and such page and read,’ and she read.

“During one of my visits, Tatiana presented me with a bronze table lamp – the one about which a book character says ‘Never pull off the lampshade,’ the one that is central to the novel The White Guard. She used to carry the lamp across the entire Soviet Union, then it stood on the overhead shelf, and the hostess asked me to take it down from there. The lamp – without the shade and the cord – was kept very long in my house, and now it stands in Nikolka’s room. She presented me with the biscuit dish on which the newlyweds Mikhail and Tatiana received gifts on the church wedding day. It is now in the dining room. She also gave me a picture frame from the Kyiv house, a sugar bowl, a glass holder, and a teaspoon that belonged to Bulgakov, as well as some old photographs. They are all in our museum now.”

Did you also have the pleasure to associate with Bulgakov’s second wife?

“In Moscow I happened to attend the lectures of Galina Panfilova-Schneider at the Art Theater museum. I was struck with the bold and interesting way she spoke about the writer’s relationships with the authorities and Stalin, about Bulgakov’s dramaturgy – things the media shunned at the time. She eventually brought me to the house of Liubov Belozerskaya. The latter was a very sociable and worldly woman. It pleased her that Kyiv intended to organize a museum, so she told us very much and gave us photos of her as a schoolgirl and a sister of charity.

“During my frequent visits to Moscow, I met Bulgakov’s friends Natalia Ushakova, Sergei Yermolinsky, and Marika Chimishkian. In Kyiv, I met the Kudriavtsev sisters, the daughters of a colleague of Bulgakov’s father at the Kyiv Theological Academy. They all shared memories and gifted unique photographs and books. When it was decided to establish a museum, I had about 50 items directly linked to Bulgakov. I offered my collection as a gift to the city, only to be told that the museum could not be opened because there were very few items and the house was dilapidated. But the situation was gradually changing, and in 1989 the city council resolved to establish the Mikhail Bulgakov literary and memorial museum. Among those who made a strenuous effort was Tamara Khomenko, director of the Kyiv History Museum, and Ivan Saliy, First Secretary of the Podil District Party Committee. Restoration was carried out in two years under the project of Iryna Malakova. So on May 15, 1991, our house first opened its door to visitors. I wish this door would always remain open to Kyivans and all those who love our city and our great fellow countryman.”

HAVE TEA ON THE VERANDA

Research associate Iryna VOROBIOVA, chairperson, board of directors, Kyiv Bulgakov Museum Foundation, shared her experience in tackling the problem of the museum’s survival in today’s context:

“In 2000 we faced a situation that, in the 21st century, we were short of pens and writing paper, to say nothing of computers. We could not invite anybody to mark Bulgakov’s birthday anniversary because the house was out of elementary order. Could there be any art projects? So we chose to set up a foundation of our own, which required some courage, for none of us was a manager. We learned to apply for grants and won the first of them for the project ‘A Tea Party on Bulgakov’s Veranda.’ That was incredible. We recreated this veranda! In other words, we thought of what people who want to help us, but do not know how, should do. All they have to do is have tea on the veranda. Visitors make a charitable contribution, and we spend this money on maintenance. We issued an appeal to buy a grand piano for reception days. To quote Lariosik Surzhansky: we decided to ‘split’ the instrument into pieces so that every Kyivan could buy a key, a pedal, etc. The first people to bring in money were two pensioners who had heard this on the radio and immediately came. When we bought the grand piano, we invited everybody to a ball, a magical extravaganza staged by Vlad Troitsky. Yevhen Hromov played Debussy in candlelight near the house, and there was another concert inside. The celebration also raged on the roof and along the entire Andriivsky uzviz. Then we held a grape harvesting festival. Our patrons and sponsors can see how we spend all that we receive: we pay for artistic trips, acquire rare items, books and photographs with Bulgakov’s autographs, and fund renovation. The foundation also funded the new exhibit ‘The Master and Margarita.’”

A HOUSE THAT SOUNDS

The current curator and director of the Bulgakov House Museum is Liudmyla GUBIANURI.

When did you first meet Bulgakov?

“I first read The Master and Margarita when I was a 10th-grade schoolgirl: I borrowed it for one night only, so very little was left in my memory except for all-out young-age rapture. And when I was applying to Tartu University, the theme of the entrance-exam essay was ‘Manuscripts Do not Burn.’ I did not choose it, for I could not recall the source of this phrase. It turned out that even at that time, just after the first publication of the novel in the magazine Moskva, Tartu students wrote term papers and graduation theses on Bulgakov. As I studied, I came across new texts by Bulgakov. So I am grateful to the legendary Tartu student life, full of wondrous creative freedom and democracy. When, a certain number of years later, I was invited to work at the Bulgakov Museum, Kyiv was a very Soviet-style city with a lasting tradition of bureaucratic relationships. So I was afraid to come here. The very first thing that struck me was that the women who met me were ‘non-Soviet.’ When I saw the way they spoke, mingled and looked, I immediately thought that I had found the right door. What is precious to me is that it is no coincidence that these people should be working in this house. They found themselves here because they had been looking forward to this and doing some important things that resulted in a museum. Not knowing exactly whether there will be a museum, Anatolii Konchakovsky was busy gathering a collection and meeting people who had seen Bulgakov. Tetiana Rogozovska was the first to conceive and conduct tours of Kyiv’s Bulgakov spots. Kira Pitoieva grew up in a special theatrical situation: she knew very well all the dramatic and prosaic works of Bulgakov, she had mingled with people who were directly involved in the first productions at the Moscow Art Theater and the Kyiv Russian Drama, while her father corresponded with Bulgakov’s sister Nadezhda Zemskaya. Iryna Vorobiova, my fellow student at Tartu, dreamed of being a watchwoman at the Bulgakov Museum. She is a research associate now, and we are all ‘watchwomen’ and guardians. We have the same attitude toward Mikhail Bulgakov and share his values. Educated at the museum from the very beginning by Anatolii Konchakovsky, Kira Pitoieva, and Svitlana Burmistrenko, I am sure today that these values will create the situation that we need.”

What do you think the Bulgakov Museum is today?

“There is a term, ‘mission,’ in museum science, and the chief mission of all the world’s museums is to preserve and hand down [values] to descendants. What is more, each museum has an inner mission of its own. We interpret this as reviving family- and house-related values, which the history of the Bulgakov family’s life within these walls proves convincingly. One can and must attract art patrons and sponsors, but one must not break or do anything to counter to this mission. It is common knowledge that whenever people walked down Andriivsky Uzviz in the times of Bulgakov, they first heard and only then saw it – they remembered it as a house that ‘sounds.’ There were a dozen children, everybody played musical instruments, and music and laughter rang out from the open windows. For this reason, all our projects pivot around family and music celebrations. Kyivans know reception days, as well as ‘The Phantom of the Opera’ project. We like reviving traditions that were little known in the Soviet era, such as Christmas and Easter festivities, name days, etc. We are trying to create a situation, when families can just come to this house and have a good time. People rarely come together nowadays, so our projects help them rally.”

Are there any blank spots in the contemporary Bulgakov studies?

“Very many! The trouble is that Bulgakov was banned for a long time. And a ban on a writer in the Soviet system meant a total ban on them as a personality. The people who could write about Bulgakov, keep documents and photos, were in fear. Also gone are a lot of buildings connected with Bulgakov: they were allowed to pass away, as it happened in Kyiv with 10, Vozdvyzhenska St., where he was born. The writer’s Kyiv period has been researched the least, and finding Bulgakov’s autograph today is like finding an unknown work by Leonardo da Vinci.”

Why is the attitude to The Master and Margarita so polarized?

“Because the novel is both open – it is one of the writer’s techniques – and incomplete. It is no coincidence that the author called The Master… his Faust – like Goethe, he devoted almost all his lifetime, as a writer, to the novel, from 1928 until his death in 1940. The only difference is that Goethe lived twice as long. And had Bulgakov not died, he must have continued to work on The Master… There could be a lot of versions, and no one knows what awaited the reader in the end – emphasis depended on the period of time when he wrote: while the 1920s were ‘vegetarian,’ the 1930s were entirely different. In his film, Yury Kara turns to the earlier versions, which I think is interesting. The question of faith – in The Master… and in the author’s life, remains open. Why are there so many opinions? One of the reasons is that when Bulgakov’s diary and the Heart of a Dog manuscripts were seized during a search, he never kept a new diary and was very cautious in conversation. Even his wives and sister avoided the question of faith and political persuasions in their memoirs.”

And what happened to Bulgakov’s seized diary?

“Bulgakov managed to have it returned and destroyed it. But NKVD had made a copy of it, titled Under a Heel, and one can read it now.”

There is an entry in the museum visitors’ book: “I love Bulgakov very much, for he inspired me to become a doctor.”

“I know a person who became a priest after reading The Master… This is what I call reading the text as a creative process, when each person reads and interprets it in accordance with their own inner world. If one wishes to be modern – and a modern person means an educated person, – they should make an effort to this end. One should always make an effort. When I was taught by Yury Lotman and Zara Mintz, they never accepted the answer ‘I don’t like it.’ They would say: ‘First you read it and try to pass it through yourself and only then conclude for what reason you consider it bad.’ This is the goal of everyone who has opened the book.”

Why does interest in Bulgakov’s oeuvre never flag?

“When Bulgakov, a young man holding a degree from one of the Russian Empire’s most prestigious universities, came to Moscow, his uncles – medical luminaries who had no children of their own – adored the nephew and could have helped him realize himself as a professional. But Bulgakov chose a way of which he said later: ‘Whoever creates does not live without a cross.’ He chose his cross deliberately: on the one hand, this caused his premature death and, on the other, he became an internationally-acclaimed author. Bulgakov is still arousing interest in the world, judging by the number of museum visitors and new translations. For example, there have been as many as three English translations. People are reconsidering his legacy and making new films. But, what is more, Bulgakov’s texts still remain contemporary and topical.”

Is it true that one of the museum’s staff is the descendant of Behemoth?

“Yes, we always keep a tomcat, but we have never lured or brought one. The impression is they do it in turns: once the place becomes vacant, another cat takes over. He comes around by himself, always wearing our black-and-white colors…”