A summary of Mikhail Bulgakov’s "Theatrical Novel"

This book is an unfinished satirical work written in 1936. The text’s main value lies in its autobiographical plot: the author wittily describes the behind-the-scenes life of the Moscow Art Theater and parodies its celebrated founders. In 2002, directors Oleg Babitsky and Yuri Goldin made a television film of the same name based on this text. The adaptation was broadcast to great acclaim on Russian television channels.

Publisher’s Preface and Concept

The fictitious author of the preface reports the suicide of his friend, Sergei Maksudov. The tragedy occurred in the spring in Kyiv. Before his death, Sergei sent his friend a thick parcel containing his notes and a request to publish them under a false name. The publisher claims the deceased worked as a minor clerk at the newspaper "Vestnik Parokhodstva" (Shipship Herald) and had never had any connection with the stage. All the events described are the product of the author’s morbid imagination, who suffered from melancholy. The notes were given a title, the epigraph was removed, and the punctuation was corrected.

Nightmares and reading the manuscript

Working at the newspaper weighs heavily on Maksudov. He spends his nights writing a long work in his gloomy attic room. The plot is born from dreams of his hometown, a snowy winter, and the civil war. Having finished, Sergei reads the manuscript to his literary acquaintances. The guests enjoy refreshments, and the elderly writer Likospastov loudly criticizes the language of the text. His friends praise the plot but deliver a harsh verdict: "The censors will not approve your text under any circumstances."

Left completely alone after the death of his old cat, Maksudov falls into despair. He steals a Browning from his friend Parfen Ivanovich and decides to take his own life. Sergei lies down on the floor next to the kerosene stove and puts the barrel to his temple as the opera "Faust" plays from the neighboring apartment. At that moment, a knock is heard. Ilya Rudolfi, the editor of a private magazine, enters the room.

Publication and new acquaintances

Rudolfi takes the manuscript, quickly devours it, and agrees to publish it. Maksudov visits the publisher, Makar Rvatsky. The contract is signed in a strange office filled with boxes of sprats. Rvatsky soon flees abroad with all the money.

The magazine manages to publish. Maksudov receives author’s copies and attends a critics’ party. Writer Izmail Bondarevsky boasts of his foreign suits and shares tales of brawls on the Champs-Élysées. Writer Yegor Agapenov tries to persuade Sergei to let his provincial relative spend the night. The hero finds social life boring. Soon, he falls ill with a severe case of the flu. After recovering from his illness, Maksudov goes to see Rodolfi and learns devastating news: the editor has fled to America without a trace, and the entire magazine’s circulation has disappeared.

The Magic of the Training Stage

Maksudov returns to writing newspaper essays. In the evenings, he watches as the characters in his texts come to life on the pages of his manuscript. In a small box of light and shadow, they move, argue, and shoot. Sergei decides to record these visions and creates a play of thirteen scenes.

Suddenly, the hero receives a letter from Ksavery Ilchin, director of the Independent Theater’s Educational Stage. Ilchin proposes reworking the text into a theatrical production. Maksudov finds himself in the auditorium for the first time. The dim light, the mysterious atmosphere, and the set in the form of a huge golden horse captivate his heart forever.

Portrait Gallery and the Enslaving Contract

Sergei reads the play to Ilchin, the female director, Yevlampiya Petrovna, and the head of the literary department, Misha Panin. Soon, Maksudov is invited to the theater building to sign a contract. Actor Pyotr Bombardov gives Sergei a tour of the foyer. Portraits of Sarah Bernhardt, Molière, actress Lyudmila Pryakhina, and even the Roman Emperor Nero hang on the walls. Bombardov tells the story of General Komarovsky, who left the military for the stage and was an excellent imitator of birdsong.

Maksudov finds himself in Gavriil Stepanovich’s luxurious office. The contract terms are absolutely servile: the author forfeits the right to distribute the text to other cities and agrees to any changes. The manager haggles at length, complains of his own poverty, and gives Sergei an advance of five hundred rubles instead of the promised two thousand.

Theatre anteroom

The play proves too long. Maksudov attempts to shorten the text in the so-called antechamber — the reception room of secretary Polixena Toropetskaya. A frenetic bustle rages here. Toropetskaya masterfully types, answers countless phone calls, and receives telegrams from co-director Aristarkh Platonovich in India.

The hero meets the administrator, Philipp Tulumbasov. This charming man unerringly distributes tickets among the patrons. Tulumbasov instantly deciphers the hidden motives of each petitioner: he consoles a woman who has lost her purse, distributes complimentary tickets to actors, and organizes a firefighter’s funeral. Soon, Maksudov sees a poster with his name next to Aeschylus and Sophocles. Director Foma Strizh announces he will take on the production. The envious Likospastov mocks Sergei, and the critic Volkodav writes a scathing feuilleton.

Audience in Sivtsev Vrazhek

The final decision on the production falls to director Ivan Vasilyevich. Maksudov goes to his home. The director’s house resembles a strange fortress with oak doors, quiet servants, and very strict rules.

The reading is disastrous. Ivan Vasilyevich doesn’t laugh at the comical scenes. He’s terrified of gunshots and demands that a character stab himself with a dagger somewhere in the distance. The director suggests absurd revisions: turning the hero’s young sister into his fifty-year-old mother, Antonina. During the reading, actress Lyudmila Pryakhina bursts into the room, sobbing. She frightens a fat cat, who, in a panic, tears an expensive curtain with his claws. Ivan Vasilyevich calmly dismisses this scandal as a useful acting lesson.

Maksudov falls into depression. The experienced Bombardov explains the unspoken rules to Sergei: arguing with the director is strictly forbidden. Ivan Vasilyevich and Aristarkh Platonovich have not spoken since the late nineteenth century and have long since divided their spheres of influence. Any resistance from the director will lead to the collapse of the production. Over dinner, Bombardov tells the astonishing story of the actor Gerasim Nikolayevich, who was miraculously cured of fatal sarcoma in the Swiss Alps.

Theory in action and the death of hope

Months later, Foma Strizh summons Maksudov to a rehearsal. Sergei watches the troupe work hard. Conductor Romanus is arguing with the assistant director about the musicians, who are locked in a cramped corner.

Soon, Ivan Vasilyevich arrives in the stalls. They wrap him in a warm blanket, and he begins to apply his famous theory of mastery. The director forces the comedian Patrikeev to ride an old fake bicycle around an actress for hours to prove his ardent love. The actors are forced to sit on their own hands, hide invisible wallets, and write love letters in the air. A huge crowd forms for the fire scene, where Pryakhina shouts her own invented lines about saving chests and diamonds.

Maksudov realizes the absolute inadequacy of this system for his play. The monotonous exercises drag on for months. The actors begin feigning runny noses to escape rehearsals for billiards and odd jobs at other clubs. Ivan Vasilyevich insistently demands that the sword duel scene be completed. The hero loses all hope of seeing his creation on stage. He firmly understands that his text has been forever lost in the abyss of bureaucracy and far-fetched theatrical theories.