Contemplating this novel exhausted me! Definitely a must-read.**SPOILERS** (I had to keep notes. Have a pen and paper handy when you read it, especially to write down names).
Satan, a sharp-dressed man with extreme character, named Woland, and his entourage (a black cat, a fanged angel of darkness, and an ex-choirmaster) visit Moscow to avenge - due to their fascist, non-authentic lifestyles - elite members of Russian society.
The first to be visited is an atheist editor who is commissioning a poet to write a poem about how Jesus did not exist. Woland explains to the editor, during a very weird meeting in a park, that Jesus did exist and that he (Woland) was there at the crucifiction, and that despite the editor's status and wealth, he is not in control of his own destiny. Woland then delivers a terrible fate to the editor to prove this. The poet, Bezdomny, whose name means "homeless", witnesses the grizzly event and ends up in a mental hospital.
The novel then takes a turn and focuses on a biblical-time dialogue between Jesus Christ and Pontius Pilate. Jesus claims that the nature of man is innocent and Pilate claims the nature of man is evil.
We all know the story from here - Pilate sentences Jesus to death by crucifiction, based on accusations (Judas) and for not following authority (Caesar) - even though he knows Jesus is innocent. Pilate later pays a price, consciously and spiritually, and so does Jesus, physically. The two carry on a relationship through time and space.
The story then moves forward to 1930’s Russia, focusing on the love affair between the Master (an authentic artist/writer) and Margarita, a rich women with significant intelligence and spirit, who's in an unhappy marriage. The Master is writing the story of Pontius Pilate and Jesus, and Margarita is encouraging his work. She leaves her secure life behind for him.
The couple are living in love and bliss, but because of the literary elites' ridicule and authority, the Master’s tale will never be told and the couple's happy fate comes to an end. The Master checks himself into an asylum (the same one as the poet) and leaves Margarita because of his depression and assumed defeat, and she is left with emptiness and longing for him.
Bezdomny and the Master meet up in the mental hospital and the poet is afterwards transformed, claiming authenticity and new awareness, realising that he was previously a scam of an artist.
Woland, who delivered the horrible fate to the editor, visits Margarita through one of his retinue - Azazello, the charming but frightening angel, and asks her to join him for a night. The promise is she will be reunited with the Master - but first she must host a ball with all of Woland's followers. Margarita asks Azazello if Woland wants to use her for sexual purposes and Azazello smugly says, "in your dreams", and that this is not the reason for his request.
Margarita accepts and begin her journey, becoming a liberated witch and having fun along the way. She has trouble facing His followers (decayed beings who like to party, who have committed some awful crime in the past). However, she is prompted by Woland's gang to treat all the guests humanely. She does, far and beyond, but not without suffering. She is rewarded.
Eventually the fate of everyone is revealed, including our friends back in biblical time, and the novel displays again and again the continual polarity of light and dark, good and evil, confusing the reader... but in a very interesting way.
Did Woland know all along that love would prevail and that Margarita would return to her Master - or perhaps hope this - or plan it? There does not seem to be a higher power other than he, and it does seem that he causes more good and actually goes after the "bad" (why this book was so controversal, I'm sure, and why The Rolling Stones who wrote a song about this novel called it Sympathy for the Devil, including the lyrics, "But what's puzzling you is the nature of my game").
Woland does make a comment to a follower of Jesus: "Where would your light be without darkness? Of course you will not argue me on the point, you are too stupid". He's got a point - would light need to exist, or really exist at all, without darkness?? But this is tricky :)
The complexities are never ending. You have to read and reread to fully grasp this novel.
