Top 180 Mikhail Bulgakov Quotes (2024 Update)
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101. “The monthly magazine Moskva, otherwise a rather cautious and quiet publication, carried the first part of The Master and Margarita in its November 1966 issue.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

102. “No, make me forget you, then I’ll be free.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

103. “Bulgakov’s gentle irony is a warning against the mistake, more common in our time than we might think, of equating artistic mastery with a sort of saintliness, or, in Kierkegaard’s terms, of confusing the aesthetic with the ethical.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

104. “Yes, man is mortal, but that would still be just a minor problem. The bad thing is that he’s sometimes suddenly mortal, and that’s the whole point! And he can’t possibly say what he’s going to be doing the same evening.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

105. “Bulgakov began work on the first version of the novel early in 1929, or possibly at the end of 1928.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

106. “Koniec seansu! Maestro! Zasuwaj pan marsza!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

107. “His swearing is methodical, continuous, and apparently entirely senseless.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

108. “The dog rose on his hind legs in front of Philip Philipovich and performed obeisance to him.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

109. “If you were to ask certain of your great-great-great-grandmothers, especially those who had a reputation for shyness, they might tell you some remarkable secrets, my dear Margarita Nikolayevna! To draw a parallel – the most amazing combinations can result if you shuffle the pack enough. There are some matters in which even class barriers and frontiers are powerless.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

110. “The cat, covered in dust and standing on its hind legs, bowed to Margarita. Round its neck it was now wearing a made-up white bow tie on an elastic band, with a pair of ladies’ mother-of-pearl binoculars hanging on a cord. It had also gilded its whiskers.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

111. “People who think you can use terror are quite wrong. No, no, terror is useless, whatever its colour – white, red or even brown! Terror completely paralyses the nervous system.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

112. “The pantry was cool and smelled of mice and boots.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

113. “No. Never, not even when falling asleep, will I ever proudly mutter about nothing being able to surprise me. No. As one year has passed, so will another, and it will be just as rich in surprises as the first one... And so I have to go on dutifully learning.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

114. “The lodger told Anfisa, Anna Frantsevna’s long-time and devoted housekeeper, to say, in case he received any telephone calls, that he would be back in ten minutes, and left together with the proper, white-gloved policeman. He not only did not come back in ten minutes, but never came back at all.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

115. “Ah, professor, if only you had discovered a way of rejuvenating hair!” Chapter 2.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

116. “These words, which do not appear in the definitive text, tell us how painfully Bulgakov weighed the question of cowardice and guilt in considering the fate of his hero, and how we should understand the ending of the final.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

117. “Why, when all’s said and done, do I have to think up a pretext for my every action? I mean, it really is torment, not a life!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

118. “This was at dusk, in mid-October. And she left. I lay down on the sofa and fell asleep without turning on the light. I was awakened by the feeling that the octopus was there. Groping in the dark, I barely managed to turn on the light. My pocket watch showed two o’clock in the morning. I was falling ill when I went to bed, and I woke up sick. It suddenly seemed to me that the autumn darkness would push through the glass and pour into the room, and I would drown in it as in ink.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

119. “He’s already the devil knows where!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

120. “These sorrowful musings on my imperfection were nothing compared to the awful realization that I had gained precisely nothing from reading the books of the very best writers; no avenues had opened up, no light gleamed ahead and it had done nothing but depress me. Wormlike, the awful thought began to gnaw at my heart that I should never make a writer.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

121. “I don’t like the news on the radio. It’s always read by girls of some sort who pronounce the place names incomprehensibly. What’s more, one in three of them has a slight speech defect, as though such ones are selected deliberately.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

122. “She gave a little jump and hung in the air a little way above the rug, then she slowly began to be drawn downwards and dropped...”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

123. “What am I crying for, when I’ve got some wine?”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

124. “I was not even aware of getting dressed, which was no simple matter: trousers and shirt, felt boots, over my shirt a leather jerkin, then an overcoat topped by a sheepskin, fur hat, and my bag containing caffeine, camphor, morphine, adrenalin, clamps, sterile dressings, hypodermic, probe, a Browning automatic, cigarettes, matches, watch, stethoscope.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

125. “Trousers don’t suit cats, messire,’ replied the cat with great dignity. ‘Why don’t you tell me to wear boots? Cats always wear boots in fairy tales. But have you ever seen a cat going to a ball without a tie? I don’t want to make myself look ridiculous.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

126. “For an addict there is one pleasure of which no one can deprive him – his ability to spend his time in absolute solitude. And solitude means deep, significant thought; it means, calm, contemplation – and wisdom.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

127. “If You Want To Experience Great Positive Change In Your Life, Always Prune Your Good Habits Towards That Change, And Uproot Any Bad Habits That May Be Limiting You.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

128. “Literature has become my life.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

129. “Twelve men conducted the investigation, gathering as on a knitting-needle the accursed stitches of this complicated case all over Moscow.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

130. “How can we help Mikhail Alexandrovich? By staying hungry? But us, you know, we’re alive!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

131. “It happens that way when a man strives to become the centre of attention, to bring sensational news somewhere.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

132. “This whole speech, extremely silly, tactless and probably politically dangerous, made Pavel Iosifovich shake with rage, but, strange as it might seem, it could be seen from the eyes of the crowd of customers that had gathered that it had aroused sympathy in very many people!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

133. “Then he hung up, the scoundrel!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

134. “But I judge by the eyes – you can’t mistake them either near or far! Oh, eyes are a significant thing! Like a barometer. You can see everything – who has a vast desert in his heart, who can jab you in the ribs with the toe of his boot for no reason at all, and who is afraid of everything.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

135. “The thought that there is no greater misfortune in the world than the loss of reason? Yes, yes, of course, that, too. But that – that’s only a general thought. There’s something else. What is it? An insult, that’s what. Yes, yes, insulting words hurled right in his face by Homeless. And the trouble is not that they were insulting, but that there was truth in them.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

136. “And who’s going to pay the rent – Pushkin?”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

137. “He who does not hurry manages to get everywhere.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

138. “No, what’s the use, there’s no leaving a place like this for any amount of freedom, thought the dog sniffing dismally, I’ve got used to it. I’m a gentleman’s dog, an intelligent being, acquired a taste for the good things of life. And what is freedom? Smoke, mirage, fiction... the raving of those unhappy-democrats...”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

139. “It’s all over,’ the cat said in a weak voice, sprawled languidly in a pool of blood, ‘step back from me for a second, let me say farewell to the earth. Oh, my friend Azazello,’ moaned the cat, bleeding profusely, ‘where are you?’ The cat rolled his fading eyes in the direction of the dining-room door. ‘You did not come to my aid in the moment of unequal battle, you abandoned poor Behemoth, exchanging him for a glass of – admittedly very good – cognac!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

140. “She must either forget him or die herself. It was impossible to go on like this. Impossible! She must forget him, forget him at any cost! But she could not forget him, that was the trouble.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

141. “The coal-black gloom of the darkest night had descended on the terraces of the most beautiful spot on earth, St Vladimir’s Hill, whose brick-paved paths and avenues were hidden beneath a thick layer of virgin snow.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

142. “Follow me, reader! Who told you that there is no true, eternal, and faithful love in the world! May the liar have his foul tongue cut out!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

143. “El hombre es mortal, y, como acertadamente se dijo, es mortal de repente.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

144. “He’s clever,” thought Ivan. “You have to admit, there are some smart people even among the intelligentsia. No denying that!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

145. “Understand that the tongue can conceal the truth, but the eyes – never!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

146. “Of course, when people have been robbed of everything, like you and me, they seek salvation from other-worldly powers!”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

147. “Gods, gods! How sad the evening earth! How mysterious the mists over the bogs! Whoever has wandered in these mists, whoever suffered deeply before death, whoever flew over this earth burdened beyond human strength knows it. The weary one knows it. And he leaves without regret the mists of the earth, its swamps and rivers, and yields himself with an easy heart to the hands of death, knowing that it alone can bring surcease.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

148. “Ali taj koji voli mora dijeliti sudbinu onoga koga voli.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

149. “It is interesting to note that Margarita’s soul was in perfect shape.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov

150. “During abstinence, I’m frightened of rustling noises, people are hateful to me. I’m afraid of them. During the euphoria I love them all, but I prefer solitude.”

— Mikhail Bulgakov