The novel’s mood is romantic, humorous, and existential. The Master and Margarita breaks apart the human psyche and explores deep metaphysical issues—its plot strands come to grips with good and evil, transgression, sacrifice, and regret. Its engagement with these themes can create moments of unease and anticipation.
Woland strikes an unsettling chord when he first introduces himself to Berlioz and Ivan Nikolayevich. Though lightened by details such as Banga or Pilate’s migraines, Ha-Nozri’s trial and crucifixion is nonetheless fraught. Bulgakov works with a story whose ending is as fixed as it is familiar, allowing the death sentence’s inevitability to loom over the Procurator’s bouts of agonized indecision. In covering vast religious terrain, The Master and Margarita reflects upon human fallibility and fate.
But Bulgakov’s absurd plot balances the novel with a lighthearted streak. The lavishly illogical episodes supply a sense of humor and whimsy. Behemoth—a talking tomcat—struggles in chess games against Woland and gilds his whiskers. The Master, Margarita, and Azazello terrify a cook when they mount a hellish steed on the streets. In another scene, the entire branch of the Commission on Spectacles and Light Entertainment breaks into song. As characters buckle under their own temptations and reality upends itself, Bulgakov opens fantastical possibilities that generate comic relief. The novel finds doses of fun in the diabolical.