133. At a deeper level, the novel took up mythmaking, salvation through a woman, eternity versus the cut and thrust of the moment, an atheist turned into a believer, the urban environment as a character, and estrangement of the physical world—all hallmarks of Bulgakov’s work. Proffer, Bulgakov, 146. “I love this novel more than all my other writings,” Bulgakov observed in Oct. 1924 of White Guard. Brainina and Dmitrieva, Sovetskie pisateli, III: 86.
134. Rossiia, 1926, no. 4 and 5. A pirated Russian edition of the full novel appeared in Riga in 1927. A complete Russian version, corrected by Bulgakov, was published in Paris under the revised title: Dni Turbinykh (Belaia gvardiia), 2 vols. (Paris: Concorde, 1927). Proffer, Bulgakov, 137–9; Agursky, Third Rome, 305–17; Bulgakov, Early Plays, 86–8. The publisher of the journal Russia, Isai Altshuler, known as Lezhnev, emigrated to Estonia in 1926 and soon declared himself the official representative to sell the rights abroad of Bulgakov’s works, prompting the writer to issue a denial through TASS of any such right. Lyandres, “Russkii pisatel” (Jan. 9, 1928); “Teatral’nyi roman,” in Bulgakov, Izbrannaia proza, 518–41; Chudakova, “Arkhiv Bulgakova.”
135. Boris Vershilov, head of the Moscow Art Theater’s second studio, had sent Bulgakov a penciled note after reading White Guard asking him to render it into a play, which the writer did in four months. Curtis, Manuscripts Don’t Burn, 62. It had premiered on Oct. 5, 1926. Gorchakov, Istoriia Sovetskogo teatra, 132–5; Gorchakov, Theater in Soviet Russia. How the play had gotten approved stumped Moscow cultural circles. Lunacharsky was ordered to open it in a private phone call from Stalin, a fact kept secret. Lunacharsky Moskovskie novosti, April 25, 1993; APRF, f. 3, op. 34, d. 240, l. 2; d. 239, l. 23; Sarnov, Stalin i pisateli, II: 421–2; Krylov, Puti razvitiia teatra, 232;” Lunacharskii, “Pervye novinki sezona,” Izvestiia, Oct. 1926, reprinted in Lunacharskii, Sobranie sochinenii, III: 325–31; Gorchakov, Istoriia Sovetskogo teatra, 133. Gorchakov, Theater in Soviet Russia, 185–7.
136. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 68, 82, 86–8, 742n2. See also Pravda, Feb. 9, 1930 (Kerzhentsev).
137. “‘Polozhenie ego deistvitel’no bezyskhodnoe’: 110–4 (APRF, f. 3, op. 1, d. 241, l. 69–80: Kerzhentsev, Jan. 6, 1929), 114 (l. 83: Voroshilov to Stalin, Jan. 29), 115 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 724, l. 5: Jan. 30); Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 91–6, 99, 100; Proffer, Bulgakov, 275–87.
138. On Feb. 2, 1929, Stalin had written an open reply to the proletarian playwright Vladimir Bill-Belotserkovsky that Turbins “is not such a bad play, because it does more good than harm. Do not forget that the chief impression it leaves with the spectator is one that is favorable to the Bolsheviks: ‘if even such people as the Turbins are compelled to lay down their arms and submit to the will of the people, admit their cause as definitely lost, then the Bolsheviks must be invincible, and there is nothing to be done about it.’ Days of the Turbins is a demonstration of the all-conquering power of Bolshevism. Of course, the author is ‘not guilty’ of this demonstration, but what is that to us?” Sochineniia, XI: 326–9. See also Kemp-Welch, Stalin and the Literary Intelligentsia, 53–5. See also Lunacharsky’s letter to Stalin on Turbins: Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 108–9 (RGASPI, f. 142, op. 1, d. 461, l. 8–80b.: Feb. 12, 1929); Smeliansky, “Destroyers”; and L. M. Leonidov, in Sovetskoe iskusstvo, Dec. 21, 1939.
139. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 102–7 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 1, d. 4490, l. 3–17: Feb. 12, 1929). See also Shapoval, “‘Oni chuvstvuiut sebia, kak gosti . . . ,’” 120–6. The “brotherly” visit of the Ukrainian writers’ delegation was accompanied by exhibitions and performances as part of a Ukrainian week, punctuated by the audience with Stalin. Pravda, Feb. 9, 12, 13, 14, 1929.
