Elena Bulgakova proved the truth "with a sweetheart paradise and in a hut" not in word, but in deed. For the sake of Mikhail Bulgakov, she left a wealthy husband and a wealthy life, fully devoting herself to the problems and concerns of the writer.
Mikhail Bulgakov had many curious habits. One of them is to observe people. For this, he loved to go to restaurants. There, the writer found an interesting person for himself and, looking at him, tried to understand what he was and what he was doing in ordinary life. Those around him got the impression that Bulgakov sees through strangers. When Mikhail Afanasyevich first met Elena Shilovskaya, he realized at first glance that he was not just a woman, but his fate. On October 4, 1932, they became legal spouses, but the couple had to build their happiness on the misfortune of others.
Death longing
Elena Bulgakova, nee Nurenberg, belonged to that rare breed of women who become the center of attention wherever they go. However, despite all her virtues, an elegant, intelligent and educated girl under 25 was in the status of an unmarried lady. When Elena was only nineteen, Lieutenant Bokshansky wooed her, Nurenberg persuaded him to marry her older sister Olga, only in 1918 the "skillful matchmaker" herself became a wife. She met a military officer Yuri Neyolov at the funeral of his father, the famous actor Mammoth Dalsky. Yuri told his new friend the tragic and terrible story of the death of the artist - a man fell under the wheels of a tram. Later this episode will appear on the pages of The Master and Margarita. And Elena herself will become the prototype of the main character of the famous novel.
Lieutenant Shilovsky during the First World War. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
At the end of 1918, Neyolov and Nurenberg got married, but this marriage lasted only a few years and cracked at the seams when Yuri entered the 16th Army, where the duties of chief of staff were performed by Yevgeny Shilovsky. The latter, although he was a man of honor, however, gave weakness in love affairs: he closed his eyes to the principles and took Elena Sergeevna away from the family. The couple signed in 1921, in the same year their eldest son Eugene was born, and five years later the youngest, Sergei. Alas, Shilovskaya was not pleased with her loving husband, children, or prosperity. She often wrote letters to her sister, where she talked about experiences, mental anguish and banal boredom. The husband was at work almost all the time, the nanny was in charge of the boys, the housekeeper was in charge, and Elena frankly did not know how to entertain herself. Quiet family life and social entertainment drove her crazy.
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Maka and Luban
Before meeting with Elena, Mikhail Afanasyevich was married twice. His first chosen one was Tatiana Lappa. The girl was ready to give birth to his heir, but the writer was not ready for paternity and insisted on an abortion. Unfortunately, the sacrifices for the sake of the husband were not limited to an interrupted pregnancy. Tatiana went along a difficult path with him: the period when he worked as a military doctor, the time of dependence on morphine and incredible poverty. In April 1924, the couple divorced, as the writer succumbed to a new passion in the person of Lyubov Belozerskaya.
Mikhail Afanasyevich met his second wife in a mansion in Denezhny lane, where the Smenovekhites met with journalists and writers. Bulgakov was dressed with restraint, but on his feet flaunted patent shoes with a bright yellow top, Belozerskaya nicknamed them "chicken" and announced this when meeting the writer. To which he replied: "If an elegant and perfumed lady knew how hard it took me to get these boots, she would not laugh." Then Lyubov realized that this seemingly strict and strong man is easy to offend.
The second meeting of the “scented lady” and Mikhail Afanasyevich took place absolutely by chance on the street. In a short conversation, Belozerskaya told him that she was in the process of divorce and moved to live with relatives. She gave her new address to the writer, and since then he began to visit her often, and once made a marriage proposal. Having got married, they wandered through rented rooms, until they finally settled on Bolshaya Pirogovskaya, in the mansion of the Reshetnikov merchants. Bulgakov called Lyuban's wife, Lyubinka and dear Lyuban, and she called him Maka. The writer invented the nickname himself, once remembering a children's poem about an evil monkey who had three sons: Mika, Maka and Mikuha. "Lyubanya", like her predecessor, helped her genius to create, but gradually the feelings between the spouses began to fade away (not without the help of Elena Shilovskaya). In October 1932, they decided to part ways.
Witch
Elena Shilovskaya began to take an interest in Bulgakov after reading Fatal Eggs and The White Guard. In February 1929, friends invited her to pancakes for Pancake Week. She did not want to go, but when she saw the list of invitees, among which was the name of the writer, she changed her mind. There they met. Later, Shilovskaya admitted that for her it was an unusually "fast love for life." The feelings turned out to be mutual, although at first the newly-made acquaintances tried to simply be friends. Once, having received a small advance, Mikhail Afanasyevich called Elena Sergeevna to drink a mug of beer with him, there was only a boiled egg from the snack. Even then, Elena understood that a completely different life awaited her next to this person, she would have to forget about sables, French perfumes and sandwiches with caviar. But this did not frighten Shilovskaya at all, she was interested and cheerful. Bulgakov loved practical jokes and knew how to joke.
Three months after they met, Mikhail Afanasyevich first told Elena about his idea to write the novel "The Master and Margarita". It was at the Patriarch's Ponds. Having introduced Shilovskaya to the plot, he took her to some strange apartment. And he mysteriously answered all the questions, putting his finger to his lips: "Shhh". There they were met by an old man and a young man. Together with this company, the lovers were sitting by the fireplace at a smartly set table, and suddenly an elderly man turned to Elena Sergeevna: "Can I kiss you?" She agreed, he kissed, and then said: "Witch." Bulgakov only exclaimed: "How he guessed!"
The break with Shilovsky was not easy for Elena Sergeevna. The husband was a noble man and loved her madly. For a while, she even wanted to give up communication with Bulgakov, promising that she would not accept a single letter from him, would not answer the phone if he called, and would not go out on the street alone so as not to accidentally meet him. The separation lasted for 20 long months. But when they ran into each other again, the writer told her: "I cannot live without you." And then he added: "Give me your word that I will die in your arms." Elena vowed to fulfill the request, although at that moment she seemed premature and far from reality - Bulgakov was not even forty then. On the same day, Shilovskaya asked her husband to let her go.
Last will
Several years after the oath that Shilovskaya made to her husband, he kept reminding her of her. And in 1939 he began to raise the topic of his death in the company of friends, albeit in a comical manner: "Well, now my last year has come" or "Yes, you are all good, you will live, and I will die soon." Usually, everyone in the audience took it as a joke, while the writer looked healthy and full of energy. But it was in 1939 that Bulgakov really fell ill with nephrosclerosis. Naturally, as a doctor, he perfectly understood what kind of ending awaited him, moreover, the best doctors in Moscow confirmed his fears. However, after the next visit of some luminary of medicine, the wife tried to calm her husband and inspire him with hope that he could defeat the disease, since Bulgakov loved life very much and did not want to die. Being a sick personthe writer dictated to Shilovskaya and ruled with her "The Master and Margarita".
At the end of his illness, Mikhail Afanasyevich almost lost the ability to speak. A few days before her death, when Elena Sergeevna was sitting at the head of his bed, her husband made it clear that he needed something. She offered medicine, water, and then guessed that her husband was asking for "The Master and Margarita." When they understood each other, Mikhail Afanasyevich was very happy and with great difficulty uttered the barely intelligible: "To know, to know." Shilovskaya did everything so that this and other previously unpublished works of her husband saw the light of day. After Bulgakov's death, she wrote personally to Stalin, but then this did not help to get things moving. The novel "The Master and Margarita" was published only on the seventh attempt of the widow. She was jubilant because she was afraid to die without fulfilling her husband's wishes. Elena Bulgakova survived her husband for 30 years and was buried next to him at the Novodevichy cemetery.
tombstone on the grave of Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov and Elena Sergeevna Bulgakova. Novodevichye cemetery. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
