 1927émigré edition published in Riga | |
| Author | Mikhail Bulgakov |
|---|---|
| Original title | Белая гвардия |
| Language | Russian |
| Publisher | Rossiya (serial) |
Publication date | 1925 |
| Publication place | Soviet Union |
Published in English | 1971 |
| Media type | |
The White Guard (Russian:Белая гвардия) is a novel byMikhail Bulgakov, first published in 1925 in the literary journalRossiya. It was not reprinted in the Soviet Union until 1966.
The White Guard first appeared in serial form in theSoviet-era literary journalRossiya in 1925,[1] but the journal was closed down before the serial was completed. The complete book was published inParis in 1927. A censored version was published in the Soviet Union in 1966. The complete version was published in 1989.
After the first two parts ofThe White Guard had been published inRossiya, Bulgakov was invited to write a version for the stage. He called the playThe Days of the Turbins. It was produced at theMoscow Art Theatre, to great acclaim. According to some sources,Stalin saw it no fewer than 20 times.[1]
In fact, the play completely overshadowed the book, which was in any event virtually unobtainable in any form.
Set inUkraine from late 1918, the novel concerns the fate of the Turbin family as the various armies of theUkrainian War of Independence (theWhite Army, theRed Army, theImperial German Army andUkrainian nationalists) fight over the city of Kiev. Historical figures such asPyotr Wrangel,Symon Petliura and HetmanPavlo Skoropadsky appear as the Turbin family is caught up in the turbulent effects of theOctober Revolution.
The novel's characters belong to the sphere of Ukrainian andRussian intellectuals and officers in the army of Skoropadsky and participate in defending the city from the Ukrainian nationalist forces, led by Petliura, in December 1918. The character Mikhail Shpolyansky is modelled onViktor Shklovsky.[2]
The novel contains manyautobiographical elements. Bulgakov gave the younger Turbin brother some of the characteristics of his own younger brother. The description of the house of the Turbins is that of the house of the Bulgakov family in Kyiv. (It is now preserved and operated as theMikhail Bulgakov Museum.)
Bulgakov's widow hadThe White Guard published in large part in the literary journalMoskva in 1966, at the end of theKhrushchev era. It was the basis for the English translation byMichael Glenny, first published in 1971, which lacks the dream flashback sections. In 2008,Yale University Press published a translation by Marian Schwartz of the complete novel, an edition that won an award.
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