20. Azazello's Cream

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Azazello

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She dropped the box right on her watch crystal

Here Margarita begins having problems with the fourth dimension - time. Soon she will find herself in the fifth dimension.

As if a needle had been snatched from her brain

After having applied Azazello's cream, Margarita feels easing the pain in her temple which started after her meeting with Azazello and it feels "as if a needle had been snatched from her brain". This needle is also seen with Berlioz in the first chapter and several other places in the novel when humans come into contact with Woland or one of his retinue like, for instance, Stefan (Styopa) Bogdanovich Likhodeev in chapter 7 and Nikanor Ivanovich in chapter 9.

A thundering virtuoso waltz

The action is again accompanied by music, but this time it is not specified, "director" Bulgakov doesn't give any indications as on what musical piece we should imagine to accompany the action.

A squatting dance

Most people know this dance, though not by name: вприсядку (vprisyadku) means sitting, in the context of the typical Russian dance involving crouching on one leg with the other out straight, alternating from one leg to the other in a crouching position.

A sweeping broom, bristles up A shchetka and a vyenik

The word Bulgakov uses for the broom on which Margarita flies away , is not the typical broom which is considered as a witch's broom in the western world. In most western presentations this kind of broom is made of twigs, tied together on a stem. The name of this kind of broom in Russian is веник (vyenik). But in the novel Margarita flies on an ordinary flat-headed broom, a щетка (shchetka).



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