This study presents a critical analysis of Mikhail Bulgakov's novel The White Guard, focusing on themes such as family, loss and the search for meaning in a world engulfed by violence. Through detailed analyses of key scenes and character interactions, it examines how Bulgakov uses symbolism and imagery to convey the profound psychological impact of the Russian Civil War on individuals and society.

Keywords: Mikhail Bulgakov, The White Guard (Белая гвардия), Russian Revolution, Russian Civil War, Analysis, Novel, Literature, 20th Century Literature

Creativity of any writer reflects his personal life experience. On this many works of M. A. Bulgakov — it is his personal experiences of those or other life situations. Mikhail Afanasievich Bulgakov is one of the most prominent and controversial writers of Russia in the XX century.

Mikhail Bulgakov was born May 3 (15), 1891 in Kiev. He received an excellent education: the First Kiev Gymnasium, and then Kiev University (Medical Faculty).

After graduation in 1916 he began to work as a doctor in one of Kiev hospitals. During the civil war since 1919 he was drafted into various military formations of the transitional governments in Ukraine. By the will of fate he did not leave Russia with the volunteer army of Denikin, but stayed in his homeland. With the arrival of the Red Army in Ukraine and the establishment of Soviet power, the past service, although as a doctor in military formations, had to be concealed. Therefore, since 1921 the family of M. A. Bulgakov moved to Ukraine. A. Bulgakov moved to Moscow, where he began his literary activities. The most mature of his works M. A. Bulgakov wrote in the period from 1924–1928.

One of the outstanding novels, which describes the historical events taking place in Kiev and throughout Ukraine, the novel by M. A. Bulgakov “White Guard”.

The period of history described in the work — 1918–1919, the place of events — Ukraine, Kiev.

The novel is fully autobiographical, the writer himself lived through these years in Kiev. Also, like one of the main characters, was a doctor.This period of our history is terrible: the collapse of the empire, powerlessness, anarchy, German occupation of Ukraine. Intellectuals, middle class, clergy, military in complete confusion and despondency, bordering on panic. And all this against the background of terrible hatred of the people for everything that embodied the government, a complete collapse of morals, morality, human life is worth nothing. All this horror of historical retrospect the author conveys through the experiences of the main characters of the Turbin family and their closest friends — officers of the Russian army: Myshlaevsky, Karasya, officer-adjutant Shervinsky. Very sympathetic is the character of Hilarion, the nephew of the Turbins, an unsightly, shy and very impractical young man who fell like thunder in broad daylight from Zhitomir (the image is most likely a composite and taken from relatives and acquaintances of M. A. Bulgakov's parents-in-law, his wife's father was a tax inspector).

The same events are described by K. Paustovsky in his works of that time, and also autobiographically. The collapse and inevitability of the impending catastrophe both writers convey very accurately and very similarly it is understandable (both lived at that time, both experienced all this horror, both graduated from the same gymnasium Paustovsky two grades younger). But there is one significant difference — M. A. Bulgakov writes his works through the prism of the books of the New and Old Testament, it affects the origin and home education (both maternal and paternal grandfathers are priests). One of the strongest scenes in the novel is Elena Vasilyevna Turbina's prayer for her dying brother Alexei. At the end of the novel, the author compares everything that happens to the main characters (the funeral of her mother, the desperate hopelessness of what is happening around her, Alexei's wounding and typhus, etc.) with the chapters of John the Theologian's apocalypse: “and there will be a new heaven and a new sun.

The author lets everything that happens in Bulgakov's works pass through his inner world. There is an understanding of historical processes and interrelationships with faith in God and in the predetermination of what is happening. Events occurring in the period from 1917 to the end of the Great Patriotic War for our homeland were sacred. All these terrible trials are not accidental. Even before the revolution of 1917, the population of the Russian Empire was rapidly churched. For example, my grandfather told me that while serving in the army in 1914, only up to 20 % of servicemen went out to worship. All this led to confusion in the minds of the ordinary population. The departure from faith in God to the terrible consequences of the revolution, the rejection of the Tsar as God's anointed and the murder of the entire royal family. M. A. Bulgakov, having a spiritual education perfectly understands that the departure of the peoples of Russia from the basic values will not just go away. And for all this will have to pay a bloody price (civil war, the period of repression and the Great Patriotic War.). This understanding is very deeply traced in many of Bulgakov's works and yet the author adheres to his basic life position: A Russian man and writer can live only in Russia, no matter what governments will be at that. He clearly understands the missionary role of the Russian people in history and this is the main idea of all his work.

Why I chose this work, because my family at that time lived in Kremenchug and experienced all this, my grandfather and great-grandfather were mobilized one Wrangel the other Denikin. And today the events occurring in Ukraine with horrifying accuracy repeated: the same slogans, the same ideas of nationalism and the titular chosenness, the same anger and hatred, and the same boredom and hopelessness of the bulk of the population. The departure of the people of today's Ukraine, already as a state, from universal Orthodox norms, positioning itself as “anti-Russia”, persecution of the Orthodox Church — all this is a repetition of history, as the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, and the history of the Old Testament of the Israeli people. The result will be the same as with the construction of the Tower of Babel, the periods of the Old Testament judges, the prophecies of the New Testament (the peoples who will reject the true God will be scattered). In general, the period of history since the Bourgeois Revolution of 1905 and the end of the Great Patriotic War in 1945 is 40 years, during this time having passed huge tests (the Revolution of 1917, the Civil War, the period of “repressions” and the Great Patriotic War), the generations of our people have become completely different. The very people inhabiting our country have been transformed. The parallel with the Old Testament book of Exodus is unavoidable. Moses also led his people for 40 years, so that they would be reborn and enter the Promised Land in a completely different spiritual quality. Today something similar is happening, right before our eyes in the post-Soviet space (and this is primarily Russia, Ukraine, Belarus) there is the birth of new generations, which will already live in completely different realities.

History is repeating itself, but all this will pass and will be washed away unfortunately with blood and in the end there should be something new, a new sky, a new sun otherwise.

...it can't be otherwise.To summarize, we can say that in his work M. A. Bulgakov, and not only he, and all writers of that period have a common paradigm describing the historical events listed above, the whole tragedy they do not lose faith in the future. The heroes of the work certainly create chaos in the understanding of the inner and outer world, but there is no decadence, no hopelessness, and inside as a pivot feels faith in the future, that is, all the events that happen to them at the moment, it is all temporary, it will all pass, they certainly do not understand how and what will be next, but what will be they are sure of it. This is what distinguishes the writers who remained on the territory of the Russian Empire from the writer's migration. This is the distinctive feature of our people. Our people always perceive hard times as a temporary and sometimes inevitable necessity to achieve some future goals, future life. This is the basis of our faith, which sits in us on a hidden level.

This is especially evident in the character of Alexei, who at the very beginning of the novel “The White Guard” is a principled man with a maximalist point of view, who has lost faith in everything and does not believe in anyone. And at the end of the novel, it is already a completely different person who has experienced his personal drama, who has gone through his cross (wounding, illness on the verge of death). He is silent, pensive, all the past is gone, it is already decrepit. And he is on the threshold of something new.

History repeats itself, but all this will pass and will be washed away with blood and in the end there must be something new, a new sky, a new sun otherwise.

...it can't be otherwise.

...it can't be otherwise.

References:

1. Bulgakov, Mikhail. The White Guard. Translated by Marian Schwartz, Yale University Press, 2008.
2. Milne, Lesley. Mikhail Bulgakov: A Critical Biography. Cambridge University Press, 1990.