Talk: Bulgakov’s Apartment and The Story of 10 Bolshaya Sadovaya

Talk: Bulgakov’s Apartment and The Story of 10 Bolshaya Sadovaya

10 Bolshaya Sadovaya was the first Moscow address of Mikhail Bulgakov, author Master and Margarita, and present day home to the Bulgakov museum, and the famous stairwell, covered in graffiti by fans of the book. Moscow-based anthropologist Dmitriy Oparin has been studying the house for many years, and has been researching the lives of its other inhabitants that included artists Pyotr Konchalovsky and Vasily Surkkov. It was also frequented by Sergei Esenin, Isadora Duncan, Anatoly Lunacharsky, Valdimir Mayakovsky and others. Oparin is equally interested in the lesser known people who lived there, before and after the revolution, and how life in the building changed in step with the world around it. These included bankers, attorneys, doctors, Soviet printing workers, writers, tailors, policemen and embassy employees. Oparin says: ‘the 20th century history of the whole city, and even country is reflected in this house.’

Dmitriy Oparin, anthropologist, lecturer at Moscow State University, researcher at the Higher School of Economics, researcher at Bulgakov’s museum.

Author of two books about Moscow, based on the memories of its inhabitants, is a specialist in the ethnic history of Moscow and a curator of several museum projects.