UPD: Added missing chapter!
Bulgakov's major talent is in his capability to transform his impressions and deceptions into satire. He works secretly on The Master and Margarita during the ongoing repression in the Soviet Union in the thirties. It turns into a glorification of freedom and a gorgeous love story, but also into a book by which he took revenge on the soviet literators for thwarting him. No wonder that many characters, locations and houses are fictitious only on the face of things. Sometimes it's a piece of cake to find out about whom Bulgakov is talking, but sometimes it needs more insight.
The Master and Margarita is loaded with interesting, comical, touching, intriguing and sometimes absolutely disgusting characters.