“Notes On a Cuff”, Chapter X – Weekly Reads
Dear friends!
Sometimes Bulgakov’s prose is similar to poetry. It is also easy to read and melodic. Take Chapter X of the Cuff Notes as an example! Enjoy reading!
Chapter X. A FOOT-BINDING AND A BLACK MOUSE
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Late one hungry evening, I wade through puddles in the dark. Everything’s boarded up. My feet are in tattered socks and battered shoes. There is no sky. In its place hangs a huge foot-binding. Drunk with despair, I mutter:
“Alexander Pushkin. Lumen coelum. Sancta rosa. (16) And his threats ring out like thunder.”
Am I going mad? A shadow runs from the street lamp.
It’s my shadow, I know. But why is it wearing a top hat, when I’ve got a cap on? Had to take my top hat to market to buy some food. Some good folk bought it to use as a chamberpot. But I won’t sell my heart and brains, even if I’m starving. Despair. A foot-binding overhead and a black mouse in my heart…
16. A quotation from Pushkin’s poem The Poor Knight.
Source: “Notes On the Cuff – And Other Stories”, Mikhail Bulgakov, translated by Alison Rise, Published December 31st 1991 by Ardis Publishers, 0875010571