The Master and Margarita

A novel set in Moscow in the 1930s, where a mysterious foreign visitor arrives with a strange entourage, including a huge talking cat, and begins to upset the city's complacent literary and theatrical circles. Their pranks expose greed, cowardice and hypocrisy in everyday Soviet life. Alongside this runs the story of a persecuted writer, the Master, and his devoted lover Margarita, as well as a retelling of the trial of Jesus under Pontius Pilate. Mixing satire, fantasy, love story and moral reflection, it is a comic and haunting book about courage, conscience and the freedom of art. It was written under censorship and published long after the author's death.