Heart of a Dog by Mikhail Bulgakov Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Heart of a Dog
Book Review: The book was new
Summary: 5 Stars
The book was new as promised, delivered very fast, so I was very glad to have deal with the seller.
Veniamin Belkin
Book Review: Throw the Dogma a Bone
Summary: 4 Stars
Bulgakov's Heart of a Dog deserves to be ranked among the greatest works of satirical writing in the 20th century. Unpublished for over 50 years, due to its harsh criticism of Stalinist Russia, this book is as relevant now as it was in 1925. Although some see in it a single-minded attack of the Socialist mindset, I believe that this view unfairly limits Bulgakov's work to a myopic ideological position. Instead, I believe that the book, through the lampooning of Sharik--a starving stray dog wandering the streets of Moscow, into a petty Marxist bureaucrat by the would be Dr Frankenstien, Philip Philippovich--illustrates the foolishness of blind adherence to any type of dogmatic belief system, rather that be Marxist, Capitalist or religious.If not, the comparison to Pavlov could not hold water because the entire point of conditioning a dog to react in a certain way to a given stimulus, was in the arbitrary nature of the stimulus involved. Thus, while explicitly representing a condemnation of the Stalinist regime, regardless of the terrible realities, Heart of a Dog is an implicit critique of the herd mentality, wherever it may be found. As it is, the mis-adventures of Sharik, as both unwanted dog and "common" man, represents a biting commentary of modernity-a time most rapt by dreams of a Utopian society born from technological achievement.
Book Review: Very good early novel
Summary: 4 Stars
A good early novel by Bulgakov, with a few weaknesses that fortunately get swept quickly aside because this is a very short book (122 pages of generous sized type). The book starts with a few chapters of general character setup, then about half way through really picks up speed of development, even though much of it is dialogue based (and how inventive and effective it is! There are many very funny parts beyond the half-way point). The bizarreness of the evolving events is justified for the reader by the valuable reflections about individual and social-political processes that are displayed.Book Review: What a knockout!
Summary: 5 Stars
I'd always had some trepidation about Bulgakov. Russian literature has such incredible precedents - how d'you compare with Tolstoy, old Dostoy, Turgenev? But Heart of a Dog knocked me for six. Laugh out loud funny, the dog-creation ranks with Papa Karamazov as a ghastly comic character you can't help having a sneaking affection for. It's the perfect short novel, that you'll want to read again and force onto a friend, guaranteed. Unless you're a cat lover.Book Review: Whoo-oo-oo-oo-hooh-hooh-oo!
Summary: 5 Stars
Besides the fact that this book has the greatest, grab-you-by-the-throat beginning I've ever seen, this book establishes Bulgakov in my mind as a giant - in Russian literature, alongside Gogol, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, and Solzhenytsin - and in 20th century literature. Don't let my name-dropping fool you - there is simply no one I can complare Bulgakov to. Who else can get inside the mind, as well as the heart of a dog as he is transformed in to a human-like creature after a gland graft. Blending sharp, piquant writing with pathos and svage satire, this book is a worthy companion to "The Master and Margarita". They sit together on my bookshelf (but never for too long).