Михаил Булгаков: Heart of a Dog

This hilarious, brilliantly inventive novel by the author of The Master and Margarita tells the story of a scroungy Moscow mongrel named Sharik. Thanks to the skills of a renowned Soviet scientist and the transplanted pituitary gland and testes of a petty criminal, Sharik is transformed into a lecherous, vulgar man who spouts Engels and inevitably finds his niche in the bureaucracy as the government official in charge of purging the city of cats.

Review

Bulgakov’s (The Master and Margarita) 1925 satire of the Russian Revolution and the utopian socialist vision of the ‘New Soviet Man’ tells of a surgeon who transplants human body parts into a dog, which results in the dog turning into an uncouth, narcissistic, and ill-mannered lout of a human being. British actor Roy McMillan (Bulldog Drummond) gives a spirited reading of this new translation of Bulgakov’s comic gem. After opening the book with a howl, he narrates the novel in an appropriately dispassionate manner, voicing the doctor as confidently arrogant, giving the dog a working-class (Cockney) accent, and also adeptly rendering the other characters. While likely to do best among those having some knowledge of Russian literature and the Soviet era, this title will appeal to any listener enjoying satirical fantasies, especially as read by McMillan.

—Library Journal, Michael T. Fein, Central Virginia Comm. Coll. Lib., Lynchburg