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“Clever people have been pointing out for a long time that happiness is like good health: when it's there, you don't notice it. But when the years have passed, how you do remember happiness, oh, how you do remember it!”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“I, the unfortunate Doctor Polyakov, who became addicted to morphine in February of this year, warn anyone who may suffer the same fate not to attempt to replace morphine with cocaine. Cocaine is a most foul and insidious poison. Yesterday Anna barely managed to revive me with camphor injections and today I am half dead.”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“Тоскливое состояние"!...
Нет, я, заболевший этой ужасной болезнью, предупреждаю врачей, чтобы они были жалстливее к своим пациентам. Не "тоскливое состояние", а смерть медленная овладевает морфинистом, лишь только вы на час или два лишите его морфия. Воздух не сытнй, его глотать нельзя... в теле нет клеточки, которая бы не жаждела... Чего? Этого нельзя ни определить, не объяснить. Словом, человека нет. Он выключен. Движется, тоскует, страдает труп. Он ничего не хочет, ни о чем не мыслит, кроме морфия. Морфия!
Смерть от жажды - райскаяб блаженная смерть по сравнению с жаждой морфия. Так заживо погребенный, вероятно, ловит последние ничтожные пузырьки воздуха в гробу и раздирает кожу на груди ногтями. Так еретик на костре стонет и шевелится, когда первые языки пламени лижут его ноги...
Смерть - сухая, медленная смерть...
Вот что кроется под этими профессорскими словами "Тоскливое состояние".”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“A morphine addict has one piece of good fortune, which nobody can take away from him—the capacity to spend his life in total solitude. And solitude means important, significant ideas, it means contemplation, tranquillity, wisdom...”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“У морфиниста есть одно счастье, которое у него никто не может отнять,�� способность проводить жизнь в полном одиночестве. А одиночество �� это важные, значительные мысли, это созерцание, спокойствие, мудрость��”
― Михаил Булгаков, Морфий

“A book is open in front of me and this is what it has to
say about the symptoms of morphine withdrawal:

'... morbid anxiety, a nervous depressed condition,
irritability, weakening of the memory, occasional
hallucinations and a mild impairment of consciousness
...'

I have not experienced any hallucinations, but I can
only say that the rest of this description is dull, pedestrian
and totally inadequate.

'Depressed condition' indeed!

Having suffered from this appalling malady, I hereby enjoin
all doctors to be more compassionate toward their
patients. What overtakes the addict deprived of morphine
for a mere hour or two is not a 'depressed condition': it is
slow death. Air is insubstantial, gulping it down is useless
... there is not a cell in one's body that does not crave
... but crave what? This is something which defies analysis
and explanation. In short, the individual ceases to exist:
he is eliminated. The body which moves, agonises and
suffers is a corpse. It wants nothing, can think of nothing
but morphine. To die of thirst is a heavenly, blissful death
compared with the craving for morphine. The feeling must
be something like that of a man buried alive, clawing at the
skin on his chest in the effort to catch the last tiny bubbles
of air in his coffin, or of a heretic at the stake, groaning and
writhing as the first tongues of flame lick at his feet.

Death. A dry, slow death. That is what lurks behind
that clinical, academic phrase 'a depressed condition'.”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“I went, and I swear that I was racked with pain and shame all the way home. Why? The answer’s simple. Ah, my diary, my faithful friend—you at least won’t give me away, will you? It was not because of the suit, but because I also stole some morphine from the hospital. Three cubes in crystal form and ten grammes of 1% solution. But this in itself is not the only thing which interests me. The key was in the lock of the hospital’s drug cabinet. Supposing it had not been. Would I have smashed open the cupboard? Would I? In all honesty? Yes, I would.”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“To die of thirst is a heavenly, blissful death compared with the craving for morphine. The feeling must be something like that of a man buried alive, clawing at the skin on his chest in the effort to catch the last tiny bubbles of air in his coffin, or of a heretic at the stake, groaning and writhing as the first tongues of flame lick at his feet.”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“For the first minute there is a sensation of being touched on my neck. The touch grows warmer and spreads. In the second minute there is a sudden surge of cold in the pit of my stomach, after which I start to think with unusual clarity and experience a burst of mental energy. All unpleasant sensations stop completely. Man’s inner powers are manifested at their absolute peak. And if I had not been spoiled by my medical training, I would say that a man can only work normally after an injection of morphine. After all, what good is a man when the slightest attack of neuralgia can knock him completely off balance?”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“Why, when all's said and done, do I have to think up a pretext for my every action? I mean, it really is torment, not a life!”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“During abstinence, I'm frightened of rustling noises, people are hateful to me. I'm afraid of them. During the euphoria I love them all, but I prefer solitude.”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“Hell, why should I have to find a pretext for every single thing I do?”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“For an addict there is one pleasure of which no one can deprive him—his ability to spend his time in absolute solitude. And solitude means deep, significant thought; it means, calm, contemplation—and wisdom. The night flows on, black and silent. Somewhere out there is the bare leafless forest, beyond it the river, the chill air of autumn. Far away lies the strife-torn, restless city of Moscow. Nothing concerns me, I need nothing and there is nowhere for me to go.”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“The rain is streaming down and shrouding the outside world from my sight. Long may it do so. I don’t need the world any more, and no one in the world needs me. I was in the clinic while the shooting and the coup d’etat took place, but the idea of abandoning the cure had begun insidiously to grow in my mind even before the fighting started in the streets of Moscow. I have the morphine to thank for making me brave. I’m not afraid of rifle fire now.”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“My previous notes must sound somewhat hysterical. In fact there is nothing particularly unusual or alarming about my condition. It does not in the least affect my capacity to work.”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine

“Первая минута: ощущение прикосновения к шее. Это прикосновение становится тёплым и расширяется. Во вторую минуту внезапно проходит холодная волна под ложечкой, а вслед за этим начинается необыкновенное прояснение мыслей и взрыв работоспособности. Абсолютно все неприятные ощущения прекращаются. Это высшая точка проявления духовной силы человека. И если б я не был испорчен медицинским образованием, я бы сказал, что нормально человек может работать только после укола морфием.
...
Но маленькая привычка ведь не есть морфинизм?..”
― Mikhail Bulgakov, Morphine