Empress Catherine II produced a body of written material so vast and diverse that it seems impossible to provide a general characterization of the works contained in the authoritative twelve-volume collection assembled by A. N. Pypin from handwritten source material. This book does not attempt an all-embracing review of Catherine’s entire literary output, which consists of works in multiple genres and languages. The Russian empress’s writings have been the repeated subject of serious analysis for nineteenth- and twentieth-century researchers; all of these in one way or another demonstrate that across a variety of genres and formats, with a greater or lesser degree of independence and originality, the literary works of Catherine II always express her politics and ideology. These texts were carefully prepared, their publications and stage productions executed magnificently. As a rule, the most significant works were translated into French, German, and, in some cases, English. European readers, as well as the Russian public, were expected to be attentive witnesses to, and happy consumers of, the monarch’s compositions. Amongst rulers, the literary productivity of the Russian empress has no analogue in history. This volume is the first study in English of the vast literary output of Catherine the Great.
Price: $129.95
Pages: 220
Publisher: Academic Studies Press
Imprint: Academic Studies Press
Series: Ars Rossica
Publication Date:
20 June 2023
Trim Size: 9.21 X 6.14 in
ISBN: 9798887191768
Format: Hardcover
BISACs:
Literature: history & criticism, Literary studies: c 1600 to c 1800, Comparative Literature, European history, Social & cultural history
“[The] book by Proskurina has already become an important milestone in the study of the literary legacy of Catherine II and the Catherinean era as a whole. The book successfully reconstructs the Empress’s efforts to shape a complimentary image of Russia—one that had achieved enlightenment and prosperity under the rule of a philosopher and writer on the throne.”
—Arina Novikova, Ab Imperio (translated from Russian)
“This is the first study in English of the vast literary output of Catherine the Great. In addition to the memoirs, for which she is famous, Catherine wrote—in French, Russian, and German—over two dozen dramas; operas, histories, essays, fairy tales; legislation; and over 10,000 letters. With breadth and precision, Vera Proskurina opens up the vistas of Catherine’s geographic imagination as she set out to conquer Russia, Europe’s Republic of Letters, and the Ottoman Empire with her pen. While she expanded the Russian empire, she wrote with purpose and ambition, creating her Enlightenment persona as the incarnation of her empire. Proskurina reveals how Catherine had her works performed, translated, and published at home and abroad in dialogue with elites in intellectual campaigns that presented Russia and its autocrat to the world as enlightened. Proskurina masterfully traces the imperial legacy of Catherine’s pen.”
— Hilde Hoogenboom, Associate Professor of Russian, School of International Letters & Cultures, Arizona State University
Dr. Vera Proskurina currently works at Emory University. She is the author of several books and numerous articles on Russian literature and the intellectual history of Russia. Her first book, Mikhail Gershenzon: his Life and Myth (1998), was devoted to the Jewish writer and thinker in the first decades of the 20th century. Her next books related to the culture & political symbolism of the 18th century: Myth of Empire: Politics and Literature in the Time of Catherine II (2006), Creating the Empress: Politics and Poetry in the Age of Catherine II (2011), Catherine II’s Empire of Letters: Literature as Politics (2017).
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. The Landscape of the Empire: The Antidote of Catherine II, or the Borders of European Civilization
2. Barbaric Capital: Laughter during the Plague
3. The Poetics of Prototypes: The Political Contexts of the Fairy Tales of Catherine II
4. Territory of Freedom: Dispute by the Palace Walls
5. “Light from the East”: Catherine II in a Fight against Freemasonry
6. Catherine’s Imperial Stride: The Greek Project on the Theatrical Scene
Bibliography
Index
