ABSTRACT
Catherine II's manifesto of July 6, 1762, announced a new force that was henceforth to direct the life of the Russian state. Catherine declared in her manifesto that autocratic power by itself, without the accidental, nonobligatory restraint of good and philanthropic qualities, is an evil harmful to the state. Catherine assigned a very large place in her writing activity to dramatic composition. She was the principal supplier of the repertoire for the theater in her Hermitage, where she gathered a select company. She wrote "proverbs", or vaudevilles, comedies, comic operas, even 'historical representations from the life of Rurik and Oleg, an imitation of Shakespeare'. Oleg was produced at the municipal theater in St. Petersburg on the occasion of the peace with Turkey at Jassy, with extraordinary splendor: more than 700 performers and extras took the stage.
