Lali et Sainval drame en trois actes en vers libres, représenté pour la premieré fois par les Comediens François de S. M . l'Imperatrice de toutes les Russies. Le 20 de Juin

£12,500 · Offered by Maggs Bros Ltd

The extremely rare, sole edition of this play in print, written and performed just once for Catherine the Great, handsomely printed and likely bound in St Petersburg in 1784. An impressive survival in exceptional condition of an artefact of the cultural francophilia of the Russian imperial court in this period. We have traced no other copies in institutions outside Russia. Written by playwright and French attaché to the Empress’ cabinet, Baron D’Estat, and inspired, as he writes in his Avis aux lectures , by a popular romance*,* the present play was performed by the French troupe at the Empress’ court in St Petersburg on 20 June, 1784. This permanent troupe –made up of actors invited by the Russian court from all over German and French territories – was established under empress Elisabeth and had their first performance in 1743. By Catherine’s rule they cost the Russian court twice as much as the Russian equivalent (Evstratov, p.50), testament to the established ‘cultural and linguistic Gallicization’ of the Russian court that had begun under Catherine’s predecessors and that the Empress continued in earnest. ‘French theatre was at the heart of Catherine’s theatrical and political projects’ (Evstratov, p.15); her trust in the ‘civilising’ function of theatre itself as ‘l’école du peuple’ (Ponzetto, 82) is borne out in listings of French-language plays at her court between 1762 and 1796. They reveal the sheer frequency and variety of such performances, including dramas such as

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