The comedy "Oh, time!" by Catherine II: author's strategies and tactics

Abstract

The ways of Catherine II's influence on the reader, stated through the prism of the author's strategies and tactics that characterize the consciousness of the writer and her focus on forming the model of Enlightenment based on gallant discourse is the subject of the article. The play "Oh, time!", being the first "noble" comedy, becomes the ideological message of the empress addressed to her subjects in order to introduce them to the Enlightenment. Comedy sets the parameters of what to pay attention to, what vices are condemned and how to perceive the reign of Catherine II. The communicative approach, expressed in the study of the author's interaction with the reader, is complemented by a comparative historical, cultural-historical and a method of holistic analysis of the work of art. The research methodology is based on the work of V. V. Sipovsky, P. N. Berkov, Y. Stennik, O. B. Lebedeva, A. Evstratov, Carrer d'Encausse E., K. Sharfa O. I. Eliseeva. The novelty of the research is determined by a new approach to the study of the comedy of Catherine II, which consists in a systematization of author's strategies and tactics, the consideration of which allows us to imagine the regulation of the domestic literary process of the second half of the XVIII century, to see the features of Catherine's Enlightenment, as well as to trace the birth of the author's own thinking, departing from the previous rhetorical system. During the study, three author's strategies were identified: ridiculing the vices of the older generation, supporting the younger generation and approving the model of Catherine's Enlightenment, each of which is implemented through three author's tactics: using speaking surnames within the framework of a traditional comedy of manners, pointing out the discrepancy between words and deeds, condemning domestic tyranny, introducing helper characters, liberation from Domostroi model of behavior, the need for young girls to understand their hearts, ridicule of the previous unenlightened rule, approval of the model of gallant behavior in the family-state, mythologization of their own rule. This not only characterizes the author's consciousness as enlightening, but allows to isolate the image that the writer wants to assert in the perceiving consciousness of the viewer and present the formation of the comedy genre "from within" as the interaction of the author and the reader.