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Catherine II: Anna Moretti

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Catherine II of Russia (1729-1796) is one of the most mythical figures in Russian history. And yet this empress does not have a single drop of Russian blood... Nothing predestined this little German princess, born Sophie Frederica Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst in 1729 in Stettin in Pomerania, to one day become empress of all the Russias, spiritual heir to Peter the Great. Her life is a true novel with its difficult beginnings, numerous obstacles strewn along her path, a coronation followed by military and political triumphs and great disappointments that dot her private life.
Sometimes glorified as a disciple of the Enlightenment and friend of French philosophers, sometimes vilified because of the worsening of serfdom or guilty of regicide, Catherine II is a myth that wavers between black and gold legend. That a woman governs. Pass. Elizabeth had preceded her. But that a woman reforms an empire so vast, so orthodox, so archaic in its oligarchic traditions! And that she wants to lead her private life like a man arouses a flood of fantasies and fabrications. Too many affairs. Too many loves. Too much noise makes her a new Messalina, who prefers her lovers – increasingly young and handsome – to the transmission of the pure blood of the Romanovs.