To Kill a Serpent in the Shell
Akunin, Boris / Orlich, Ileana Alexandra
To Kill a Serpent in the Shell dramatizes the final year of Tsarevna Sofia's regency, interrogating Russia's history while subtly confronting the Russia of today. The play, both a riddle and a fantasy, depicts the political rivalry between the regent and her lover, Vasili Golitsyn, on the one hand, and the young Tsar Peter on the other.The regency's incipient humanism, espoused in Golitsyn's consideration for the well-being of the Russian peop...