Feminist Screenwriting in the Russian Empire: The Case of Ekaterina Vystavkina

• In Event: 19th-Century Russophone Women Writers III: Memoirs by Actresses and Midwives, Crime Fiction, and Screenplays

Abstract

This paper discusses the beginnings of feminist screenwriting in the Russian Empire. It explores the life and career of Ekaterina Vystavkina, who was a writer, journalist, eminent feminist activist, and screenwriter. Her two major works in cinema, The Bloodless Duel and The Golden Slipper, the first Russian Cinderella film adaptation, reflect the ideas of women’s emancipation and appear to be innovative experiments in plot making and genre. In the 1910s, critics did not understand the feminist message of these films. However, by comparing sources on these films with other texts written by Vystavkina, it is possible to see them as the first major examples of feminist screenwriting in Russia.

Author

• Anna Kovalova, U of Pittsburgh