CHAPTER VI.
FIFTH PERIOD, THE REIGN OF PETER THE GREAT (1689-1723).
The Fifth Period of Russian literature is that which comprises the reign of Peter the Great, with its reforms, scientific aims, and utter change of views upon nearly all conceivable practical and spiritual subjects.
With the general historical aspects of that reign we cannot deal here.
The culture which Peter I.introduced into Russia was purely utilitarian; and moreover, in precisely that degree which would further the attainment of his ends.

But however imperatively his attention was engaged with other matters, he never neglected to maintain and add to the institutions of general education and special schools, and to order the translation of such works as were adapted to the requirements of his people, as he understood those requirements.
His views on the subject of literature were as peculiar as those on culture, and were guided by the same sternly practical considerations.
But it must be said, that under him the printing-press first acquired in Russia its proper position of importance, and became the instrument for the quick, easy, and universal dissemination and exchange of thought, instead of serving merely as an indifferent substitute for manuscript copies.

Not only were books printed, but also speeches and official poetry for special occasions; and at last the "Russian News" (January, 1703), the first Russian newspaper, keenly and carefully supervised by Peter the Great himself, made its appearance.
At the end of the seventeenth century, only two typographical establishments existed in all Russia: one in the Kieff Catacombs Monastery (which does an immense business in religious books, and cheap prints and paper _ikoni_, or holy pictures); the other in Moscow, in the "Printing-House." In 1711 the first typographical establishment appeared in St.Petersburg, and in 1720 there were already four in the new capital, in addition to new ones in Tchernigoff, Novgorod-Syeversk, and Novgorod; while another had been added in Moscow.

Yet Peter the Great distrusted the literary activity of the monks--and with reason, since most of them opposed his reforms, while many deliberately plotted against him--and in 1700-1701 ordered that monks in the monasteries should be deprived of pens, ink, and paper.
His official, machine-made literature offers nothing of special interest.

But one of the curious phenomena of the epoch was the peasant writer Ivan Tikhonovitch Pososhkoff (born about 1670), a well-to-do, even a rich, man for those days, very well read, and imbued with the spirit of reform.