Ignatiy Yurevich is a playwright, a teacher, an enlightener, who worked in the second half of the 18th century.
Background
There is no much biographic information, including time and place of birth. It is only known, that in the 1780s Yurevich lived in Polotsk district and worked as a teacher in Zabelskiy Dominican College, which was an important centre of literary and theatrical life of the country.
Career
The college organized a school theatre. Its repertory was varied (tragedies, comedies, operettas, etc. were staged). The teachers of the college wrote classical tragedies and comedies on the ancient themes for the theatre. Among them there were the following: a tragedy “Croesus” (1789) and a comedy “Pyshnogelskiy”. The author of these works is Ignatiy Yurevich. The influence of educational ideas is noticeable in them. Using Herodotus’ works as a basis, Yurevich showed senselessness of the war between Persian king Croesus and Lydian king Cyrus in the tragedy “Croesus”. He glorified a peaceful solution for intergovernmental conflicts in this work. In the comedy “Pyshnogelskiy” the author disclosed hard drinking, squandering, moral pettiness of the local gentry. Yurevich wrote his works in Polish, but they were filled with Belorussian words. Yurevich’s works are preserved in the department of manuscripts of the central library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences.