Opera for Beginners (Part 3 of 3)

[cahn]

I talked about Opera for Beginners for my family reunion talk and used much of the advice I was given here, thank you! :)

-I brought speakers, because there isn't much use in giving an opera talk if you can't hear the music! The hilarious thing was that I was not the only one who had audio/audiovisual components to my presentation, but I was the only one who had brought speakers. I had been a little bitter about lugging them all around Montana, but less so when they turned out to be broadly useful :) What was more irritating was that after they worked fine when I tried them out in my office, they didn't work at all for a while when I was trying to give the talk. Finally my cousin's teenager, who was acting as unofficial tech support, suggested rebooting as a last resort, and of course that worked. Sigh.

-A couple of people mentioned talking about where one might go looking for opera. My biggest recommendations to a newbie are the following:
1.The Chandos Opera in English CDs, without which I would still hate opera today. I highly highly recommend all the Mozart ones, particularly the da Ponte operas (Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte), and the bel canto comedies (e.g., Barber of Seville, The Elixir of Love), and dis-recommend their Verdi except Don Carlos (for some reason Verdi tends to come out a bit muddled). Their French opera also seems to be very good, and I absolutely adore their Eugene Onegin (which stars Thomas Hampson and Kiri te Kanawa).

2. Met On Demand, which comes with a free 7-day trial. People who know a lot about opera rag on the Met for not being adventurous in its staging and concept, which, fair, but for a beginner, in my opinion, that's exactly what you want, and you can't do better than the Met for gorgeous staging and costumes, great singers, and great videography, which I didn't even know would affect me until I started watching a bunch of these... and... it does actually make a huge difference when watching video. (Watching live is, of course, different.)

-I showed several clips, one of which was a 3-minute clip of Kaufmann/Hampson/Salminen in the auto-da-fe scene from Don Carlo. (Alagna/Keenlyside/Furlanetto is still the whole version of Don Carlo I would recommend, but for auto-da-fe out of context I thought the former was better, not least because it didn't have a giant weeping Jesus in the background.) I explained beforehand the background about how Posa is Prince Carlo's best friend but also has the relationship where he has sworn fealty to King Philip. (I have uploaded the clip here (google drive video clip, ~3 minutes) -- mildredofmidgard, I know music/opera is Not Your Thing but this is the moment in Don Carlo I was talking about, check it out) and my big triumph, as far as I am concerned, is that when the clip ended my cousin cried out, "Oh, that's so sad!" MY WORK HERE IS DONE.

-My other great triumph was that E was curious about what I said about Don Giovanni. Being her, she could not care less about Don G himself -- she was perfectly content with a limited understanding that he was the Bad Guy -- but she was particularly interested in what I said about Don G coming to a sticky end, and asked about it the next day. Once I further explained that there was a singing statue and that in many productions Don G disappeared into flames with the statue at the end, both she and A really wanted to watch it, so that afternoon we all snuggled up on the couch and watched "Don Giovanni, a cenar teco" (this one with Rodney Gilfrey) and they still ask for "the statue opera" on occasion. (That's the only part they have watched or are interested in watching, or that I am interested in playing for them, until they're a lot older. Well, okay, "O statua gentilissima," but that's along the same lines.)

-Since you guys said it was fun for people to recognize music in opera, another short clip I showed was from Thais, because, well, I don't know if it's all Koreans or just my particular family, but all our extended relatives LOOOOOVE Meditation from Thais and all of us cousins who play violin (or piano, if that cousin happened to be near one of the cousins who played violin) have had to play that song approximately six million times, every time a third cousin twice removed came to visit. There was much groaning when the melody was revealed :)

-It turns out my aunt (uncle's wife) really likes opera!!!! We are already making plans to go to Salzburg or Italy sometime and watch opera :D (well, pipe dreams right now... I certainly wouldn't go until my kids are older)

(Part 1 was where I asked for help; Part 2 was an outtake of this post about emoting in opera)

Comments

[selenak]

All of which is to say, at great length, here lies another major difference between Katte and Posa, the reluctant follower of his friend's stupid plot vs. the enthusiastic deviser of stupid plots involving his friend. But the parallels are just as clear.

Well, to be fair to Schiller's Posa, one big reason why he starts the overcomplicated intrigue with the letters business is because at that point, Philip is already very suspicious of his son (through no fault of Posa's; Carlos has been denounced by Eboli who's in unrequited love with him), and also, Posa thinks Carlos has just made the mistake of trusting Eboli again with a full confession (he hasn't, and Eboli is already regretful of her actions, but Posa can't know that, whereas he does know Eboli was the one to tell Philip his son and wife are carrying on behind his back). So from Posa's pov there is need for urgent action, especially since simultanously, the situation in the Netherlands is going from bad to worse, the Duke of Alba is about to be dispatched there, and Posa wants Carlos to free the Netherlands, which can only happen if either Philip entrusts his son with the command instead of Alba (fat chance; Carlos tries that earlier and fails) or Carlos gets to the Netherlands and leads the rebellion himself (which is the secondary plan Carlos and Elisabeth are still following in the play's last scene, when Philip and the Inquisition catch up with them).

Incidentally, if we go back to Schiller using the Fritz-Katte-Friedrich-Wilhelm tale for historical inspiration, it's worth remembering that one of the reasons for Katte's death sentence FW explicitly names in his letter to the tribunal is "as Katte plotted treason with the rising sun, and conspired with the legates and ministers of foreign powers"; the major reason for all those letters Wilhelmine and her mother were burning, too, because they did carry out negotations and plottings with the British government not just behind FW's back but explicitly against his will (since he had nixed the idea of a double marriage between Wilhelmine and her cousin the British Crown Prince while Fritz would marry said prince's sister; FW was in general backing away from the British alliance and his wife, who was King George's sister, still pushing for it was a major reason for marital strife and had been for years).

[mildred_of_midgard]

Thank you for expanding on the complicated plots in Schiller! That does make sense. This thread continues to be very educational.

I actually had "talk about the conspiring with foreign powers" aspect of the plot on my list of things to talk about today, so thank you for summarizing that so I don't have to. :D Among other things, there's some evidence that Friedrich's ability to tolerate what his father was putting him through vs. his desires to run away fluctuated in sync with the changes in his marital prospects.

Also, due to vague wording in my sources, I had been under the impression that the 1,500 letters were the incriminating letters between Friedrich and Wilhelmina relating to the escape attempt. If that number also included the foreign correspondence and anything related to the double marriage negotiations, that makes far more sense. (I admit to not memorizing the dozens of pages of chronology related to all those marriage negotiations before and after 1730, omg.)

[selenak]

God yes, those marriage negotiations are a headache to keep straight. (Err, no pun intended.) BTW, I seem to recall Katte also had some family connections in Britain? Mind you, I doubt either the British royals or the nobility would have been pleased to see them actually on the Island, because exiles are rarely welcome, especially when coming without money. Though it is interesting to contemplate what would have happened to European history if, say, Friedrich Wilhelm after a successful escape from Fritz & Katte would have disinherited his oldest son in favour of one of the younger ones. I mean, would Prussia even have become the dominating German state? Friedrich Wilhelm had militarized the country and created its army, and Heinrich was also a good general, but I don't think he had Friedrich's ambition (or stomach for leading a war with several nations at once). And without Prussia as the dominating German state and new European power, who knows what would have become of German history. (Hasten to add this is not meant to blame Friedrich II for the Nazis! But, say, the 1848 Revolution and first attempt at a German constitution might have worked out differently with Prussia as just one of several leading German states, and with half a century of parliamentary monarchy before the 20th century showing up, the unified Germany might have been quite different from the authority-obeying empire it became. And God knows one one would miss Wilhelm II.)

[mildred_of_midgard]

BTW, I seem to recall Katte also had some family connections in Britain?

That may well be the case, but I don't remember coming across this; I remember that he visited London when he did the Grand Tour, but that's all. I'll keep an eye out for it.

Though it is interesting to contemplate what would have happened to European history if, say, Friedrich Wilhelm after a successful escape from Fritz & Katte would have disinherited his oldest son in favour of one of the younger ones.

Yeah, there are so many ways a successful escape attempt could have gone down. Fritz *said* he was always planning on coming back as soon as FW agreed to treat him better. I think that's quite likely; the real question in my mind is whether FW would have backed down in the face of foreign opposition and succession problems, or whether the prospect of losing face would have pushed him into "I never did anything wrong, how sharper than a serpent's tooth, etc." mode.

The problem with disinheriting your oldest son is that you then end up with a Jacobite situation. Just because he's disinherited doesn't mean he doesn't come back with a foreign army; and then if you think there are strong sympathies for him in your own country, you might back down for these reasons alone. But then the ability of FW and Fritz to go toe-to-toe and stare each other in the face and never back down (especially with the power differential mitigated) should not be underestimated. That would have been one interesting game of chicken. "In short, I think there are on this earth no two men quite like them, father and son." (Grumbkow to Seckendorff)

I'm sure the British family would not have been thrilled to have him show up, but, if he's not a permanent penniless exile, he becomes a potential game piece in getting concessions from Prussia. (Question: didn't Versailles agree to offer him asylum?) Like, if he refuses to accept his disinheritance, and there are local sympathies in Prussia, not to mention the Queen's party, you don't even necessarily have to provide your exile with an army. You just spend a lot of time half-bluffing that if he shows up after FW is dead, he's got a plausible claim to the throne and military backing, game over. Then maybe FW backs down, and there's a tearful public reconciliation and a lot of private back-stabbing.

Or maybe Fritz ends up stranded like the Stuarts in Rome, who knows. (With a stronger personality, I still think that's an interesting situation.)

Would Augustus Wilhelm, under his father's tutelage and with Heinrich's services as general, have invaded and held Silesia? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ If so, would the brothers then have gotten Prussia politically maneuvered into the Seven Years' War in the first place? (Again, the politics of the Diplomatic Revolution are more complex than I have mastered, but I seem to recall Fritz blithely making enemies left, right, and center and then going, "I am innocent of this war.") *cough*

If Friedrich is forced to accept his disinheritance, maybe decides living on a country estate and writing poetry is not the worst life ever, then my familiarity with later history is not strong enough for me to speculate intelligently on the AUs (my "period" of European history kind of stops after Napoleon).

Would it have been "enough" for Prussia's future momentum to hold Lower Silesia and concede Upper Silesia? (A plausible outcome of a Fritz-less Prussia, imo.) Would the First Partition of Poland have come along anyway, and might Prussia have benefited from it? Or was the mystique from winning the Seven Years' War against all comers necessary to Prussia's later development through Bismarck into Nazi Germany?

Definitely if Friedrich's personal contributions to the alphaness of Prussia were necessary and could not have been adequately reproduced in part by his brothers and nephew, that does change a lot, and you know, yeah, almost certainly for the better. And yes, on the one hand I can acknowledge that Fritz played his role in a sequence of events that culminated in the Nazis, and on the other, maintain that their propaganda that he would have been totally on board with their program is completely unjustified and he would have been appalled. (Lol, I have this whole reincarnation AU in my head where he ends up going on a rant to which everyone is like, "It's...great that you're so opposed to the Third Reich, but, um, way to make the Holocaust all about you?")

[selenak]

The problem with disinheriting your oldest son is that you then end up with a Jacobite situation. Just because he's disinherited doesn't mean he doesn't come back with a foreign army; and then if you think there are strong sympathies for him in your own country, you might back down for these reasons alone.

Good point, especially given that the Jacobite Situation was very contemporary to FW. (BTW, refreshing my vaguer Hohenzollern memories reminded me that young FW managed to beat up future George II of England when they were both kids, despite being five years younger. No wonder adult George had a general "These Hohenzollern are all nuts, why is my sister married to one?" attitude.)

(Again, the politics of the Diplomatic Revolution are more complex than I have mastered, but I seem to recall Fritz blithely making enemies left, right, and center and then going, "I am innocent of this war."

That's how I recall it, too. There was a recent German tv two parter on young Maria Theresia which took a lot of liberties but did convey the general "What the hell, Prussian Ambassador? Did your king really just say/do that?" attitude quite well. Since both August Wilhelm and Heinrich strike me as more naturally cautious, I doubt they would have ended up in that situation.

And yes, on the one hand I can acknowledge that Fritz played his role in a sequence of events that culminated in the Nazis, and on the other, maintain that their propaganda that he would have been totally on board with their program is completely unjustified and he would have been appalled.

Oh, no question about that. He was ruthless in war, but his Prussia actually had the most modern laws of any German state until Napoleon in terms of citizen's rights, and he'd have regarded the whole racial superiority dogma as vulgar and stupid even before it got genocidal.

Btw, I always thought Goebbels telling Hitler that Roosevelt had died by saying "the Czarina Elizabeth is dead" and the lot of them promptly concluding that this would lead to the US withdrawing because that's what Russia had done in the 7-years-war was a perfect illustration of both historical ignorance and utter delusion about the present on a scale not rivaled until Ceaucesceou went out to greet the masses on his balcony in 1989 and just couldn't understand why they weren't cheering but wanted to kill him.

[mildred_of_midgard]

Good point, especially given that the Jacobite Situation was very contemporary to FW.

That has always been a large part of my explanation for why FW never made serious moves to disinherit Fritz without killing him, regardless of how much he talked about it, and why I don't think Fritz stood a chance offering to give up his place in the succession in exchange for Katte's life.

(BTW, refreshing my vaguer Hohenzollern memories reminded me that young FW managed to beat up future George II of England when they were both kids, despite being five years younger. No wonder adult George had a general "These Hohenzollern are all nuts, why is my sister married to one?" attitude.)

Oh, damn, I had somehow missed that anecdote! No wonder 18th century history, dang.

He was ruthless in war, but his Prussia actually had the most modern laws of any German state until Napoleon in terms of citizen's rights

Yup, yup. Fritz is the living embodiment of the "fair for its day" TV trope.

[mildred_of_midgard]

No wonder adult George had a general "These Hohenzollern are all nuts, why is my sister married to one?" attitude.

Just remembered some article or blog post or something I ran across recently, which began, memorably, "Every happy family is alike. Every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Most of those ways were explored by a Hohenzollern at some point."

Trufax.

[selenak]

Indeed. Though it‘s not like the House of Hannover has much room to throw stones. I mean, Georges I to IV were notorious for hating each other‘s guts as fathers and sons. Though other than George III, none actively tried to kill his offspring, and Farmer George was clinically mad at the time.

BTW, in recent months one of the current Hohenzollern made headlines here in Germany, in typical Hohenzollern fashion.

Prince: So I‘m thinking. Maybe it‘s time for the German state to pay my family some money and/or restore some property to us?

Germans: WTF?

Prince: You did it for the House of Wittelsbach. The Wittelsbacher Ausgleichfond was founded after WWI and is still ongoing.

Germans: A) The Wittelsbach dynasty didn‘t lead us into WWI. That was your ancestor Willy.. B) The Wittelsbach family didn‘t afterwards get chummy with Hitler, despite living in the same province, but wisely kept their distance. Whereas your ancestor Son-of-Willy was all public fawning over AH because for some deluded reason, he thought HItler would restore the monarchy, and even showed up on propaganda occasions like the Day of Potsdam. C) The Wittelsbacher Ausgleichsfond is something the state of Bavaria pays, not the Federal Republic.

Prince: Son-of-Willy was much misunderstood. He was really anti Hitler.

Germans: WTF? There are films, photographs and documents.

Prince: ...he hung out with a friend of Stauffenberg‘s that one time. Now, maybe gimme a castle or two?

Our Insane Family

[mildred_of_midgard]

Way to keep up the family traditions, Modern Guy!

Also, accurate? My nineteenth-century history-fu is too weak to say, but I love the concept and execution.

Re: Our Insane Family

[selenak]

Well, I'm with them on FW 4, not least because that jerk played a big role in the 1848 revolution and first attempt at a unified Germany - but not thanks to military conquest or a dynasty but due to chosen parliamentary representatives from all states coming together - ending in failure.

However, while I understand the sentiment of fighting FW 1, I would point out that this relies on fighting him during the last years of his life when he was ill if you imagine winning or surviving that fight. I mean, we're talking about someone who won physical fights as a kid against a five years older kid (ask George II), who created the army his son would later use for his conquests and who has a track record of physical brutality through his adult life. Sorry, but I think I'd lose such a fight, any day, and so would most people not into martial arts. (Now, why Sophia Dorothea didn't just commission someone to poison him is another question.)

Also, what's F3 ever done to the poster? He was a devoted, mild-mannered husband to Vicky and would have been a progressive ruler, if he hadn't had cancer. Why would you want to fight him?

Re: Our Insane Family

[mildred_of_midgard]

However, while I understand the sentiment of fighting FW 1, I would point out that this relies on fighting him during the last years of his life when he was ill if you imagine winning or surviving that fight.

LOLOL! There are counterarguments to be made, but point definitely taken. Commitment to the fight outstrips size and skill in a great many cases, which, without knowing anything about the anecdote, I'm guessing had a lot to do with the George II as kids situation. As I once saw someone put it, "A serial killer with a clothesline trumps a cheerleader with a bazooka."

Can some of us gang up on an absolute-power-less FW 1, though? Please? No one said it had to be 1 on 1. :P

Also, what's F3 ever done to the poster? He was a devoted, mild-mannered husband to Vicky and would have been a progressive ruler, if he hadn't had cancer. Why would you want to fight him?

I know nothing about him, so cool, thanks! *takes notes*

[mildred_of_midgard]

Oh, Farmer George being clinically mad. Do we still think he had porphyria, or has that theory been discounted? Because FW was supposed to have had porphyria, and I've seen a lot of people argue that it may have contributed to his mistreatment of his family, albeit in more of a "he was in a worse mood when he was in pain" way than a "he literally had no idea what was going on around him" way.

[selenak]

As far as I know, it's a "still under debate" Thing, i.e. the yay and nay sayers of the porphyria theory rage on, but I'm anything but an expert. What's not under debate is that he did attempt to strangle Prinny.

Incidentally, the current Hannovers, true to form, are carrying out a bitter Father-son feud which has now gone to court. They're both called Ernst August (the older one was married to Caroline of Monaco for a while and infamous for beating up reporters and pissing in public when the big fair at Hannover was opened), and if you want to employ Google translate, you can read one typical article about it here.

[cahn]

(Lol, I have this whole reincarnation AU in my head where he ends up going on a rant to which everyone is like, "It's...great that you're so opposed to the Third Reich, but, um, way to make the Holocaust all about you?")

OK obviously you need to WRITE THIS NOW :P

[mildred_of_midgard]

Fritz would totally have made the Holocaust all about him. How DARE you suggest he had anything in common with the Nazis! As any examination of his actual track record will show, he was an ENLIGHTENMENT monarch! Even when he conquered new territory, it was because he was setting out to improve the inhabitants' living conditions, and they were happy to have him!¹

People emigrated to his country so they could have more freedoms than anywhere else in Europe! He wanted to institute even more reforms than he did, but the nobility would have revolted. But he always did his best to protect the peasants, to the point where sometimes unscrupulous peasants took advantage of him this way!

If you're going to get all high-and-mighty about his "legacy" and the "precedents" he set, you need to look at the reforms other monarchs made during and shortly after his lifetime in imitation of him. People like Joseph II, Peter III, Catherine II, Leopold II², and their reforms, which improved the lot of subjects outside of Prussia. You know what happened to French monarchs that *didn't* follow his example, huh?

And don't even get him started on the whole beer-drinking, sausage-eating, German-speaking, Protestant prince the Nazis made him into! He drank champagne (watered because he was opposed to getting drunk^{3 4}), ate spicy French food, and was totally a deist/atheist like those godless commies the Russians that the Nazis hated so much (not that in any universe he would be a commie). Most importantly, he spoke French and wrote in French and studied French literature and wanted nothing to do with German culture, *gag*.

What, you said something about Jews? Sorry, you say they were the main victims of the Nazis? He's pretty sure the biggest victim of the Nazis was HIS REPUTATION, which took DECADES to rehabilitate, omfg. So uncalled for.

Oh, and IF he ever said anything anti-Semitic, that was totally different in the 18th century when everyone he knew was anti-Semitic, and he actually gave Jews more rights than a lot of people did⁵, and if *you*'d lived in the eighteenth century, you would have been brainwashed into a lot of opinions you'd cringe at today too, so don't go getting all holier-than-thou on him.

Also, Napoleon? Paid his respects at Fritz's tomb after defeating Prussia and said, "Hats off, gentlemen; if this man were alive, we wouldn't be here today"⁶, remember that part? Well, if Fritz had been alive in France during WWII, there would have been no fucking Vichy Regime, you better believe that.

<-- I haven't written this AU rant, but something like that, only in the first person.

1. Sometimes true.

2. First European monarch to abolish the death penalty altogether, in Tuscany, the year Fritz died.

3. Poor guy, the only time I know of that he got drunk was when he was about 16/17, and his father forced him to drink (FW did like to drink and smoke with his officers and they all got a bit rowdy at times) until he became intoxicated and started crying that he loved his father, and kissed him, and his father patted him on the head approvingly, like this is all FW ever wanted and is that too much to ask? and finally someone said, "Go home, Fritz, you're drunk," and put him to bed. On AO3, we would tag this "Forced Intoxication".

This story is extremely telling, btw, because alcohol doesn't *make* you aggressive or weepy or rambunctious, it just disinhibits you from whatever you've been exercising self-control over when sober. This anecdote tells you that, quite predictably, young Fritz spent a lot of time REFUSING to break down and cry that he loved his father and why didn't his father love him???

Of course, so does this one nightmare he reported having when he was 48 years old, in which he was arrested, and when he asked why, his sister said it was because he didn't love their father enough. He protested that it wasn't true, but he was carted off to prison anyway. ("Dream interprets self," as my wife likes to say about some of our dreams.)

And also that dream where Fritz asked his father what he thought of what he'd done with the kingdom he inherited, and FW said "Well done, Son", and Fritz told his father that his approval meant more to him than anything in the universe, UGH, Fritz, please get a therapist that hasn't been invented yet. Also *hug*.

Stockholm Syndrome, sigh. I know of very few child abuse survivors who don't have it. P.S. Fritz said a lot of nice things about his father after the latter's death, some of which were objectively true and some of which were pure Stockholm.

4 When Fritz was stressed, he once said, "I'd like to get drunk, but that's not an option, so I write French poetry instead." His reaction, later in life as king, to visiting the prison where he'd been kept and where he'd watched Katte get executed, was to go hole himself off for a while in a bleak mood and write poetry that I assume was emo.

5 I've seen the decree he promulgated regarding the Jews in his kingdom described as "a curious mixture of the medieval and the modern," which describes a lot of Fritz's policies in general. One biographer writes, "In an ocean heaving with irrational cruelty, a sovereign who was merely severe stood out as an island of humanity."

I like to say that Fritz managed to rise above his century in many ways, kept pace with it most of the time, and occasionally dropped the ball vis-a-vis his contemporaries.

I also like to argue, in general, that while cultural relativism is not a thing and I believe in an objective right and wrong, most humans are influenced by what their society is telling them in most respects. Some people manage to be pro-Semitic in a world where anti-Semitism is the default, some manage to be neo-Nazis in a post-Holocaust world, and the majority of people do what their society is doing. I have every reason to believe Fritz's anti-Semitism falls into the third category.

I do also believe that I myself would have some really abysmal beliefs I don't currently have if I had been born in the past, and that even if better ideas were floating around in the ether, I would not necessarily latch onto them in 100% of the cases. This forces me to realize that my hypothetical 23rd century self is probably looking at real me and WTFing on at least a couple of things.

6. Napoleon helped himself to a few of Old Fritz's belongings as memorabilia, including his alarm clock, lol. Told you Fritz was a celebrity!

[selenak]

And don't even get him started on the whole beer-drinking, sausage-eating, German-speaking, Protestant prince the Nazis made him into!

Here I have to protest on behalf on what little honor Nazi propaganda movie makers have, because their Fritz as played by Otto Gebühr does not consume a single sausage, nor does he drink beer. The reason is obvious and has nothing to do with historical authenticity. Hitler was a vegetarian and officially didn't drink alcohol, either. (Unofficially, I think he did when the Nazis were still a rising party and consuming beer was the done thing to be one with the people, etc., but not after, as far as propaganda was concerned.) And since the whole point of those movies was to tell the population AH was Fridericus Redivivus: no sausage for Gebühr!Fritzi. (Don't forget, Hitler fancied himself a patron of the arts and stiffled artist, too, with the academy in Vienna who wouldn't have him standing in for FW in his mind.)

All of which goes to say: one thing I'm missing in your rant-by-Fritz is that he would suspect this whole Nazi appropriation of him is one last Austrian revenge act, because Hitler was Austrian, after all, and didn't the Austrians manage to put the blame for the Nazis entirely on Prussia/Germany while styling themselves "the first victim of Nazi aggression", complete with Hollywood movie?

All kidding aside, if you want a flavor of the full vileness of their version of Fritz, YouTube has the clip from Der große König where Friedrich is arguing with Heinrich after Kunersdorf. Heinrich wants to sue for peace. Friedrich says never and then goes on into a rant on how the Habsburgs have lost all claim to lead Germans because in "their many blooded empire" they treat people of "foreign blood" the same as their German subjects. Etc. I.e. Nazi racism literally put into the mouth of a historical figure who had his own -isms, sure, but never that one.

[cahn]

...okay, wow, I am sort of dying here that a) Nazis were actually just as bad as we always think they are, but b) not in exactly the way that I/mildred had imagined, but c) only so they could make movie!Fritz be more like Hitler, and most of all d) Fritz' paranoid self turning it into an Austrian conspiracy. Friiiiiiiitz!

[mildred_of_midgard]

I'm still mad at the Nazis for protecting his body during WWII! Because I *like* being able to visit his grave, and in a totally irrational way I'm glad he finally ended up where he wanted, and I'm incensed at the fact that the Nazis and their fucked up priorities played any role in this at all, and more generally at the fact that we're fanboying/fanpersoning the same individual in the first place. Grrrr. GTFO of my fandom, Nazi scum! I'd rather have millions of living people saved than one corpse; I'd rather have one living person than a million corpses.

Oh, I don't remember if we've brought up the specifics yet, but during the allied bombing of Berlin, Fritz and FW's coffins got removed for safety by those-whose-names-will-not-be-spoken to an underground mine, behind a really thick wall. Some American soldiers eventually found them there after the war. Then they got shuffled around to churches and castles and whatnot, until 1991.

Of course, if anyone had listened to Fritz in the first place, none of this would have been necessary: Sanssouci escaped the bombing--iirc, because the bombing was concentrated around Berlin, and Sanssouci was far enough removed on the fringes in Potsdam--which is why there's still that lovely palace and park there today. (And again, would rather spare one living person than all the palaces and historic sites in the world.)

Mmm, don't know if we mentioned this either, but Küstrin (site of Katte's execution and Fritz's imprisonment), right on the Polish side of the border these days (are you paying attention, teenage mildred_of_midgard and your 18th-century mental map?), *was* bombed out of existence at the end of WWII, and is now a set of ruins you can go visit (and which I might, if the planets align).

[mildred_of_midgard]

Quite correct, "Nazis made him into" was an an anachronistic conflating of what they themselves invented with German nationalistic propaganda that predated them, and which they inherited, built on, and modified. This is what happens when I step outside my period. ;) But unless my memory is very much shot, there was a historical tendency for more than a century before 1933 to turn Fritz into a model German prince instead of the "I do whatever the fuck I want" prince he really was*, that we can be pretty sure he would also have objected to.

* More accurate, or at least more complete, than "Francophile," which was merely one side of a polutropos man.

Re the Austrians, that is an excellent point! I shall update my mental rant.

[cahn]

(I am mostly just reading your and mildred_of_midgard's exchanges with great glee. This is MOST EXCELLENT.)

Well, but it's even more complicated than that, right? Philip is super suspicious, yes, but Posa doesn't decide he has to frame himself with his (made-up) letter until Posa thinks Carlos is making a full confession to Eboli, true, but Posa only thinks this because Carlos has gone to Eboli to ask her to warn the Queen -- because Posa started this whole thing of showing Philip the letters in the first place, and never told Carlos that he was doing this OR that he wasn't showing the King a particular semi-incriminating letter from the Queen. Posa, could you just tell someone your plans?!

[selenak]

Posa, could you just tell someone your plans?!

Thus say we all. :) I mean, he was a bit time pressed, but still, there was an interlude where he could have done, between:

Philip: I Need a hero I need an honest man to advise me. You've impressed me by having done heroics while never asking for any royal favours in return. Please advise me!
Posa: Yay freedom of thought! Here's why and how you should reform your empire.
Philip: Not buying that, but you know, I really like you. I've been told my wife and son are having an affair. Any opinions on that?
Posa: No way. I happen to know that the person who told you came on to Carlos just the other day. Also, the Queen is into politics, and you're not allowing her to participate in government so the only interest she has in your son is political. But tell you what, let me check out the situation for you, and I'll report.
Philip: Sounds like a plan. You're officially my Trusted Lieutenant now.
*next Scene*

Posa: Carlos, for reasons I totally can't explain right now I need all your letters.
Carlos: Err, okay?

THAT. That would have been the point to explain, Posa!

[mildred_of_midgard]

Oh, lol, this sounds like so much fun.

[cahn]

RIGHT?! Like, okay, you're in a bit of a hurry, but you could at LEAST have taken thirty seconds to go, "Look, the King totally thinks you're getting it on with the Queen, and so I'm going to show him all your other letters, which he doesn't care about, and NOT that one from the Queen."

...now that I write that out, I guess Posa must totally not trust Carlos to keep hold of his own half-incriminating letter, given how insistent he was about taking that one too. But he could... also have told Carlos that? It wouldn't have been any weirder than "hey, gimme all your letters. Yeah, including that one."

(lol, I adore your synopses)

[mildred_of_midgard]

Selenak's synopses are amaaaaaazing. ("Amaaaaaaazing" is technically a different word from "amazing". :-P)

[mildred_of_midgard]

I'm glad you're gleeful about this! Because I've gone completely off topic now that Selenak has shown up, and am only making an occasional nod for form's sake in the direction of opera for beginners. ;) There's even been Game of Thrones!

I am gleeful myself. Thank you for hosting the Fritz party.