Ha, I was waiting to see if selenak had something to offer first. But I suspected her knowledge might be limited to German sources, just as mine is limited to English.
Sadly, I have further limitations, which are:
1) Most of the Fritz reading I've done was 20 years ago, when I was ~15 years old, and thus, while I remember a surprising amount of facts, I don't remember much about authors. 2) Due to chronic pain, I can no longer read physical books and can only read e-books. Not many of the Fritz bios have been converted to e-books.
So with these limitations, the only biography I can currently recommend as a starting point is Blanning.
Pros: - It's recent, from 2015--more recent than I remembered. - I found it quite readable. - The author doesn't "no homo" Fritz. - Best of all, he challenges a lot of long-standing unquestioned or rarely questioned beliefs about Fritz that have been floating around the ether for 200+ years, by looking at the documentary evidence.
Cons: - It left me wanting more, by skimping a lot on the military and political side.
Oh, but another pro: - It filled in a gap in my reading by actually engaging more with his artistic side than most biographers I've encountered.
If I could read more extensively, I'd have a lot more confidence in my opinions about the conclusions he draws in his challenging of long-standing myths, but between me not being able to read German or French fluently, and not being able to (re)read physical books in English, all I can say is I like the fact that he *is* trying to challenge long-standing myths by looking at documentary evidence. It's encouraging.
On the political side, MacDonogh is more thorough (and drier--oh, god, the endless Fritz & Wilhelmine wedding negotiations) and makes a good complement to Blanning, but he constantly frustrates me by saying factually wrong things, not considering the bias in his sources (or considering it wrongly), or just not backing up what he says with documentary evidence. Read with caution. Or as I always say, never read just one book on any subject. Blanning + MacDonogh is a pretty decent combo, though.
Mitford came out of her own abusive childhood believing that children deserve to be beaten, starved, and humiliated if they don't mold themselves into perfect emotional mirrors for their parents' every whim. I vaguely remember reading and disliking her bio of Fritz 20 years ago, but this time around, I had to stop reading 14 pages in. Cannot recommend.
But if you want a book-length treatment that's chaotic and out of chronological order, but focuses on presenting the glorious historical batshit in the most entertaining way possible, start here, then here, here, then read through the comments in cahn's Frederick the Great tag posts in order!
Also, always feel free to come here and ask us questions! We won't even mind repeating things if you don't feel like reading through the 100,000+ words of comments. I might even put together a "Best of" set of links, although the problem with our asynchronous presentation is that any given comment might presuppose knowledge that was presented in earlier, less exciting comments.
Welcome to the fandom! Somebody in it is always up to some wacky hijinks. :D See also my recent comment about Fritz thinking, "Oh no, it's been five whole minutes since I last said or did something controversial! Must...publish...ridiculous pamphlet!"
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Book treatments
Date: 2019-10-24 05:32 am (UTC)Sadly, I have further limitations, which are:
1) Most of the Fritz reading I've done was 20 years ago, when I was ~15 years old, and thus, while I remember a surprising amount of facts, I don't remember much about authors.
2) Due to chronic pain, I can no longer read physical books and can only read e-books. Not many of the Fritz bios have been converted to e-books.
So with these limitations, the only biography I can currently recommend as a starting point is Blanning.
Pros:
- It's recent, from 2015--more recent than I remembered.
- I found it quite readable.
- The author doesn't "no homo" Fritz.
- Best of all, he challenges a lot of long-standing unquestioned or rarely questioned beliefs about Fritz that have been floating around the ether for 200+ years, by looking at the documentary evidence.
Cons:
- It left me wanting more, by skimping a lot on the military and political side.
Oh, but another pro:
- It filled in a gap in my reading by actually engaging more with his artistic side than most biographers I've encountered.
If I could read more extensively, I'd have a lot more confidence in my opinions about the conclusions he draws in his challenging of long-standing myths, but between me not being able to read German or French fluently, and not being able to (re)read physical books in English, all I can say is I like the fact that he *is* trying to challenge long-standing myths by looking at documentary evidence. It's encouraging.
On the political side, MacDonogh is more thorough (and drier--oh, god, the endless Fritz & Wilhelmine wedding negotiations) and makes a good complement to Blanning, but he constantly frustrates me by saying factually wrong things, not considering the bias in his sources (or considering it wrongly), or just not backing up what he says with documentary evidence. Read with caution. Or as I always say, never read just one book on any subject. Blanning + MacDonogh is a pretty decent combo, though.
Mitford came out of her own abusive childhood believing that children deserve to be beaten, starved, and humiliated if they don't mold themselves into perfect emotional mirrors for their parents' every whim. I vaguely remember reading and disliking her bio of Fritz 20 years ago, but this time around, I had to stop reading 14 pages in. Cannot recommend.
But if you want a book-length treatment that's chaotic and out of chronological order, but focuses on presenting the glorious historical batshit in the most entertaining way possible, start here, then here, here, then read through the comments in cahn's Frederick the Great tag posts in order!
Also, always feel free to come here and ask us questions! We won't even mind repeating things if you don't feel like reading through the 100,000+ words of comments. I might even put together a "Best of" set of links, although the problem with our asynchronous presentation is that any given comment might presuppose knowledge that was presented in earlier, less exciting comments.
Welcome to the fandom! Somebody in it is always up to some wacky hijinks. :D See also my recent comment about Fritz thinking, "Oh no, it's been five whole minutes since I last said or did something controversial! Must...publish...ridiculous pamphlet!"