Happy Fritzmas! (*) / Frederician discussion post 7

[cahn]

Frederician fandom is the best! 3 stories in main archive and 2 stories in Madness, eeeeeeee and I have only managed to read my own gifts so far (well, I guess Madness isn't open yet either, but even if it had been I wouldn't have managed to have read them) but they are so goooooood

Also, I would like to apologize on behalf of the fandom that none of us apparently managed any Fritz/Voltaire. Some of us, uh, didn't know enough about Voltaire, and we are Taking Steps to attempt to rectify this in the future if anyone requests it, say, next year. Just saying.

I'm making this post because the last one has an insane number of comments, but I still owe SO many comments on the last post and I kiiiinda would like to read and comment on Yuletide stories for the next week as time permits so I almost hope this post doesn't get much action and then we resume in the new year? (Especially since there is a limited amount of discussion we can do on the fics right now!) :D I was thinking of making another post anyway for reveals.

(*) My husband D came up with this :P :)

Comments

Re: Protocol

[selenak]

Speaking of the third person, something I avoided in both of my stories - except for letting FW do it once in Fritz' memory - is the third person use that was so common of the 18th century, especially in Prussia, mostly, though not exclusively if a higher ranking person is adressing a lower ranking one. This was mostly a concession to English language readership because it sounds really stilted and confusing if you're not used to it.

My favourite illustrating example of how this speech style worked is from Faust, Faust first approaching Gretchen: "Schönes Fräulein, darf ich's wagen/Arm und Geleit Ihr anzutragen?" and Gretchen's neigbhour Marthe talking to her later re: the jewelry "Ach seh Sie doch! Ach schau Sie nur!" That's not the "Sie" and "Ihr" form from second person - which was also used already int his era and in the case of "Sie" still is to this day - but the third person, I.e. "Beautiful Lady, may I dare/ To offer my arm and company to her?" and "But look she there! Just glance she there!" respectively. Faust outranks Gretchen socially as a university professor while Marthe is her elder.

A generation later, teenage Jacob Grimm really bristled about the fact that his teacher would adress him - a student who wasn't a noble and got into the grammar school he attended mostly due to his brains - with "Er" -, as in "Setz Er sich, Grimm" - "sit he down, Grimm". He took that as a put down and a reminder of his lower rank. Heinrich Heine, a bit younger but still the same generation as the brothers Grimm, made fun of Prussians still insisting on using the third person singular as a form of adress when the rest of the Germans had moved on linguistically in his great satiric verse epic Deutschland: Ein Wintermärchen.

On a completely different note, with all the talk about health complaints among Prussians and Frenchmen alike, I have to share this bit about MT giving birth to Marie Antoinette, an excerpt from a biography:

Vienna, November 2, 1755.
Her windows wide open, as was her habit, regardless of the rigors of the season, the Empress Maria Theresa worked without respite. She was busy annotating reports, signing decrees, dictating her orders when the first pains suddenly made her wince. The thirty-eight-year-old sovereign, ruler of an empire, was to give birth for the fifteenth time in her life. Nature had reclaimed her rights and the female head of state could do nothing but stoically await her deliverance. But since Maria Theresa hated wasting time, she took advantage of the momentary inconvenience to have a decayed tooth extracted. Once that operation was disposed of, she settled, following German custom, into the low armchair where she would give birth to her child. Word was rushed to her husband, Francis of Lorraine, that the birth was imminent. The Prince was attending the All Souls’ Day mass with his son Joseph at the Augustinian church. After arranging for the young man to be escorted back to his apartment, he ran to his wife’s bedside. It was a difficult labor, but at around seven-thirty in the evening, a perfectly formed infant girl came into the world. On the following day, she was baptized Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna. Since all the archduchesses were given the first name of Maria, they were usually addressed by their second name. Maria Theresa would refer to her youngest daughter as Antonia. It was the French who would call her Marie Antoinette.

MT: since I'm going into labor and will be in pain anyway, might as well get that tooth extracted. Tell me again about how women are too weak to rule, boys!

Re: Protocol

[mildred_of_midgard]

Re the 3rd person, I'm familiar with the practice but agree with the decision not to put it into an English-language fic. I think it would require some worldbuilding and would still sound odd.

One thing you can do in English is have a lower-ranked person address a higher-ranked person in the third person, e.g. "Would His Majesty like more mustard in his coffee?" It will sound formal, but at least to readers of historical fiction like me, familiar enough.

You go, MT! Show those boys!