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Announcing Rheinsberg: Frederick the Great discussion post 10
So for anyone who is reading this and would like to learn more about Frederick the Great and his contemporaries, but who doesn't want to wade through 500k (600k?) words worth of comments and an increasingly sprawling comment section:
We now have a community,![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
rheinsberg, that has quite a lot of the interesting historical content (and more coming regularly), organized nicely with lots of lovely tags so if there's any subject you are interested in it is easy to find :D
We now have a community,
rheinsberg, that has quite a lot of the interesting historical content (and more coming regularly), organized nicely with lots of lovely tags so if there's any subject you are interested in it is easy to find :D
Re: Henri de Catt Unplugged - I
Bad AW, spoiling Fritz' retirement plans. Sigh.
gah FRITZ
Now here's a civilian job that, as opposed to flutist, no one has imagined for Fritz: love poetry ghost writer.
OMG, okay, I... would not have imagined that, yes.
My current guess as to why he keeps harping on this is: the idea of being broken. He himself has given in, not out of fear for the afterlife but of his father, but still, he has submitted. So Voltaire, who is so similar and yet not, can't be unbroken to the end.
:( That sounds extremely plausible.
Also, aw on the phrasing "his princess". Sa princesse indeed.
<3
There was talk of his brother, who had caused him much sorrow, in pace ut and in bello.
*headdesk* OKAY FRITZ.
"She was waiting for Voltaire from Potsdam; as he was late, because he still had some scheme to earn money, "said the King," she came to meet him in Brussels. Not seeing him, believes him unfaithful, takes opium."
Huh, interesting this came from Fritz. OK, my best guess is still that it's a garbled reference to that earlier story, because it seems weird that the same story would arise about two independent events. Certainly Zinsser never mentions anything of the sort about Voltaire, though to be fair she does seem to regularly leave out some of the more sensationalistic gossip. On the other hand, something that is only cited by Fritz is definitely just gossip. Mildred, did Bodanis have anything about this??
Original: " Le prince Henri s'y fourra" - which google has as "Prince Heinrich will get into it"; honestly, I'm a bit lost - I mean, I'd say "got under it, the table, but the family is there already?
Given the reflexive and the y, I'd translate it as "Prince Heinrich stuffed himself in there." I totally see what you're saying about the shift in focus -- yes, it very much sounds to me like Heinrich's POV, whether it's him directly or via a boyfriend; my thought is that I could totally see him saying to Catt (or boyfriend) something like "all of us got under the table; I tucked myself into a corner of it." Aaaaaand now I'm having a lot of FEELINGS about little Heinrich hiding under the table, curling himself into a little ball crushed in with his family while his crazy dad rampaged and beat up his big sister (and a lot of feelings about the thing you mentioned a while back -- was this Ziebura? -- where he read Wilhelmine's memoirs and was all "yeah, that was a bad year").
FW >:(
Re: Henri de Catt Unplugged - I
Not that I remember, but I had to return the library book, so I can't check.
Aaaaaand now I'm having a lot of FEELINGS about little Heinrich hiding under the table
This.
Re: Henri de Catt Unplugged - I
Clearly, an AU is called for where successfully escaped Fritz has to make a living both as a musician and as a ghost writer, since FW has entirely cut him off from funding, and mean Uncle George won't give him any money, either. And sugar daddy Suhm is out of funds.
OK, my best guess is still that it's a garbled reference to that earlier story, because it seems weird that the same story would arise about two independent events.
Indeed. My guess is that Fritz heard the original gossip and promptly decided Émilie wouldn't make a suicide attempt over any man but Voltaire, so substituted him. This also gives him the opportunity to feel smug as having been the other, excuse, THE ONLY man, since he dates the event as happening in 1743 or 1740 if he claims Voltaire was en route back from Potsdam.
In any event, as I said in an earlier post, Fritz mid 7 Years Old war relaxing by gossipping about the ten years dead competition is surely… something.
Aaaaaand now I'm having a lot of FEELINGS about little Heinrich hiding under the table, curling himself into a little ball crushed in with his family while his crazy dad rampaged and beat up his big sister (and a lot of feelings about the thing you mentioned a while back -- was this Ziebura? -- where he read Wilhelmine's memoirs and was all "yeah, that was a bad year").
"Brings back one bad memory in particular" is I think what Ziebura quotes him as saying; the book is back at the library, so I can't check. Which is why I had him remember it in "Promises to Keep", not knowing Henri de Catt's diary would furtherly back me up in this regard.
Re: Henri de Catt Unplugged - I
YES PLEASE. Also, sugar daddy Suhm doesn't have any funds that I know of until he joins the Russian court in 1737, so that's plenty of time for Fritz to be in need of a source of income.
This also gives him the opportunity to feel smug as having been the other, excuse, THE ONLY man, since he dates the event as happening in 1743 or 1740 if he claims Voltaire was en route back from Potsdam.
LOLOL. Also, yes, Fritz couldn't imagine her making a suicide attempt over anyone else, no way.
"Brings back one bad memory in particular" is I think what Ziebura quotes him as saying; the book is back at the library, so I can't check.
All I have is your original write-up, which doesn't include a direct quote, but close enough:
Heinrich: Dear Ferdinand, guess what? Big sis wrote her memoirs. Lots of stories I had no idea about, though there was one that brought up a really bad memory from when I was four.
Self: Oh. You mean the hair drag scene where according to Wilhelmine the younger sibs, including you, begged FW for her life?
I have to quote the rest, just because it makes me laugh so much:
Heinrich: Friedrich she describes the way I remember him....
Self: She DOES?!?
Heinrich: ...a paranoid mean-tempered bastard once he got on the throne, though charming as a boy. I guess. Everyone is.
Self: Christ.
Heinrich: Have now been inspired to reread his letters.
Self: Have I mentioned yet you all need therapy?