Speaking elsewhere of Du and Sie, Voltaire's German wiki entry has this gem of a footnote I had previously overlooked: Wilhelmines Tochter, Friederike, hatte Voltaires La Pucelle abgeschrieben, reiste ihm nach Vernoy nach, behandelte ihn als Onkel und ließ sich von ihm duzen. Max Döllner: Entwicklungsgeschichte der Stadt Neustadt an der Aisch bis 1933. Ph. C. W. Schmidt, Neustadt a. d. Aisch 1950, OCLC 42823280; Neuauflage anlässlich des Jubiläums 150 Jahre Verlag Ph. C. W. Schmidt Neustadt an der Aisch 1828–1978. Ebenda 1978, ISBN 3-87707-013-2, S. 329.
Boy, did Wilhelmine take this "Brother Voltaire" thing seriously or what, if her daughter treated him as an uncle and allowed him to call her tu (since I doubt it was literally du)?
Wilhelmine: definitely shipping Fritz/Voltaire over all the other boyfriends. Despite all. Comes from having the same soul as Fritz in a female body, I tell you.
Wilhelmine: I have four brothers and five sisters. I'm telling you, I can spot the Hohenzollern soul in an Arouet body a mile away!
Wilhelmine: definitely shipping Fritz/Voltaire over all the other boyfriends.
I don't know how she felt about Suhm or Fredersdorf (I find it possibly telling that Fritz doesn't write to her about Fredersdorf, even with the class differences), but I think Algarotti's the only other boyfriend we know that she liked.
Wilhelmine: Peter Keith is NOT the real hero of 1730, and neither is Katte!
I don't know how she felt about Suhm or Fredersdorf (I find it possibly telling that Fritz doesn't write to her about Fredersdorf, even with the class differences), but I think Algarotti's the only other boyfriend we know that she liked.
Ah, but then everyone (except Lehndorff) liked Algarotti! Whereas decidedly not everyone liked Voltaire. I can think of something Voltaire and Algarotti have in common, though, to wit, the reason why I cast them both as cats. Neither guy is going to settle down with Fritz for good. They're intermittently living together, long-distance loves. Peter Keith and Katte come into Fritz' life when he's moved out out of the female sphere to the male one at court where Wilhelme can't follow him. Whereas Peter and Katte can hang out with him all day (in theory, baring FW, but you know what I mean). Fredersdorf is the one who actually gets to live with Fritz, as in live in the next room, be with him always when Fritz isn't campaigning or Fredersdorf isn't on business travels. (Including one to Paris as we now know. Presumably he took a translator with him?) Voltaire, even if the big explosion hadn't happened, wasn't likely to do that.
Incidentally, if Voltaire was on "tu" terms with Wilhelmine's daughter, it makes the two of them having a good cry about Wilhelmine as mentioned in Fritz' letter in the correspondance (you know, the one with "greetings and letters do not replace Voltaire if one has once had him in persona" in it) less likely to have been a courtly convenience and more likely to have been carried by real emotion.
We all have our problematic favourites. :) And you know, Wilhelmine's daughter can't have been the type to put up with jerks just because society demanded it. Seeing as she took the really rare step of leaving her no-good husband Carl Eugen of Würtemberg on her own accord and went back to her parents. (Schiller: I sympathize. I left him, too, seeing as I was in his bloody cadet school, hated it, and famously hightailed it out of Würtemberg after "The Robbers" because my first theatrical smash hit and he put me on a Most Wanted list.)
Ohhhh! Do we have any letters from Wilhelmine about what she thought about that? (I assume from your use of "parents" that Wilhelmine was still alive at the time?)
She was. Actually daughter Friederike left her husband twice. The first time her parents and Uncle Fritz persuaded her to go back and give it another try, but the second time - September of 1756 - she remained in Bayreuth. (That the war had just broken out helped in this regard.) Now, the reason that the entire Würtemberg match came to be was because Würtemberg was one of the biggest German duchies, and Fritz was trying to build an anti-Habsburg league within the HRE.
Wilhelmine was never keen on her son-in-law; she already had the impression directly after the wedding that he was, while apparantly at this point passionately in love (well, in lust - according to Casanova, Wilhelmine's daughter was the most beautiful princess of Europe), way too jealous and possessive. We do have a letter from her to Fritz about this. Fritz being Fritz, he wrote back that hey, a passionately interested husband was a GOOD thing, surely? Also it would cool down in time anyway.
Sure enough, Carl Eugen lost interest. He and Friederike then travelled together to Italy (this was before Wilhelmine herself went) in order to save the marriage. This did not work. After their one and only daughter died as a baby, Friederike grew melancholy. He started to have lots of mistresses. Then Friedrike left for the first time and went home to Bayreuth. Cue parental attempt to mediate between husband and wife. But Uwe Oster doesn't quote any letters on this, so I can't, either. After the second time, they didn't bother anymore. (Also if I understood Lehndorff's diaries correctly Carl Eugen actually sided with MT in the 7 Years War.) This why Friederike was with her mother when she died (along with the Margrave, of course). She herself died in 1780. Carl Eugen's main claim to fame is being notorious for being the tyrannical Duke young Schiller went up against (and wrote that biting scene in Kabale und Liebe" where Lady Milford gets the jewelry and the servant tells her how the Duke sells regiments to Amerika to pay for his high life about), before hightailing it out of Würtemberg for good.
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Re: From our Parisian Correspondant in Sanssouci: Extra, extra!
Date: 2020-03-25 06:36 am (UTC)Boy, did Wilhelmine take this "Brother Voltaire" thing seriously or what, if her daughter treated him as an uncle and allowed him to call her tu (since I doubt it was literally du)?
Wilhelmine: definitely shipping Fritz/Voltaire over all the other boyfriends. Despite all. Comes from having the same soul as Fritz in a female body, I tell you.
Re: From our Parisian Correspondant in Sanssouci: Extra, extra!
Date: 2020-03-25 06:47 am (UTC)Wilhelmine: I have four brothers and five sisters. I'm telling you, I can spot the Hohenzollern soul in an Arouet body a mile away!
Wilhelmine: definitely shipping Fritz/Voltaire over all the other boyfriends.
I don't know how she felt about Suhm or Fredersdorf (I find it possibly telling that Fritz doesn't write to her about Fredersdorf, even with the class differences), but I think Algarotti's the only other boyfriend we know that she liked.
Wilhelmine: Peter Keith is NOT the real hero of 1730, and neither is Katte!
Re: From our Parisian Correspondant in Sanssouci: Extra, extra!
Date: 2020-03-25 11:26 am (UTC)Ah, but then everyone (except Lehndorff) liked Algarotti! Whereas decidedly not everyone liked Voltaire. I can think of something Voltaire and Algarotti have in common, though, to wit, the reason why I cast them both as cats. Neither guy is going to settle down with Fritz for good. They're intermittently living together, long-distance loves. Peter Keith and Katte come into Fritz' life when he's moved out out of the female sphere to the male one at court where Wilhelme can't follow him. Whereas Peter and Katte can hang out with him all day (in theory, baring FW, but you know what I mean). Fredersdorf is the one who actually gets to live with Fritz, as in live in the next room, be with him always when Fritz isn't campaigning or Fredersdorf isn't on business travels. (Including one to Paris as we now know. Presumably he took a translator with him?) Voltaire, even if the big explosion hadn't happened, wasn't likely to do that.
Incidentally, if Voltaire was on "tu" terms with Wilhelmine's daughter, it makes the two of them having a good cry about Wilhelmine as mentioned in Fritz' letter in the correspondance (you know, the one with "greetings and letters do not replace Voltaire if one has once had him in persona" in it) less likely to have been a courtly convenience and more likely to have been carried by real emotion.
Re: From our Parisian Correspondant in Sanssouci: Extra, extra!
Date: 2020-03-29 05:17 am (UTC)You are determined to make me like Voltaire, aren't you :D I guess I have to like someone Wilhelmine liked that much...
Re: From our Parisian Correspondant in Sanssouci: Extra, extra!
Date: 2020-03-30 02:49 pm (UTC)Husband-leaving
Date: 2020-04-02 04:16 am (UTC)Re: Husband-leaving
Date: 2020-04-02 07:47 am (UTC)Wilhelmine was never keen on her son-in-law; she already had the impression directly after the wedding that he was, while apparantly at this point passionately in love (well, in lust - according to Casanova, Wilhelmine's daughter was the most beautiful princess of Europe), way too jealous and possessive. We do have a letter from her to Fritz about this. Fritz being Fritz, he wrote back that hey, a passionately interested husband was a GOOD thing, surely? Also it would cool down in time anyway.
Sure enough, Carl Eugen lost interest. He and Friederike then travelled together to Italy (this was before Wilhelmine herself went) in order to save the marriage. This did not work. After their one and only daughter died as a baby, Friederike grew melancholy. He started to have lots of mistresses. Then Friedrike left for the first time and went home to Bayreuth. Cue parental attempt to mediate between husband and wife. But Uwe Oster doesn't quote any letters on this, so I can't, either. After the second time, they didn't bother anymore. (Also if I understood Lehndorff's diaries correctly Carl Eugen actually sided with MT in the 7 Years War.) This why Friederike was with her mother when she died (along with the Margrave, of course). She herself died in 1780. Carl Eugen's main claim to fame is being notorious for being the tyrannical Duke young Schiller went up against (and wrote that biting scene in Kabale und Liebe" where Lady Milford gets the jewelry and the servant tells her how the Duke sells regiments to Amerika to pay for his high life about), before hightailing it out of Würtemberg for good.
Re: Husband-leaving
Date: 2020-04-04 03:42 am (UTC)Well, good for Friedrike, anyway :P
Oh, I knew I'd heard Carl Eugen's name before! Thanks for reminding me :D