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Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-30 06:07 pm (UTC)Oh, yes, very good point.
FW: ....BUT WHAT ABOUT THE POPERY?!? NO SON OF MINE...
SC: Oh, hush. It would only be for show
LOL, I'm sold, this is how it would have happened!
I'm sure he'll return to the true faith as soon as the Emperor has kicked the bucket and introduce Protestantism in Vienna.
This is totally what I would say to FW as a persuasive technique! But actual Fritz...so on the one hand, he's got a pragmatic side, where he's willing to attend church during wartime, or have the court wear mourning for Isabella and stuff--the trappings, for public support. But his actual decisions fly in the face of whatever emperor has nominal authority over him.
So...Emperor Fritz remains nominally Catholic but gets excommunicated, thus continuing a long and respectable tradition of Pope/Emperor conflict?
Does a Fritz already in possession of Silesia (tu felix Frederice nube) continue the tradition of leading his army over the Alps and biting off more than (or in his case, possibly exactly as much as, as with Silesia) he can chew?
Does he get into a multi-front war with various Italian states to the south and Austria-Hungary to the north(-east), as MT rallies the Catholics to side with the Pope against her husband? Does MT pull off the Diplomatic Revolution with the French as fellow defenders of the faith?
I can see AW deciding his allegiance is to Big Bro emperor, and Heinrich winning some victories in Central Europe. Maybe more without Big Bro around?
Also, it would be totally hilarious if AW inherits in May 1740 and Fritz in October 1740, and Fritz decides not to recognize the Prussian Jülich-Berg claims. :P
but he might have gotten along with her better (and certainly would have been pleased she could do all the courtly stuff and was regarded as an ornament to the court)
Agreed. I suspect they would have had roughly the same number of interactions, as he relentlessly distanced her from power, but they might have been politer interactions.
while I don't think SD would have been as enthusiastic about Mina as wife to her first son the way she was about her as wife to her third, for as long as it's made clear she's still the most important woman in Prussia both in terms of social standing and to Fritz, she'd have been okay with her
Makes sense. And if niece Amelia, of impeccable bloodline, had shown up in Prussia married to Fritz, as per SD's *one wish*?
And speaking of grandparental AUs...
On the one hand, I've always been convinced, and I know you agree, that a Fritz raised by someone like Eugene of Savoy--kind and homosexual and in love with the arts, and also in love with having an army and a treasury to pass on to his beloved and well-treated son Fritz--still invades Silesia at the same time for the same reasons. (And possibly is more open to tactics other than decisive battles with monstrous casualties on both sides, because *that* strikes me as a "fight" reflex that got reinforced bigtime by trauma. And also possibly doesn't insult and betray other European powers quite so much. TBD.)
On the other hand, if Fritz had been raised by F1 (and SC if she lives long enough), and inherited a bankrupt kingdom without one of the finest armies in Europe...I'm not convinced that Fritz does an FW and invents frugality and militarism on his own. Workaholism maybe.
If he does, of course, he doesn't have the money and the army by November of 1740. But I'm not sure he does at all. He might have turned out more like August the Strong, minus the drinking, fox-tossing, mistresses, etc., of course.
What do you think?
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-30 09:50 pm (UTC)THAT LETTER. UGH. And speaking of which, I was thinking of that letter during the part where SD visits Oranienburg and Pollnitz is all "AW is so courteous, he accompanied all the pretty ladies-in-waiting to their rooms!" Hmm, yeah, "courteous" is one word for it...
Also, FS is almost the best <3 :P (I already like you so much, FS, why'd you have to go and have those affairs?)
Other things in this reading:
But why had the King let Wilhelm fidget for so long and not sent him his marching orders at the same time as the one to Heinrich?
It doesn't seem like she answers this?
he got the answer from Friedrich that he shouldn't [imagine? go on?] so much about the one created child, but rather use the time to make another.
I think google is funking "einbilden," but anyway I laughed out loud with sheer shock at Fritz's answer. Woooow, Fritz. Your brother is worried about his utility as a person and that you see him as just a baby daddy, and your response is seriously to tell him to go make another one??
German progress: I continue to mostly be able to read AW's letters syntax-wise with help from the translation, even the ones he's writing as an adult, though of course I don't have the vocab. I don't get all the syntax, mind you, but it's a marked contrast to Fritz's letters where I have a lot more trouble. And in both AW and Fritz's letters I can make out a lot more than in Ziebura's prose. Then there's Biefield and Pollnitz, where I can't even figure out if I know the syntax because it's all descriptive using words I don't know :P
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 01:04 am (UTC)* I had forgotten that Pöllnitz got F1's nightclothes, but now that I'm reminded, I am charmed.
* AW and Sophie: the longer she resisted, the more his passion grew. Yeah, I feel like this is a common dynamic.
* Okay, so Ziebura says FW-puncher and heroine of our fandom was the aunt of Sophie. ?? I thought it was Sophie's mom, Johanna? Is she confusing Sophie the aunt of FW2 flame Julie? Or are we missing something? Wilhelmine says the woman in question was a lady in waiting of SD, and Sophie's memoirs (at least as quoted by unreliable editor) say Sophie's mom was a close friend of SD who spent almost the whole day at court, which I could easily see Wilhelmine remembering or simplifying as "lady-in-waiting." But I guess Johanna could have had a sister?
The thing that makes me think Ziebura could be wrong is that she calls Peter III the son of Elizaveta instead of the nephew. The thing that makes me think she could be right is that we had to apologize to her about Marwitz. :P
The other thing that nagged me when I first ran into the "Sophie as FW-puncher" claim of unreliable editor was that Wilhelmine refers to the lady in question as "fille" and "demoiselle." Johanna was, if Wikipedia can be trusted, 31 at Fritz's wedding, married, with at least one kid. Now, "fille" and "demoiselle" can/could in French be used of a lady-in-waiting as a job title, regardless of marital status. But as much as I trust FW not to go for a 3-year-old sexually (or even an 11-year old), I was actually surprised when I first looked her up and realized she was in her 30s. That's not young for a woman by the standards of the 18th century.
So maybe Wikipedia is wrong! Or Johanna looked especially attractive for her age (by the standards of a very ageist and misogynist society! where men can be attractive at 70 but women start going downhill after 25). Or FW, no spring chicken himself (44), was drawn to her anyway. I guess I just feel like if you're normally rigidly faithful to your wife and are breaking down because you haven't had any in 3 years and don't believe in masturbation1, you're going to go after the hottest young thing in the place. But maybe that's stereotyping both middle-aged men and 30-yo women. Idk.
1: Remember our crackfic where Heinrich and FS debate whether Fritz might chill the fuck out if he were getting laid more regularly? This might be even more true of FW, who didn't believe in masturbation. I feel reasonably sure if that if Fritz felt like masturbating, he did, no second thoughts. Even if he was traumatized into having difficulties taking that last step with people, which I still think is unlikely but not impossible.
FW, on the other hand...think of all those trips he made without SD! And also, did he believe in non-reproductive sex with pregnant women? Because she was pregnant quite a lot! (Although apparently didn't always realize it.)
* I love (sarcasm alert) Fritz writing a letter where it sounds like he's trying to talk AW into learning more about Prussia (remember, it has to be *his* idea!), then taking him on a trip and not letting him learn anything. *headdesk*
That one really feels like trauma to me. Because Fritz's willingness to share information seems to have done a 180 after late 1730.
And btw, remember when he told Grumbkow he "could complain on several grounds" about Katte? I'd put money on that including 1) Katte was supposed to get permission to go on a recruiting trip out west so he could run away with Fritz, and he not only failed to convince his commander, he didn't keep trying once he got a no, 2) Katte had the opportunity to escape Berlin in time (according to Fritz), and for whatever reason (a girl? Wilhelmine?), didn't. I think it has to be much easier to live with Katte's death and Fritz's role in it if he can pin some of the blame on Katte. Survivor's guilt is never rational.
But what I'm thinking his takeaway from 1730 was is that if you tell people what you're planning, they may betray you (not!Robert Keith), or they may loyally but incompetently die for you (Katte), but either way it's not going to end well. Better to keep things to yourself.
Which is why I think Fredersdorf met him at just the right time, just enough to get a foot in that door before it closed. (And being a commoner helped.) Sorry, AW.
* Fritz gets sick in 1747 (this is the year of "Pulvis et Umbra",
* AW writes up some "absolute power is bad" notes to self, Ziebura concludes, "From this we can conclude that AW, as the heir, would not have followed the absolute ruling style of his brother in everything."
In everything, no, but I can't help remarking...
I hear Fritz wrote down some opinions about ruling styles before he became king too. :D
More seriously, what I think this shows is that AW would not have followed the *micromanaging* style of his father and brother. Most absolute monarchs, enlightened or not, don't have the energy, paranoia, masochism for that, and that's a major reason Fritz got called der einzige. He wasn't the most absolute monarch of his age so much as the most meddling. MT may have been a demanding workaholic, but I think she was less of a paranoid micromanager? Maybe? I haven't read a bio of her in 20 years.
Google fail:
Fritz makes fun of AW when he goes to communion, not supper. Evening meal = Last Supper = reenacting the Last Supper = communion.
You probably got the real meaning from common sense, never mind looking at the German, but I thought Google's take was funny and worth sharing:
The prince saw the task of the church in preaching hope of eternal bliss to the poor and the unfortunate, and virtue, benevolence and moderation to the soldiers, and bravery to the rich and careless.
Soldiers, be more benevolent and moderate! Rich people, be more brave! The true purpose of religion.
:P
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 01:12 am (UTC)I think google is funking "einbilden," but anyway I laughed out loud with sheer shock at Fritz's answer. Woooow, Fritz. Your brother is worried about his utility as a person and that you see him as just a baby daddy, and your response is seriously to tell him to go make another one??
Oh, then you're going to love this. I'll let
Look, AW, you had one kid. Mom and Dad had fourteen. You gotta think numbers game here. If 4 die, 6 are girls, and 2 are not only gay but committed to being childless, you've got 2 left over who can carry on the succession. What if that one kid of yours dies? Get fucking!
Your brother is worried about his utility as a person and that you see him as just a baby daddy, and your response is seriously to tell him to go make another one??
Well, remember during the cashiering, Fritz says that AW may be fit to command a harem, but not troops. If you ask me, he used AW's heterosexuality and sex drive as a weapon to keep him in his place, i.e. Erzeuger1 of the continuation of the Hohenzollern line, not an actual viable rallying point for an alternative to Fritz as ruler.
I wasn't actually shocked when I got to this, because I remembered Ziebura saying in the Heinrich bio that AW got nagged to father more kids so much that the normally good-natured AW protested that he wasn't a breeding bull.
Fritz: Yes, you are. Get to it.
1 Reminder, per Selena:
Erzeuger: it's usually used in a passive sense, the most disdainful way you can say "father".
Okay, I'm off to read 7 more pages before bed. Yell at me if I don't!
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 02:26 am (UTC)I didn't know AW and Maupertuis had that exchange of letters! It was actually really interesting to read. And I liked how they related their opinions on the role of passion to their opinions of theater censorship.
Fritz saying the stupidest lady should go first: MacDonogh has a fuller version of that quote (which I've found in Trier):
We don’t have any differences of rank here and we don’t recognise any either. I don’t intend to introduce any. You wear my Order [the Black Eagle] therefore you have the same position as my ministers and the others who have received it.
When Charles V was in Milan a storm blew up between two of the first ladies of the court as to which of the two walked before and which behind the other. The quarrel reached his ears and he decided that the stupidest came first. That decision removed all distinction and the women came in in whatever order they chose. I don’t want to know about any ceremonial either, when you get to the door first, you enter first; when another reaches it before you, he precedes you.
ETA: Oh, I was incorporating some material from the AW book into our chronology, and I notice Fritz is visiting the spa at Bad Pyrmont (which is closer to Wesel than Berlin, so not a trivial trip) in May 1746. Suggesting that bad health might have been contributing to his bad mood in April 1746, the month of Marwitz (and also continuing to lose it at Wilhelmine).
None of this excuses his behavior, but in much the same way that I agree with numerous historians that FW's wretched health contributed to his perennial bad mood, you can probably pick out some statistically significant correlation in Fritz's life as well.
stop inbreeding, peopleRe: "How I Survived..." and "A Family Affair"
Date: 2020-08-31 02:31 am (UTC)OMG, I *completely* forgot about this--
Rokoko Babysitting
Date: 2020-08-31 03:30 am (UTC)May 2: "There stands one who will avenge me."
May 6: Babysitting adventures commence.
So either FW was in Ruppin checking on Fritz, or Fritz had been summoned to Berlin and then sent back to his regiment, but either way: Fritz's number one complaint at Ruppin to Suhm is that his regimental duties don't leave him with enough time to study, which is why he's giving up sleep. Then he's with Dad, which means he's not allowed to read. Then he finally escapes FW, but he's still overwhelmed with his regiment, and then--surprise babysitting! With hardly a day's break between family responsibilities. I can see why he was so frustrated.
Also, if he *was* in Berlin (it was only for a short period, because his previous letter is dated April 27, also from Ruppin), that means that hardly a couple of days passed between when Fritz left Berlin for Ruppin and when his brother left Berlin for Ruppin. Which makes it extremely likely that something during that Berlin visit triggered the surprise babysitting adventures.
Not that you have to stick to the strict chronology--you could have him babysitting at Rheinsberg! But just fyi, in case that sequence of events inspires you or anything. :)
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 04:28 am (UTC)Heh, yeah, I bet.
(Ziebura knew what she was about, putting that fratboy letter fairly close to the beginning... it definitely has affected my outlook on him.
Though I would also like to say here: I am even more convinced I made a good choice asking for AW first and wives second!)
in February 1747 he suffered a stroke during a flute concert in Potsdam
Wow, he really recovered very quickly from -- *goes back and checks the notes to Pulvis et Umbra, because I know mildred would have said something about -- ah, "might actually have been an acute neuritis episode." :)
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 04:31 am (UTC)But I wouldn't turn down pieces that stimulate lust. Lust and enjoyment are the true happiness in life.
Uh-huh.
The pleasure one feels when listening to beautiful music, reading or having interesting conversations is less strong than the pleasure one feels in the arms of a loved one
EXCUSE YOU oh wait, this was before Verdi, okay fine NO WAIT this was after J.S. Bach, I still call foul
(okay, it's different, sure, Bach isn't exactly a sensual pleasure, but...)
And that's even without tackling the reading or interesting conversations bit :P
He believed that all people should follow their passions whenever the opportunity presents itself.
Yeah, I'm not sure what I think about this. No, I am actually sure what I think about this :P
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 04:36 am (UTC)Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 04:46 am (UTC)This is totally what I would say to FW as a persuasive technique! But actual Fritz...so on the one hand, he's got a pragmatic side, where he's willing to attend church during wartime, or have the court wear mourning for Isabella and stuff--the trappings, for public support. But his actual decisions fly in the face of whatever emperor has nominal authority over him.
So...Emperor Fritz remains nominally Catholic but gets excommunicated, thus continuing a long and respectable tradition of Pope/Emperor conflict?
Does a Fritz already in possession of Silesia (tu felix Frederice nube) continue the tradition of leading his army over the Alps and biting off more than (or in his case, possibly exactly as much as, as with Silesia) he can chew?
Does he get into a multi-front war with various Italian states to the south and Austria-Hungary to the north(-east), as MT rallies the Catholics to side with the Pope against her husband? Does MT pull off the Diplomatic Revolution with the French as fellow defenders of the faith?
I can see AW deciding his allegiance is to Big Bro emperor, and Heinrich winning some victories in Central Europe. Maybe more without Big Bro around?
Also, it would be totally hilarious if AW inherits in May 1740 and Fritz in October 1740, and Fritz decides not to recognize the Prussian Jülich-Berg claims. :P
*seriously rethinks whether maybe I should ask for MT for Yuletide in addition to or instead of Heinrich*
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 05:33 am (UTC)When I originally read the biography, I remember my readerly sympathy was affected until the chapter "AW and his sisters", in which he's being a loyal brother and helper to Wilhelmine and Ulrike, letting me to conclude that while I definitely would not have wanted to be in a romantic relationship with him, let alone marry him, any more than his brothers, he was a good friend and relation to have.
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 06:32 am (UTC)A sister wouldn't have been Fräulein von Pannewitz, though, but Fräulein von Jasmund (Johanna's maiden name). Checking Ziebura again, I find the footnote says it was Anna Helene von Pannwitz, i.e. the sister of Johanna's husband, Katte's commander, who was SD's lady-in-waiting until 1736 and then married Rittmeister Christoph von Schöning. Googling that name, I found wiki only has Christoph von Schöning fils, son of Christoph von Schöning pére without an wiki entry of his own, and born in 1737, which would fit, except the mother of 1737!Christoph is named as Marie Eleonore von Bergen, not Anna Helene von Pannwitz. Googling Anna Helen von Pann(e)witz directly brought me nothing, though you may have more luck. Anyway, I must have overlooked that footnote the first time around.
On a tangent:
That's not young for a woman by the standards of the 18th century.
True, though it should be noted that when Madame de Pompadour dies in her early 40s, the Duc de Croy, making an entrance about this in his diary, refers to her as "young", and so does Voltaire in a letter about the same death. Of course, both of them are decades older than Reinette at that point and are writing from this pov.
But what I'm thinking his takeaway from 1730 was is that if you tell people what you're planning, they may betray you (not!Robert Keith), or they may loyally but incompetently die for you (Katte), but either way it's not going to end well. Better to keep things to yourself.
Agreed, though I would add the older he got, the more the need to control people also factored in. I mean, it's one thing to keep AW in the dark despite AW being his designated successor, because Fritz himself isn't yet that old during AW's life time. But it absolutely would have made sense to introduce future FW2 to government work, not just the military stuff. Or, if he absolutely did not want to give future FW2 any real responsibilities beyond regiment exercises, to go through with his "building up Heinrich as the power behind the throne" idea. As it was, FW2 had no job training, Heinrich had no established power base, and presto, FW2 having anti-Heinrich ministers who get the job because they show him affection and flattery and Prussian politics going haywire.
I hear Fritz wrote down some opinions about ruling styles before he became king too. :D
I'm also reminded of AW himself telling Lehndorff in January 1758 that he can't guarantee anything if he ever becomes King "because then the devil gets into one".
More seriously, what I think this shows is that AW would not have followed the *micromanaging* style of his father and brother.
Agreed. He was no slob by any means and willing to work hard, but FW and Fritz style of monarching meant an absolutely insane workload. Not to mention that Heinrich, as the envoys at the time guessed, would probably have become unofficial PM, and because unlike Fredersdorf, he was a member of the royal family, I'm not sure why it shouldn't have been official (i.e. "First Minister" - I mean, the title was there since Richelieu). And we do know Heinrich knew how to delegate.
MT may have been a demanding workaholic, but I think she was less of a paranoid micromanager?
Not when FS was still alive, but don't forget her frequent clashes with Joseph. Mind you, these were inevitable since Joseph, unlike FS, really wanted to co-govern, and they had some differences of opinion on several key issues. So I would say this was less paranoid micomanaging but the inevitable result of an absolute monarch used to rule on her lonesome suddenly having to share, with the added emotional baggage of a mother/son relationship and the confusing and paroxical demands that on the one hand, Joseph as the male ruler should have had precedence, but on the other, MT as the parent should have had precedence. (De facto, many courtiers if in doubt listened to MT, but Kaunitz, with an eye to the future and the invitability of Joseph outliving MT, changed sides.) Absolute monarchy, even the enlightened variation, just wasn't made for a co-governing model.
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 06:53 am (UTC)I didn't know AW and Maupertuis had that exchange of letters! It was actually really interesting to read. And I liked how they related their opinions on the role of passion to their opinions of theater censorship.
There's a vid on YouTube where people have staged a discussion between Maupertuis, Émilie and La Mettrie based on their respective writing. (I.e. with actors playing the roles but speaking solely in quotes by the real deals.) I haven't had the time to wach more than the start yet, but the Maupertuis bits sound as if they could have come from this exchange, though of course I bet he was repeating himself in his correspondances.
"The stupidest lady should go first" is one of my AP's favourite Fritz stories. He will be crushed to learn Fritz borrowed the quip from Charles V. Whom is the letter addressed to?
Suggesting that bad health might have been contributing to his bad mood in April 1746, the month of Marwitz (and also continuing to lose it at Wilhelmine).
None of this excuses his behavior, but in much the same way that I agree with numerous historians that FW's wretched health contributed to his perennial bad mood, you can probably pick out some statistically significant correlation in Fritz's life as well.
Oh, absolutely. And unfortunately, if you're on top of the hacking order, you have ways to share and vent your misery a normal patient does not.
re: Inbreeding - worth pointing out that for all the Habsburg related jokes there, another reason why MT was an aberration from the norm and lucked out with FS was that she - who must have had an iron constitution, as we've repeatedly said - was the product of a Habsburg marrying a Protestant (and of course converting) Braunschweig princess he wasn't related to instead of doing the usual cousin marrying, and to find shared ancestors between MT and FS, you have to go back enough generations to make it irrelevant. Presto, relatively healthy children and not one mad one among them (looking at you, Spanish Habsburgs).
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 07:17 am (UTC)Lehndorff agrees with you, because that harem jibe made it to Berlin, or rather Magdeburg, where he writes in an entry dated November 7th (1757) about how Heinrich's page has arrived at court and has reassured everyone Heinrich's wound was harmless (remember, this is post Roßbach and Lehndorff has been a bit salty about Mina fainting at the news Heinrich was wounded), and that Fritz has promoted Heinrich to top boss in Saxony. But also, Lehndorff continues:
"At the same time, I am inconsolable not just to hear about the sad state of health of the Prince of Prussia, but also of all the grief that has come to him. After that unfortunate Bohemian march and the burning of Zittau, fortune seems to have left him entirely, which is all the more regrettable since he put his all into wanting to serve and earn glory. The King knows his weak spot and taunts him with writing him that he's evidently only fit to command a harem, not an army. He became ill, went to Dresden, then Torgau, then Wittenberg, finally to Lepzig."
Now, presumably Lehndorff either learned this from Heinrich's page, or via a letter the page brought from Heinrich (currently in Leipzig with AW), or even a letter from AW himself. But either way, it's telling that of all the jibes in Fritz' letters of that time, the "the only thing you're good for is sex" seems to have struck hardest. (Or at least Lehndorff thinks it did.)
"have inordinate pride over" is the correct translation, btw.
What if that one kid of yours dies? Get fucking!
See, this is why I'm loving the apocryphal story about Elisabeth's reaction to a similar Fritz command so much. (And am without pity for George Keith, if it was him who brought the command.)
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 07:26 am (UTC)AW: Heinrich, help me out here.
Heinrich: Well. What I think is... why does it have to be either/or? It's the combination which truly provides the highest pleasure, like, say, listening to a wonderful piece of music played by a superb cellist and then having sex with the cellist. Or sharing a great new book by taking turns to read it out loud to each other, followed by sex in a good friend's old and new appartment.
Fritz: This wishy washy compromise stuff is why I am King and you're not.
Heinrich: Come to think of it, reading out loud Voltaire's trashy memoirs while adding my personal comments also counts as a pleasure of the highest order. Without any sexual acts involved at all. So yes, reading wins.
Re: "How I Survived..." and "A Family Affair"
Date: 2020-08-31 07:31 am (UTC)Re: Rokoko Babysitting
Date: 2020-08-31 12:44 pm (UTC)Or: FW is in a bad mood due to Austrian treachery (from his pov) and on general health principle, and kid Heinrich has done something (what?) which, if discovered, could make him FW's next target. It's therefore decided to bundle him off to Big Bro for some weeks by which time whatever it was will have been forgotten/been disappeared. (Only Heinrich was a brat and SD therefore makes him send Fritz cheese as a present.)
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-08-31 08:47 pm (UTC)Heinrich: Well. What I think is... why does it have to be either/or? It's the combination which truly provides the highest pleasure, like, say, listening to a wonderful piece of music played by a superb cellist and then having sex with the cellist. Or sharing a great new book by taking turns to read it out loud to each other, followed by sex in a good friend's old and new appartment.
Fritz: This wishy washy compromise stuff is why I am King and you're not.
I cannot get over this. Every time I read it I laugh *so hard*! :D
And LOL FOREVER to Heinrich's last line! You win this round by A LOT, Heinrich! :DDDDD
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-09-01 01:06 am (UTC)LOL! My fic as reference work. I'm so proud. :D
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-09-01 01:11 am (UTC)Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-09-01 01:11 am (UTC)Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-09-01 01:14 am (UTC)Fritz: It seems I somehow didn't make this perfectly clear earlier. Yes, your purpose in life is to make babies while I do important things. Capiche?
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-09-01 01:54 am (UTC)WELL THEN
We've had the wrong Frau von Pannewitz this whole time! That *does* make more sense of her age and the discrepancy around whether she was a lady in waiting or not.
Darn, now I have to update my fic. Also, her ability to bring candles from home in "Survived" was predicated upon Sophie's memoirs saying she lived outside the palace and wasn't a lady-in-waiting.
In my fic, I went with the lady-in-waiting interpretation, not realizing it was a different person. Hmm. I could just change "Johanna" to "Anna", as I didn't use "Frau", and
I guess good thing we're doing the AW readthrough. Thank you for catching that,
Fics and headcanons become obsolete fast in this fandom. I told RP about the Voltaire letter-doctoring project yesterday (I had to-I had told him about the marriage letter!): he was *shocked*, just as we were. He kept saying, "Wooow." And he had heard about Catt and Trenck and Koser's takedown of Münchow fils back in the day!
Googling Anna Helen von Pann(e)witz directly brought me nothing, though you may have more luck.
It's on my to-do list. :)
I'm also reminded of AW himself telling Lehndorff in January 1758 that he can't guarantee anything if he ever becomes King "because then the devil gets into one".
Yup!
Agreed, though I would add the older he got, the more the need to control people also factored in.
Definitely. Though some (not all) of that need I think comes from his trauma. Anything he doesn't control is going to end badly for him. And it does get worse with age, because he gets into a bad feedback loop, and the people he used to kinda sorta trust, because he got to know them when he was younger, keep dying off, and trusting new people is Not On.
I mean, it's one thing to keep AW in the dark despite AW being his designated successor, because Fritz himself isn't yet that old during AW's life time.
But he does keep riding into battle in the front lines (and positioning his brothers in the front lines too!). I mean, that one shot at Prague could have taken all three of them out.
As it was, FW2 had no job training, Heinrich had no established power base, and presto, FW2 having anti-Heinrich ministers who get the job because they show him affection and flattery and Prussian politics going haywire.
I'm sort of reminded of that story (of unknown veracity) that Fritz in his last years refused to have maintenance done on Sanssouci because it was his, and no one was supposed to live there after him. I'm not saying he didn't care what happened to Prussia after him, but he didn't come up with a sustainable model of government, and he didn't take measures to make sure things continued after his death.
but don't forget her frequent clashes with Joseph.
Right, but as you say, that's a co-ruling problem, not a delegation problem. Not a "my ministers don't know what's going on because I deliberately keep them in the dark" problem. I think what AW's memorandum shows is that he wouldn't have done *that*, and regardless of how he turned out as monarch, I actually believe it. The way absolute power tends to go bad is not in the masochistic "do *all* the things!" way, but in the arbitrary way. AW might well have made very bad high-handed decisions, like many monarchs given that power, but I'm willing to believe that someone other than him might have known what was going on at any given time.
So, yes and no he wouldn't have followed Fritz's style. Yes, he wouldn't have had the micromanaging problem. No, I'm not sure he wouldn't have done some of the same (or differently bad) individual interfering acts/punching down/etc. Less trauma might have helped, but as LOTR taught us, that kind of power is just no good for even the well-meaning.
Fix-it fic where Fritz has lots of money and boyfriends and his favorite sister and NO power. (The fact that he's inheriting feudal estates from Comte Rottembourg is already something I'm wrestling with: where do Enlightenment values intersect with slightly-less-traumatized-but-still-traumatized control issues and desire to make a profit off the estates?)
Re: AW readthrough
Date: 2020-09-01 02:11 am (UTC)The latest in a series of blows from your salon participation. :)
Whom is the letter addressed to?
So that one is actually addressed to the Comte de Solms-Sonnewalde, who I think was the Russian envoy. 1780. So different from the one Ziebura refers to (in person to the Oberkammerherr von Loos, per Lehndorff) which means Fritz, as he so often does (and as I do and Maupertuis no doubt also did), repeats his favorite anecdotes and historical references.
The Lehndorff volume Ziebura cites, btw, is volume 4, so right around the time of 1780, plus or minus a few years. Clearly Fritz had hit on a winning formula for "I don't give a fuck."
worth pointing out that for all the Habsburg related jokes there, another reason why MT was an aberration
Yep, I was thinking of her! (Back when I was ~15-17, I spent hoooours on this one massive European royal genealogy site, tracing out the family trees of everyone I knew, and one of my hobbies was finding out how spouses were related. I remember being quite pleased that I connected Fritz and EC on the first try just by guessing (and that was a few generations back!) and was very much BAD IDEA! about FW and SD. I remember nodding approvingly at MT's parents and her marriage.
My mother, our family genealogist, could never get me to show the slightest interest in our own family tree, though. :P)