If true, this would mean that Zimmermann got the idea from Voltaire's memoirs and then elaborated on it so as to make his hero EXTREMELY STRAIGHT. Which would be an interesting and unforeseen-by-Voltaire consequence of his rumor.
Quite, but then, Voltaire the historiographer who'd no sooner finished his age-of-Louis-XV that a competitor published (faked) memoirs of Madame de Maintenon, and Voltaire the inexhaustible embroiderer and inventor of yet more drama (FW present at Katte's execution! Wilhelmine flying through the window!) would probably not have been surprised by anything. And he must have come across any type of Fritz fan in his time, including Zimmerman's "he is so STRAIGHT!" type.
On balance, I do think Fritz exchanged fluids at least a few times in his youth, and, as they say, it only takes once.
Given how quickly he jumps on the chance to accuse other people of STD, I'd say it's possible, and I even buy that he asked one of the Schwedt cousins for a doctor, because they're an obvious choice. Just not that it traumatized him into becoming celibate.
Well, the one thing Münchow and Zimmermann have in common is that they both think Fritz was treated for an STD, they just differ on which decade it happened in, and whether Fritz continued to be sexually active after 1740.
Nope, Zimmerman puts the last year of Fritian sexual activity as 1735. (Remember, two years of married bliss with EC and then returning STD in Zimmerman's version!) Whereas Münchow calls bullshit on this based on two reasons: a) personal observation as Fritz' page in 1738 in that if you sleep next door to someone's bedroom, you hear stuff ("not the evening prayers"), and b) seeing something only he and a sworn-to-silence person in the early 1740s were witness to when Fritz was in the field. The later let us conclude he probably meant an army surgeon treating Fritz for STD, but Münchow Fils does not actually say so - he just says "me and one more person who was sworn to silence and never said anything witnessed something".
In this fandom, you either have an STD or you're accused of having one. What was Lehndorff's source on Kaphengst, anyway? :P
If I recall correctly - and I can't look it up, because it's in volume IV, which I read at the Stabi in March just before the lockdown - it was Ludwig Wreech (member of Heinrich's household - I think he was a Haushofmeister - and yes, son of the lady Fritz wrote poems to). Who told it to Lehndorff as an explanation as to why Kaphengst remained behind on this particular trip, complete with saying he caught the disease from one of the actors in Heinrich's theatre group.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Re: The STD thread
Date: 2020-07-16 05:57 am (UTC)If true, this would mean that Zimmermann got the idea from Voltaire's memoirs and then elaborated on it so as to make his hero EXTREMELY STRAIGHT. Which would be an interesting and unforeseen-by-Voltaire consequence of his rumor.
Quite, but then, Voltaire the historiographer who'd no sooner finished his age-of-Louis-XV that a competitor published (faked) memoirs of Madame de Maintenon, and Voltaire the inexhaustible embroiderer and inventor of yet more drama (FW present at Katte's execution! Wilhelmine flying through the window!) would probably not have been surprised by anything. And he must have come across any type of Fritz fan in his time, including Zimmerman's "he is so STRAIGHT!" type.
On balance, I do think Fritz exchanged fluids at least a few times in his youth, and, as they say, it only takes once.
Given how quickly he jumps on the chance to accuse other people of STD, I'd say it's possible, and I even buy that he asked one of the Schwedt cousins for a doctor, because they're an obvious choice. Just not that it traumatized him into becoming celibate.
Well, the one thing Münchow and Zimmermann have in common is that they both think Fritz was treated for an STD, they just differ on which decade it happened in, and whether Fritz continued to be sexually active after 1740.
Nope, Zimmerman puts the last year of Fritian sexual activity as 1735. (Remember, two years of married bliss with EC and then returning STD in Zimmerman's version!) Whereas Münchow calls bullshit on this based on two reasons: a) personal observation as Fritz' page in 1738 in that if you sleep next door to someone's bedroom, you hear stuff ("not the evening prayers"), and b) seeing something only he and a sworn-to-silence person in the early 1740s were witness to when Fritz was in the field. The later let us conclude he probably meant an army surgeon treating Fritz for STD, but Münchow Fils does not actually say so - he just says "me and one more person who was sworn to silence and never said anything witnessed something".
In this fandom, you either have an STD or you're accused of having one. What was Lehndorff's source on Kaphengst, anyway? :P
If I recall correctly - and I can't look it up, because it's in volume IV, which I read at the Stabi in March just before the lockdown - it was Ludwig Wreech (member of Heinrich's household - I think he was a Haushofmeister - and yes, son of the lady Fritz wrote poems to). Who told it to Lehndorff as an explanation as to why Kaphengst remained behind on this particular trip, complete with saying he caught the disease from one of the actors in Heinrich's theatre group.