cahn | Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 18

...apparently reading group is the way to get lots of comments quickly?

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From:

mildred_of_midgard

Stratemann includes a sympathy poem written for Fritz in late 1730. (I'll get to by whom and why.)

Well, aren't you the tease. :P (Kidding: I think you meant to include it and forgot?)

Anyway, I went and looked it up, and I can see why you wanted to build suspense: the Neumark War and Domain Chamber. Whose director was--

Hille?!

I did not see that one coming, I admit.

More later! In the meantime, thank you for these latest glorious envoy writeups.

From:

prinzsorgenfrei

It's what it says on the box, really, I'm new to all of this :'D

So, uh, hi! I'm Jana, I've talked to

mildred_of_midgard on AO3 and I was told that I could introduce myself/be part of the chat! I have no idea whether I picked the correct page for this! The joy of joining a new social network!

I'm 20 years old and about to enter my third semester of history and art history at uni. I've been interested in Fritz since I was about 13, but, being 13, I didn't get many proper sources until way later, so all of my knowledge is kind of... a huge mess of anecdotes and a few primary sources that I read way later. I am currently attempting to solidify my knowledge on Fritz with more books and more primary sources and honestly, your page has been a goldmine, it's SO fun to read!

My first language is German, I'm alright at English and I can manage some French. I've drawn some comics about historical anecdotes years ago and intend on maybe doing so again and, as of right now, I'm in the middle of painting a pop art style portrait of Katte to match the pop art style poster of Fritz that my parents got me from the Deutsches Historisches Museum. That kind of sums up my level of weird.

Uh... yeah! I really hope I picked the right place to post this!

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Hi! Yes, you've come to the right place! Welcome!

I've seen you around on tumblr Fritz fandom, so I immediately recognized your name when you commented on my fic, and I was very pleased!

You guys, I thought I had linked to this piece back when I put together my collation of my favorite tumblr links, but I guess I didn't?? Anyway, enjoy it now. :D

being 13, I didn't get many proper sources until way later, so all of my knowledge is kind of... a huge mess of anecdotes and a few primary sources that I read way later

We've all been down that road! We're constantly revising our beliefs and our opinions as new information turns up. Be aware that even some of the information in

rheinsberg has been superseded by later discoveries. It's a fast-moving fandom!

honestly, your page has been a goldmine, it's SO fun to read!

Yay, that's what we hoped when we put it together! You said you had a particular interest in Fredersdorf; have you been had time to check out his tag? We have a copy of his correspondence with Fritz (I think you said you had acquired the same volume) in our pdf library, and

selenak was kind enough to read it and summarize it for us (which, tbh, is how we know almost all sources in this fandom are propagated). She is a goldmine.

Anyway, I don't remember if anything under the Fredersdorf tag says why we don't believe he was dismissed for financial irregularities, but we don't. :P Lehndorff doesn't know anything about it, and there's a distinct lack of mentions in any of our actual sources, so we're waiting until we find evidence before we subscribe to any belief in that. Citation needed!

Also fic. We have written several Fredersdorf fics between the three of us, some in which he features and some in which he's a secondary character. And to think that last year, he had no tag in AO3! (He's getting nominated and requested again for Yuletide this year.)

the pop art style poster of Fritz

The Andy Warhol one? Oh,

cahn, have you seen this one? They had it hanging in Sanssouci when I was there.

Pop art Katte sounds great!

Above all, we're happy to have you and look forward to sharing the Fritz fun! :D

Edited Date: 2020-10-03 06:07 pm (UTC)

From:

prinzsorgenfrei

Phew, I'm glad I found the correct page :'D

I've seen you around on tumblr Fritz fandom

I have to admit that I somewhat forgot that my AO3 profile and my old art blog have the same name :'D Oh boy, there's some stuff on there... Though I'm glad to know people like it a bit! :D
I made new and more silly doodles (like a very Cursed looking Heinrich) on my last vacation to Brandenburg, I might upload those at some point (to my new tumblr though...)

Fredersdorf

I have not read through the Fredersdorf tag yet, but I definitely will :D I do have a Richter copy of the correspondence from 1926. I'm really glad I found it, it's in great condition and the few letters I've read so far were very interesting and lead to me and a group of friends referring to Fritz as Friech for the past few months (makes it easier to differentiate between the five different Friedrichs we talk about).
My newest acquisition is a 1936 copy of Der Kronprinzenprozess by Carl Hinrichs, which lists a bunch of primary sources, some of which I did not know yet, and would probably break my heart for good if I read through it in one sitting.

The Andy Warhol one?

The one I have is this one which the DHM apparently photographed in a basement, using a phone from 2012.
I put it up in my new apartment because it's something I had a frame for and I have this random pink wall... Couldn't figure out what else to put on the other walls and my colleague suggested painting something in the same style, sooo Katte it is.
It's quite a process since I've never worked with the grid method, acrylic paint, canvas boards OR pop art before, but I have some hope left that it's going to look good eventually. Hopefully. Please.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

I made new and more silly doodles (like a very Cursed looking Heinrich) on my last vacation to Brandenburg, I might upload those at some point (to my new tumblr though...)

We are Heinrich fans, bring it on!

My newest acquisition is a 1936 copy of Der Kronprinzenprozess by Carl Hinrichs, which lists a bunch of primary sources, some of which I did not know yet, and would probably break my heart for good if I read through it in one sitting.

IT BROKE MY HEART. And all I did was read the

selenak write-up! And because I like having my heart broken, it's on my list of things to read once my German is good enough to not need a translation. :D (Getting closer!)

The one I have is this one which the DHM apparently photographed in a basement, using a phone from 2012.

Oh, wow, that one is new to me. So pop art of Fritz is a thing! See, this fandom is sooo educational.

sooo Katte it is.

Excellent choice! Pop art of Katte needs to be a thing. PS, I accept fanart treats for fandom exchanges like Yuletide. :D (Damn, I need to finish my letter. How am I supposed to participate in fanfic exchanges and study German and comment on German reading group and read and reply to

selenak's write-ups *and* be royal detective? :P)

From:

selenak

Willkommen, bienvenue, wellcome! (Inevitable Cabaret joke is inevitable. *g*) “A bunch of anecdotes and a few primary sources” is how we started, too, and believe me, Mildred is the.most resourceful librarian of the world - no sooner does one idly mention an obscure eighteenth century figure than she’s unearthed their memoirs/correspondance/diaries for us to read.

Browsing through tumblr, i did see some of your beautiful art, and so I’m doubly glad you’re joining us!

From:

cahn

Hi hi hi hi! Welcome! Yay, I'm so glad you found us! :D Your art is lovely! (I have a tumblr but don't tend to go there these days unless specifically pointed to something, so thanks

mildred_of_midgard for the link :) )

And when this whole thing started, I knew... just about zero about Fritz, I knew that he was maybe king of Prussia?? (At which point mildred started telling me about how he was king In Prussia for a while, but anyway...) So I've been indebted to

selenak and

mildred_of_midgard for telling me everything and letting me hang out with them while they figure out all these amazing things :) It's fun and totally nonjudgmental! :D

Feel free to chime in whenever and wherever you want! We do often have several threads going at once, so mildred usually suggests tracking the current post so you'll be informed of whenever new comments are added. (I think it's that little bell at the bottom of the post proper; being the host of the salon means that I don't have to track myself!) I also usually open a new post once the old one reaches 300 or so comments, so if there are no new comments for a day or two it's probably because we've moved over to a new post (and/or there's a fic deadline and everyone's working on their fic instead, ha). (I tag these posts as 'frederick the great.')

From:

cahn

Same here, yay! Circle of Voltaire and my third fandom aren't through yet either.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Um. I kind of did this intro to our fandom, in what was an extremely on-brand moment for me. :D :P

Recruitment into the Fritzian fandom is more friendly and more consensual than recruitment into the Fritzian army, but it's not much less organized and high-octane!

how he was king In Prussia for a while, but anyway...

On which I turned out to have been possibly chronologically wrong! I still have a bookmark from a Potsdam or Berlin gift shop that says that he became King of Prussia only with the first Polish Partition, but then Selenak found evidence (I forget what evidence) that he started calling himself that already in the 1740s and eventually just wore everyone down, Fritz-style, so...

The Queen of Hungary: *clears throat*

From:

mildred_of_midgard

My second fandom got approved while I was asleep last night, but *checks* yep, still waiting on my third.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

* Oh, Podewils was Grumbkow's son-in-law! I feel like I've run into that like 3 times and have forgotten it every time. So, goodbye English-friendly Knyphausen (Ariane's father) and hello Grumbkow son-in-law.

* That letter where Charles VI asks FW to not kill his son? Oster says Seckendorff only handed it over when the pardon was a done deal. Because it's Seckendorff, I believe it, but I'd like to see a citation.

* FW asking the preachers whether a father can force his daughter to get married: apparently one said yes! The preacher of the Garrison Church in Potsdam. (Where both FW and Fritz would be buried until Nazi times, if I'm remembering correctly.)

* Contra Wilhelmine's memoirs, Oster doesn't think that SD proposed the future Margrave of Bayreuth as a possible match, not even as a decoy.

* Oster has the "don't get married just to get me out of prison" letter, AWWW. I still love the mutual self-sacrifice between these two. YOU TWO. <3

* Oh, the future Margrave's regiment later got renamed the Ansbach-Bayreuther dragoons! I was *wondering* where that name came from. Duuuh.

cahn, they will later distinguish themselves at the battle of Hohenfriedberg in 1745, one of Fritz's great victories. Wikipedia:

At this point the Prussian Bayreuth Dragoons, an oversize unit numbering around 1,500 men, entered the battle. A strong gust of wind blew away the powder smoke and the dust and revealed an opening in the Austrian lines through which to charge the vulnerable Austrian infantry. The dragoons deployed into line, and attacked north against the right flank of the first Austrian line. They drove all the way along that line, routing it completely, then turned south to destroy the second Austrian line.

The Austrians, already outnumbered, abandoned by their Saxon allies, without cavalry protection, and now broken by this attack, began to surrender en masse. The Bayreuth Dragoons defeated several thousand Austrian infantry and only suffered 94 casualties. The Dragoons overran twenty battalions, took 2,500 prisoners, capturing 67 flags and standards as well as four cannons in what is considered and celebrated as one of the great cavalry battlefield triumphs. The battle ended with the complete defeat of the Austro-Saxon army.

* Lol at SD protecting her girls' delicate ears from dirty sexual jokes.

* FW on his boar hunt: We're going to kill a bunch of pigs and everyone has to buy the meat! Especially if you're Jewish.

Sigh. Less expensive and more offensive than Fritz making them buy porcelain, I guess.

* Oster on Wilhelmine bringing Marwitz to Bayreuth: Little did she know that this girl would one day ruin her marriage.

That's right, blame the woman.

* Fritz writing to Wilhelmine after her wedding: "When I see you, you will again find the brother who dares [emphasis mine] to show you tenderness." Everybody stop being so hard on him for the wedding! We have the letter from Grumbkow telling him to set boundaries! There are plenty of other things to be hard on Fritz for, you won't have to do without.

* Schwager: I keep seeing this word used, not just for what I would call a brother-in-law, but also for the relationship between the FW and Wilhelmine's father-in-law, for which English has no single word. So German 1) actually has a word for that relationship, 2) it's the same as brother-in-law?

* Fritz in 1732: Can I go to Bayreuth with you, Dad? Can I can I can I?

Oster: The memory of the last trip FW had taken through south Germany with Fritz was too fresh...

I bet.

* Lol at the whole *drama* over Wilhelmine's daughter's baptism. I'm sorry you're being born into a dysfunctional family, little Friederike! [

selenak, do we know what name she went by?]

* Fritz was godfather! Aww, I had either forgotten that or not known it. But of course he was.

* Fritz on October 19, 1732: If I could make gold, I would first use my knowledge to help out Wilhelmine.

If you could make gold, huh? I wonder if Fritz talked about making gold before 1732, or if we're seeing traces of Fredersdorf here.

* Speaking of Fritz and Fredersdorf, as we head into Christmas 1732, Fritz had been visiting FW at Wusterhausen before Wilhelmine arrived! I had missed that and assumed it was the first visit in a while, and wrote accordingly. Oh well! Fanfic takes liberties with chronology.

* This part, though, zomg:

Fritz to Wilhelmine: Don't bring too many servants, or Dad will fire them, and don't bring your musician right away. Let him come later, and don't let anyone find out he belongs to you.

THAT part of our fics was spot on! Wow, I didn't realize

cahn and I had accidentally fictionalized an actualfax letter!

Also,

Nimm nicht viel Dienerschaft mit, denn er willdaran streichen

I'm assuming "streichen" is "remove", not, as Google hilariously translated it, "paint". Though Fredersdorf is nearly tall enough to get painted!

cahn, you missed the chance to include that scene. :P (Though historically, as far as I can tell, FW hadn't taken up painting yet. What is fic for if not for chronological liberties!)

* Another thing I got wrong that I will pretend was intentional conflation of minor characters: the Sonsfeld who takes care of little Friederike while Wilhelmine is in Berlin is not Sonsine the much loved, but her inexperienced sister who's like, "Halp, a baby, what do?" Or at least so Wilhelmine claims in her letter to try to get money for a proper nurse--I hope that was partly a rhetorical device!

* Fritz is disillusioned with the English and "hates everything English."

Lehndorff: :-(

* Judging by the letters and not the memoirs, Fritz had already left for his regiment when the German comedian episode happened, because Wilhelmine reports to him on it.

THAT is one chronological liberty I will stand and die by! Besides, we were writing fanfic of her memoirs. :P

* Fritz of Bayreuth: *loves his baby*
Fritz of Bayreuth: Please don't tell your sarcastic brother-in-law.
Wilhelmine to Fritz: Please tease my husband about this.

Okay, Wilhelmine?

* Wilhelmine: Dr. Superville saved my husband after a stroke! I will take this opportunity to note that he is of French extraction and comes from a good family.

* Superville on Fritz in 1739: much wit/spirit/intelligence, but a bad heart and a terrible character. He's suspicious, stubborn, excessive, selfish, ungrateful, vicious, and unless I'm very much mistaken, will someday be even stingier than his father.

Oster: He's not wrong.

Me: Well spotted in 1739! Here's one person who wasn't caught off guard in 1740.

* Wilhelmine and the Margrave set off for Italy and France in 1739! This is not ringing a bell at ALL! Wow.

That sucks that it didn't work out and they had to wait another 15 years, at which point she was very sick. :( :( :( I'm glad she was healthy enough to enjoy it, at least.

* Per Oster, Wilhelmine knew about her husband/Marwitz in 1739, but Fritz didn't.

* Oh, something I forgot to mention from the earliest pages:

Daß die Akademie der Wissenschaften unter Friedrich Wilhelm I. für die Bezahlung der Hofnarren zuständig war, sagt eigentlich alles.

That the court fool was responsible for the Academy of Sciences under FW really says it all.

Things like this are why I had *no* concept of Gundling as anything *but* the court fool until

selenak stepped in. MacDonogh's the same.

:(

From:

mildred_of_midgard

* Ugh at Wilhelmine wanting to see FW before he died and none of the men in her life letting her. I totally get why Fritz was doing his usual "for your own good" move, but ugh. You shouldn't have to ask permission to visit your dying father.

* Wilhelmine may have expected Fritz to summon her straight to Berlin after he became king. I've always been surprised that he didn't! Even before I knew that she spent several months there immediately after her daughter was born. I would be interested to hear the

selenak take on this. Yes, he still would have abandoned her to go off to war, but he sent for Algarotti and Duhan and a bunch of other people that he only abandoned after a few months. Why only a brief visit to Wilhelmine on a trip that was mainly for other purposes, and then an eventual invitation to come visit in October?

Also, lol at Oster saying the trip to Strasbourg was for political purposes. The rest of the trip, yes. Strasbourg?

Fritz: It is very important that Europe be prepared for my willingness to cross borders illegally.

:P

* Bei dieser Lebensweise verfliegt die Zeit so rasch, daß ich wünschte, die Tage hätten 24 Stunden.

They don't? Does this mean "waking hours" in German or something?

* Oster has the "there stands one who will avenge me" quote!

* War starts, and Wilhelmine is very encouraging to the Austrian envoy and says that she wishes Fritz hadn't invaded, that Bayreuth will not fight on his side, and that they will remain loyal to MT. That's more than just lunch!

* Wilhelmine and Margrave: Hey, if it's asserting old claims time, maybe we can get Nuremberg for Bayreuth!
Fritz: I would advise against.
Wilhelmine and Margrave: ???

Macaulay: His first object was to rob the Queen of Hungary. His second was that, if possible, nobody should rob her but himself.

* Fritz: You should totally fight on my side!
Wilhelmine and Margrave: We made an alliance against the Habsburgs!
Fritz: Too late, I already made a separate peace. Allies gotta fend for themselves.
Wilhelmine and Margrave: ???
Fritz: *kicks off the Second Silesian War*
MT: What about that peace?
Fritz: Allies need me!

Oster: "The accusations of faithlessness bounced right off him."

15-yo Mildred: My FAVE. :D :D :D

Superville: See? SEE? I called this in 1739 and no one believed me! Voltaire was still getting the Anti-Machiavel published in 1740!

* Man trinke mit seiner Geliebten ja auch keinen Kräutertee

I get the gist of this (it's what I said in my Peter Keith post about Fritz not having a high opinion of the political prowess of people he met socially), but what is this about herbal tea?

From:

mildred_of_midgard

I meant to bring this up, but I have it in my head that I didn't, and I also can't find it in our discussions, so here goes: Ziebura *doesn't* think Kalckreuth tried to compromise Mina as a favor to Heinrich. She says he did it in order to bring Heinrich down with him by creating a scandal. Then she comments that Heinrich was disappointed when Mina was exonerated, because it would have given him an excuse to divorce her.

I mean, who knows what was going on in Kalckreuth's head; maybe compromising Mina was a win-win for him. Either Heinrich's grateful and takes him back, or he doesn't but now he's embroiled in a scandal.

Yeah. Kalckreuth, best of boyfriends.

I pity Fräulein von Morrien SO MUCH, marrying him to protect Mina and then dying in childbirth a year later. :/

From:

cahn

FW WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS

Mildred, you want to know why I find Fritz more congenial than FW even though they can both be terrible? This kind of thing is why! (Well, also, because Fritz can be charming and FW just can't, at least not in a way I recognize.)

From:

cahn

I suppose if someone had written about me that I deserve to be gruesomely executed and my wife keeps going on about what a great guy he is - or at least that's how I understand her - then I'd be somewhat resentful, too.

Heh. Yeah, I guess this is a reminder to me that I always have to be careful to think about both sides (as you are).

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Another 20 pages. The Marwitz drama is hitting its climax, and Fritz is about to start getting upset about the Erlangen journalist. :(

Since I'm doing 20 pages with very little effort, and I'm not actually making myself do more than that,

cahn, let's raise my weekend quota to 30 and my weekday quota to 25? We all know I'm capable of doing 50, but as my concentration improves, I'm trying to do some things besides German, and of course salon calls. :) Among those non-German things is The Club, which I'm currently reading at the suggestion of the Amazon recommendation algorithm. I don't know how accurate it may be, but since practically everything in it is new to me, I'm finding it very engrossing. At the very least, it's a good starting point for "Who are these people whose names and sometimes works you know, but not much more?"

All of which is to say, I'm no longer spending 100% of my free time on German, but I also don't want to lose my momentum, because I'm SO. CLOSE. But I'm so far that if I stop, what little command I do have will be gone before I know it.

So 30 pages tomorrow or you yell at me!

From:

cahn

The tall guys thing always makes me laugh when it's about how weird FW is, but not when it's about, well, the tall guys :(

When the King had lunched eight days ago with the English envoy du Bourgue, there was a lot of hard drinking; and since his Majesty emptied a cup toasting the King of England's health directed at the Chevalier Hotham, the envoy demanded an equally large cup and asked for permission to toast his Majesty's health as well; which he put to the test, but holdling and emptying this put even his coworkers on week feet, but he still managed to keep his countenance; though at last his legs could not carry him anymore, and he had to be carried to his coach.

Heh! Man, FW.

Okay, I liked that story about Ulrike and Amalie :P :)

From:

cahn

Email away. They all speak English. Seriously.

Why do I feel like in somewhere between a day and a week we are going to see a LOT more action in this already action-packed fandom? ;)

Of course, an irresistable fanwank occurs to me: Peter did meet Algarotti....and young Andrew Mitchell. By 1747, Andrew Mitchell was rising in the ranks of the foreign office - not yet enough to be envoy himself, but he was certainly forming connections with Lords Holderness and Newcastle. Maybe he recced Peter?

YES PLEASE. And those of you who might write fic about Peter Keith, you know who you are, could totally put it in the fic :D

Edited Date: 2020-10-04 04:30 am (UTC)

From:

cahn

Since the revue was a really big public spectacle (this is also why Fritz was pissed off when Heinrich didn't salute him properly in the after the 7 Years War, remember), such a gesture would have been quite something. And does argue it's FW Hans Heinrich is struggling for forgive. Not to mention that it gives the lie to the "Hans Heinrich totally on board with FW executing his son!" version.

YES I KNEW IT oh Hans Heinrich :( <3

~~oh man I wish we'd had that report on Christmas 1730 when we'd written our fics~~

Her Majesty the Queen, however, enjoys with her husband the King a most endearing complete harmony and bliss

...whoa.

Anyway, see what I mean about Wihelmine being kept as much a prisoner as Fritz? Actually more so

Yeah. Poor Wilhelmine :(

From:

cahn

Go for it! :) I'm still behind but I'm working on it :)

From:

cahn

He's sent fool garnments and refuses to wear them (Stratemann: But they were presents! How could he!).

Ugh! Gundling is one of those (quite a few) things I will just never forgive FW for :( Though lol Stratemann :)

Editor Richard Wolff: the Margravine gives one of her typical exaggarated descriptions of this meeting in her memoirs of these four gentlemen trying to "bully" her into marriage.

*facepalm*
Ugh, wow.

Meanwhile ,the British envoy: Wilhelmine looked pale and if she'd faint the entire time, and the Queen was upset and almost in tears, and the King glowered. Taking the British bias into acccount, I suppose the truth was somewhere in between, but Stratemann's polyanna-ness is still striking.

Poor Wilhelmine :(

From:

cahn

HAHAHAHAHA! It's true, Heinrich! :D

From:

cahn

I made new and more silly doodles (like a very Cursed looking Heinrich)

Yay! Heinrich is my Problematic Fave :D

From:

cahn

:( I find myself hoping that at least the sex was good! I mean, maybe it was, Heinrich thought so anyway?

From:

selenak

Speaking of reading non-German books, I've finished "Domestic Enemies", and it is indeed very good. (Though I suspect only partly applicable to the German states within the same period.) And hooray on you reading a book featuring my guy Boswell (among others)! (No, I haven't read this one, but you might say I know the cast. *g*)