Re: Corneille, I‘ll check out whether the Orieux biography says where Orieux has his numbers from. It‘s interesting that they are so completely different for each participant, not just one.
Agreed, though the presence of Elizaveta in one and Catherine in the other suggests that Voltaire sent another request in or shortly after 1762, which makes sense.
Also, if Elizaveta is correct, then she must have been asked in 1761, which implies that Fritz was asked in 1761 (difficult breakup or no, they've resumed their correspondence, and I doubt Elizaveta gets asked years before Fritz), which was a reeeeally bad year for him war/finance-wise (hence the need for the second miracle a year later), so again, I believe 6. Maybe he bought another 200 after 1763. ;)
It is interesting that Orieux says Louis wouldn't contribute, and Davidson says he ponied up for 200.
My need for numbers to match up is bugging me!
Speaking of which...
MT: Ahem.
cahn, MT is peeved at losing on a technicality: she died at 63, extremely busy. :P
Catherine: I did all that at 65 and had a vivid sex life, too, Monsieur le Cardinal.
Rumors abounded that she died in the middle of one of her excessive sex acts (some said with a horse, the only male big enough to satisfy her appetites), but this is mostly likely (I say this because I haven't investigated the sources myself) men hating on a sexually and politically dominant woman.
Cardinal Richelieu
Died at 57, according to Wikipedia. Perhaps it's more impressive that he managed to cram that much activity into just 57 years!
(Our Yuletide nominee the Duc, however, lived to be 92, albeit I'm not seeing evidence that he was extremely busy for the latter few decades.)
LOL. Well, Boswell was young when first meeting Johnson (22 years), but Johnson was over 50.
Weird, I took that to mean Boswell was young, but you're right, it parses better if Johnson is the one who's young. I probably parsed it that way because I knew Boswell was young and Johnson wasn't.
Anyway, Johnson in his 50s is still younger than Voltaire at 316, which is what he would have been in 2010. ;)
he keeps writing memos to himself to be more dignified, more like his father or Johnson; it never works, but unaware, he was not
I saw this in The Club, and thought it was funny.
What‘s more, some statistic fans have worked out that between Boswell living most of the time in Edinburgh during these years, and being on the Grand Tour right after his initial time in London where he had met and befriended Johnson, they spend only about 200 plus days in each other‘s company all in all. (Though of course they corresponded in between.) (Also, just how much Johnson had taken to Boswell can be seen from the fact that Boswell talked the Scotland-disliking Johnson into a journey a deux to the Hebrides
And statistics fans have further worked out that a quarter of those were on the Hebrides trip! (Everything I know, I know from one book, but it was an interesting book. ;)
Actually, to quote the numbers more precisely:
It has been calculated that, all told, he and Johnson were in each other’s company just 425 days during a friendship that lasted twenty-one years, and fully a quarter of those days were during a single journey they took together.
Re: Random things
Agreed, though the presence of Elizaveta in one and Catherine in the other suggests that Voltaire sent another request in or shortly after 1762, which makes sense.
Also, if Elizaveta is correct, then she must have been asked in 1761, which implies that Fritz was asked in 1761 (difficult breakup or no, they've resumed their correspondence, and I doubt Elizaveta gets asked years before Fritz), which was a reeeeally bad year for him war/finance-wise (hence the need for the second miracle a year later), so again, I believe 6. Maybe he bought another 200 after 1763. ;)
It is interesting that Orieux says Louis wouldn't contribute, and Davidson says he ponied up for 200.
My need for numbers to match up is bugging me!
Speaking of which...
MT: Ahem.
Catherine: I did all that at 65 and had a vivid sex life, too, Monsieur le Cardinal.
Rumors abounded that she died in the middle of one of her excessive sex acts (some said with a horse, the only male big enough to satisfy her appetites), but this is mostly likely (I say this because I haven't investigated the sources myself) men hating on a sexually and politically dominant woman.
Cardinal Richelieu
Died at 57, according to Wikipedia. Perhaps it's more impressive that he managed to cram that much activity into just 57 years!
(Our Yuletide nominee the Duc, however, lived to be 92, albeit I'm not seeing evidence that he was extremely busy for the latter few decades.)
LOL. Well, Boswell was young when first meeting Johnson (22 years), but Johnson was over 50.
Weird, I took that to mean Boswell was young, but you're right, it parses better if Johnson is the one who's young. I probably parsed it that way because I knew Boswell was young and Johnson wasn't.
Anyway, Johnson in his 50s is still younger than Voltaire at 316, which is what he would have been in 2010. ;)
he keeps writing memos to himself to be more dignified, more like his father or Johnson; it never works, but unaware, he was not
I saw this in The Club, and thought it was funny.
What‘s more, some statistic fans have worked out that between Boswell living most of the time in Edinburgh during these years, and being on the Grand Tour right after his initial time in London where he had met and befriended Johnson, they spend only about 200 plus days in each other‘s company all in all. (Though of course they corresponded in between.) (Also, just how much Johnson had taken to Boswell can be seen from the fact that Boswell talked the Scotland-disliking Johnson into a journey a deux to the Hebrides
And statistics fans have further worked out that a quarter of those were on the Hebrides trip! (Everything I know, I know from one book, but it was an interesting book. ;)
Actually, to quote the numbers more precisely:
It has been calculated that, all told, he and Johnson were in each other’s company just 425 days during a friendship that lasted twenty-one years, and fully a quarter of those days were during a single journey they took together.