Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 21

[cahn]

Much slower because of world-events/Life-in-general/Yuletide/holidays, but still going!

End of Yuletide signups:
4 requests for Frederician RPF :D :D 2 offers
2 requests for Circle of Voltaire RPF, 2 offers (I hope we did not scare you off, third offer!)

Comments

Versailles

[selenak]

Replying here to Mildred's and Cahn's comments in the earlier post.

Water fountains as the big challenge to engineers: okay, this made me look up Herrenchiemsee, aka the palace Bavarian King Ludwig II. (yes, the one from Neuschwanstein, the Wagner fanboy) built in late imitation of Versailles. Turns out the waterworks were practically the only thing about it finished and working when he died. But given Herrenchiemsee is build on an island in the middle of the largest Bavarian lake - large as in nearly as large as American lakes - , the water supply was no problem!

Louis the patient, wry-humored in the endearing anecdotes: I think that's one reason why Louis XIV.' working schedule worked for Louis, and for none of his successors. He was a despot, but for all his love of opulence a hard-working one, and one able to submit himself to the micromanagement of his time and the incredible amount of etiquette he himself had created instead of freaking out and venting the pressure by making life hell for those serving him, or not working at all and making someone else do it.

Re: Versailles

[mildred_of_midgard]

But given Herrenchiemsee is build on an island in the middle of the largest Bavarian lake - large as in nearly as large as American lakes - , the water supply was no problem!

Indeed! Also, Ludwig lived in the second half of the 19th century, which is when engineers finally developed the technology to get the fountain at Sanssouci working. So he had a number of advantages over Louis and Fritz. I also wonder about the elevation of his gardens relative to his abundant water supply--that was a problem both at Versailles and Sanssouci.

Louis: But Louis the chill of those anecdotes was Louis XV. The author goes on to give illustrations of Louis XIV reprimanding his courtiers for lack of etiquette, including one guy (a prince de Turenne, evidently this one, not the famous one) being banished after a series of repeat offenses culminated in him accidentally hitting Louis in the face with the fringe of his glove, because he hadn't removed his gloves before handing the King his shirt. No citation given, though, unlike the Louis XV anecdotes. The author also doesn't say whether these two sets of anecdotes were representative of how the respective monarchs handled etiquette violations.

Re: Versailles

[mildred_of_midgard]

More gossipy sensationalism from the Versailles book.

The first thing to note is that Saint-Simon is the Versailles equivalent of Lehndorff and Hervey, i.e., a courtier who left vivid and detailed (several thousand pages) memoirs that are a treasure trove for court life of the period (1691-1723). I notice that he has at least one chapter named after him in Horowski, which I haven't yet read but intend to.

So, remember when I talked about how protocol around seating was a Big Deal^TM at Versailles? In the words of Spawforth, the author of the Versailles book I'm reading, The pages of Saint-Simon are full of incidents that hinged, as it were, on doors or stools. Today they seem funny or simply baffling, like a report by an anthropologist from a faraway land. But for Saint-Simon these episodes were no laughing matter.

Three examples:

Anecdote 1: Some women of the Lorraine family try to sit above the duchesses by arriving there first, but one duchess beats them to it. One of the Lorraine women physically wrestles the duchess off her seat. They then bitch at Saint-Simon's wife, a duchess, for sitting above them. Saint-Simon, when he finds out, complains to the king, which was not something one did casually.

Anecdote 2: Madame de Léon is trying to move up the social ladder. She plans a maneuver in which she will pay a visit to one of the royal princesses and enter the room with two higher ranked women, so that when the princess rises to greet the other two, it'll look like she rose for Madame de Léon.

But the usher forces the three women to enter the room separately, thus giving the princess the opportunity to remain "firmly seated" when the Madame de Léon arrives. Foiled!

Anecdote 3: For context, the Duchess d'Orleans is the legitimized daughter of Louis XIV and Madame de Montespan, and she's the wife of her first cousin the Regent (Philippe d'Orleans, son of famously gay husband of Liselotte by the same name). So she's not exactly a nobody. But, she's technically illegitimate. This will become a plot point.

One day, as she's entering a room, the usher accidentally opens *both* doors to her. Now, this is something you're only supposed to do for legitimate children of the monarch. Illegitimate offspring only merit one door open.

The duchess of Berry, the daughter of the Duchess d'Orleans, "weeping with rage," demands that the usher be sacked for accidentally showing her mother too much honor.

Because...what is filial piety compared to court etiquette, I guess.

So all this is the context in which Wilhelmine and the pre-MT empress can't meet until their people spend a whole day negotiating seating arrangements.

Wilhelmine: I am the daughter of a king and expect to be treated like it.
Empress: But you're in town incognito specifically so you can avoid all the duties of a margravine.
Wilhelmine: But I want to have my cake and eat it too!
Empress: I will have the least fancy chair I can get away with, and you will have the fanciest chair I can give you, with a high back, but my chair will have arms and yours won't, sorry, that's how it's gonna be.
Wilhelmine: FINE.

Also, per Horowski, this was a thing at court in London as well: in the first gathering with his family and new wife, Fritz of Wales gave his wife a chair with arms and his "astonished" sisters only chairs with backs but no arms. The sisters, iirc, had their servants bring better chairs, but they left before coffee, because they'd been warned that even worse insults of precedence were to come.

My wife, hearing these stories: These people need a hobby!
Me: I think this is their hobby or possibly their religion.
My wife: They need a less toxic hobby!

On a lighter note, this dirty joke:

Perhaps the knack when speaking frankly to royalty was to do so in such a way that the monarch could not be sure whether or not he should be offended. Once, at one of Louis XVI’s suppers at Versailles, the young Marie-Antoinette was playfully pelting the monarch with bread. Turning to the comte de Saint-Germain (not to be confused with the supposedly immortal alchemist), an old soldier, the king asked him how he would comport himself on campaign if under attack from projectiles. “Sire, I would spike the cannon” came the brusque reply.

Louis kept smiling. But others present were sure they had just heard a none-too-veiled reference to the childless state of the royal marriage.

The Comte de Saint-Germain is presumably this one, not to be confused with the more famous supposedly immortal alchemist.

Early Education

[selenak]

felis: while "to please me and my wife [...] in everything he does" is basically a set phrase, it's also literally impossible to accomplish later on. Poor kids.

Quite. It's telling of how little FW knew whom he was married to that the possibility that he and his wife might want different things from their children never occured to him. In fairness, now that I've read up on the simultanous Hannover family dysfunction: cousin G2 who was Hervey observes was quite similar to FW in many ways had a Queen who while presumably no more in love with her husband than SD was made it her policy to knock herself out to please him and change his mind via persuasion and manipulation, and she always presented a united front with the kids. Interestingly, FW's own mother, otoh, did clash with her husband's advisors early on, just like SD would later, but F1 didn't have the temperament for marital warfare, and ended up choosing her over the advisors.

funny enough, this whole part was then followed by a provision stating that if Fritz was disobedient, they (= Finkenstein and Kalkstein) should always threaten him with the Queen's reaction, never with FW's ("müssen sie Ihn mit [der Königin] alle Zeit schrecken, mit Mir aber niemahlen").

mildred_of_midgard: We have discussed how FW, in many respects, didn't understand child psychology, like, at all. And--surprise!--none of his children turned out as he intended.

cahn: Heh, this actually does seem to me that he kind of did understand the concept of good cop, bad cop? Only... it might have worked better if he had actually stuck to it and not in fact had all these over-the-top reactions that everyone was quite correctly scared of :P

I think what it comes down to is that what only child of his parents FW didn't understand that different children have different reactions, and also that if you want to play good cop, bad cop, with you as the good cop, you can't simultanously want to be thought of as the highest authority. I mean, a lot of fathers in biographies I've read pulled off the later smoothly, wether or not they intended it, by being the fun parent, with the others being stuck with the thankless role of disclipline-giving parent. This usually came with the fathers being absent a lot, though. FW, by contrast, made himself ever present in Fritz' life.

But seriously, the earlier point is key, imo. FW assumed Fritz would be just like him. He had hated having to learn Latin, Greek and Roman history, dancing etc. - let's not forget his mother's biography informed me Tiny Terror FW danced ballet in in public to his grandmother's delight! -, so he thought he'd spare his son(s) this and that they'd be happy about it and grateful, as he himself would have been. And when Fritz wasn't and loved just what FW had hated as a kid, it confused and hurt him, he started to feel rejected and responded badly, thereby starting a vicious circle. Whereas little AW responded positively to not having to learn Latin etc. and loved playing with guns and fireworks, so FW felt accepted and loved and started a positive cycle of affectionate reinforcement. (That AW actually didn't turn out like him at all, either, neither in temper nor inclinations, is another matter; he was able to blind himself about their very different attitudes to sex, for starters, by never finding out about them in his life time. And within FW's lifetime, all the kids still prayed, visited services and were careful not to show any scepticism, of course.)

felis: I've now started reading his correspondence with Duhan, which is very sweet so far.

I'm with Mildred: bring on the quotes! None of us has read it so far.

Re: Early Education

[mildred_of_midgard]

I think what it comes down to is that what only child of his parents FW didn't understand that different children have different reactions, and also that if you want to play good cop, bad cop, with you as the good cop, you can't simultanously want to be thought of as the highest authority.

Yep, this is what I mean by "not understanding child psychology, not even a little bit." "Good cop/bad cop" is all very well, but you can't play good cop by acting like a bad cop, if you terrorize your children they will be terrified, and also children have different personalities!

Agree with you, as you know, about how the dynamics came into being, and the vicious cycle vs. virtuous cycle.

Re: Early Education

[felis]

He had hated having to learn Latin, Greek and Roman history, dancing etc. - let's not forget his mother's biography informed me Tiny Terror FW danced ballet in in public to his grandmother's delight! -, so he thought he'd spare his son(s) this and that they'd be happy about it and grateful, as he himself would have been.

Hee, did not know the ballet detail, but otherwise, yes, and in the same vein, I also noted the instruction that morals should always be taught through examples and short maxims, because this "won't cause disgust or frustration, unlike extensive systems of ethics and morality". Which tells you something about the way FW liked to learn things and about his assumptions regarding the way Fritz' mind would and should work.

Fritz-Duhan Follow-Up

[felis]

As I recall, Fritz tried to get him back, but couldn't, so a position with the in-laws was the best he could do until he inherited. Then Duhan and Algarotti got nearly verbatim "come quickly!" one-liners on June 3.

Ha, I knew there was a double of Algarotti's summons, but didn't remember it was Duhan. Also, I did a slight mental double-take at "in-laws" because I'd been thinking of it as "with his sister", since he repeatedly mentions her in the letters and took advantage of her visits to get them to Duhan safely. But either way, he seems to have been on good terms with the duke as well (not so much with the duchess). No idea how exactly he accomplished Duhan's change of living conditions, though, and who helped him with that, because going by his pre-1740 letters, it seems to have been quite risky to even write to him (see below).

In parallel with the French originals at Trier, I've been checking out this German edition of their correspondence from 1791, which itself is a translation of an earlier French edition. [With the result that the German translator writes opinionated footnotes about the French editor's strange opinions on Fritz.] Both Trier and this edition have the same 25 letters from Fritz (some of them rather short) and 2 letters from Duhan, so it's not very extensive. (The state archive seems to have two or three more from Duhan, but all from 1745, which makes me wonder if his pre-1740 letters might have been destroyed by Fritz for safety reasons. The book edition also includes the two versions of Duhan's eulogy, one written by Formey (I assume? if he was writing academy eulogies in 1745 already) and one by Fritz himself.)


The correspondence starts with an endearing one-liner you probably know, 15-year-old!Fritz's letter from 1727, when his education was deemed finished and they had to part ways: I promise you that, when I have my own money in hand, I will give you two thousand four hundred ecus annually, and I will always love you a little more than at this hour, if this is possible. [Signed "Frideric Pr.R. (L.S.)" and I have no idea what the L.S. stands for...]

After that, the letters are basically split in two halves, pre- and post-1740, with the post ones all written when Fritz was away during wartime, and mostly in 1745. As with other people, there's a tonal change, and particularly the 1745 letters are clingy "write me more often!" ones, so much so that I was a bit surprised, until Fritz mentioned that Jordan and Keyserlingk had just died, and I remembered that he was also on the outs with Wilhelmine and Voltaire during that time.

The 1730s letters are very affectionate, with lots of promises to do more for Duhan once he's able to, full of encouragement (it sounds like Duhan was struggling a bit in exile, possibly with depression), but also occasionally quite cryptic when referencing past events. Case in point, the marble quote in context, July 15th, 1733, because I have to admit, without Mildred's comment, I would not necessarily have made that connection:

It was not for want of will but of opportunity that I could not assure you, my dear, of my constant friendship. I purposely pass by the times when fate persecuted us both equally, and I believe that in these kinds of cases one must think of a happy future, and forget all that was disastrous and unfortunate in the past. However, my dear friend, I can assure you that your misfortunes have affected me more than my own; and since you know that when I am a friend, I am so truly, you can judge what I have suffered on your behalf. But let us break away from a matter as odious as it is distressing, and return to the present. You know my situation has changed a lot to my advantage; but you do not know, perhaps, that one cuts very deeply into marble, and that it always remains. I don't need to tell you more, because from there you can roughly understand the state of what concerns us. As far as I'm concerned, you can count on my esteem, my friendship, and my assistance. I still have the feelings towards you that I had of old. I hope that a time will come that will open up opportunities for me to prove this to you.
[...]
Attach yourself to the bearer of this letter, who is my very faithful friend.

No footnote telling me who the faithful friend was, unfortunately. But it shows that the letter writing had to happen secretly, which keeps being the case, so Charlotte becomes a go-between:

March 19th, 1734, written in Berlin: You know the risk you run when you can only do things while trembling. This is why I have only been able to answer you now, having a good opportunity through my sister. She will tell you everything I think about you. I am still the same, but similar to a mirror, which is obliged to mirror all the objects in front of it. I mean to say, not daring to be what nature made it, it is unfortunately subjected to the sad need to conform to the bizareness of the objects that present themselves --- --- I say too much, and I would say even more when speaking to a faithful friend, if I did not remember the principle of the wise man, who wants a seal to be put on his tongue. Farewell, my dear, until the time when I can see you again and speak to you without fear and without anxiety, and when I will reiterate to you the assurance of my perfect esteem, and how I am all yours.


October 2nd, 1736, he has things to say about Duhan vs. FW: Unless I have such sure opportunities as this, I don't dare to write to you. I hope you know me well enough not to suspect me of superficiality, nor to believe me capable of forgetting the gratitude I owe to a man of honor and integrity, who has employed all the wisdom of his mind to raise and educate me. I constantly remember the illustrious testimony that Alexander the Great gave to his teacher, in declaring that he was, in a certain sense, more indebted to him than to his father himself. I recognize myself as much inferior to this great prince, but I do not think it unworthy to imitate his good traits. So allow me, my dear Duhan, to tell you the same thing. My father only gave me life; are the talents of the mind not preferable?
[...]
I confess that I would very much like to see you again; but, knowing too well the disposition of minds, I can't flatter myself to have this satisfaction any time soon. When one indulges blindly in one's prejudices, and without examining things thoroughly, one is often prone to be seriously mistaken; hence most of the mistakes that men make. This is why it would be hoped that Father Malebranche's treatise 'The Search after Truth' was better known and read. Blood ties impose silence on me on a subject where I could explain myself more clearly, and where the subtle distinction between hating a bad deed and loving the one who commits it might vanish. These are the occasions when respect commands us to give bad things a twist that makes them less odious, and when charity wants us to paint the faults of the fellow man in the best colors we can.


March 13th, 1737 - Duhan's father has died and Fritz writes a condolence letter...

It is certain that the most severe tests, which we are obliged to pass in this world, are when we lose people forever who are dear to us. Constancy, steadfastness, and reason seem little help to us in these sad circumstances, and we only listen to our pain in these moments. I feel sorry for you with all my heart, seeing you in such a situation. [...] What is more common than being born and dying? However, we are always astonished at death, as if it were something foreign to us, and uncommon.
Console yourself, my dear Duhan, as best you can. Consider that there is a necessity which determines all events, and that it is impossible to fight what is resolved. We only make ourselves unhappy, without changing anything in our condition, and we spread bitterness over the happiest days of our life, the brevity of which should invite us not to grieve so much with unhappiness.
There is nothing more flattering to me than the confidence you show in me and the recourse you want to have in me. [...] How happy I would be if I could lessen your pain and find a proper balm to heal the wound this sorrow caused you! If my friendship can be of any help to you, please count on it and make use of the feelings I have for you.
We are about fifteen friends, retired here, who taste the pleasures of friendship and the sweetness of rest. It seems to me that I would be perfectly happy if you could come and join us in our solitude. We know no violent passions, and we only apply ourselves to making use of life. [...]


June 22nd, 1737, Fritz and his eternal enemy: ingratitude ;) - Ingratitude is a vice to which I feel an aversion of temperament, and I dare say, without hurting the laws of modesty, that gratitude has always been my favorite virtue.
May a happy fate join us, after a certain action [i.e. FW's death] has passed! I'm in your debt, and I'm dying to pay it off.


October 9th has the poem dedicated to Duhan, in which Fritz praises him as a mentor and as someone he should have listened to earlier instead of seeking pleasures in his youth, and then calls him his "seul père":
I owe you more, finally, than the author of my days:
He gave me life in his young love;
But he who teaches me, whose reason enlightens me,
He is my nurturer, and my only father.


February 10th, 1738, still secret letters, plus improving himself:
I neither could nor dared to answer your penultimate letter. All I can say about it is that the verses are charming, that they breathe freedom, playfulness and grace. If you write more, don't be stingy; send some fragments to me; but use my sister's intermediary, and do not risk any letter by post.
I am buried among books more than ever. I run after the time that I wasted so thoughtlessly in my youth, and I amass, as much as I can, a store of knowledge and truth. You will not condemn, I hope, the pains I am giving myself; they are a result of the knowledge that I have of myself. We must make up for all the faults of nature; we must take art for help, and draw even from the most remote antiquity to rectify what we find faulty in ourself.


The 1740 summons was quoted already, so let's skip to March 18th, 1744, from Breslau, Fritz keeps making good on his debts and his gratitude: You ask me what is your job as director of the Liegnitz Academy. It is to calmly draw your pension, to love me, and to enjoy yourself. These are duties which I hope you will not deny yourself, and which will be all the less painful to you as they are all that is required of you. Live happily in Berlin, dear Duhan, and enjoy, in age, the advantages owed to your merits, which fate denied you in your youth.


An example of the aforementioned 1745 letters, from Neisse: He starts with a poem lamenting Jordan and then says: I make no reparation to you, for you do not deserve it; and I will call you ungrateful, fickle and treacherous, until the moment when I will enjoy your pleasant company more often, and when I will see that, living in the same city, you will not live as if you were separated by a hundred miles from me. Jordan did not do so, and the friendship he had for me was sociable and bonding. I saw him every day, and when he was not sick, we lived together constantly.
Farewell, my dear Duhan; correct yourself, and become less sedentary.


September 24th, 1745, grieving Fritz: Think how unfortunate I am to have lost, almost at the same time, my poor Jordan and my dear Keyserlingk. They were my family, and I think I am now a widower, an orphan, and in a mourning of heart more dismal and more serious than that of black clothes.
[...]
Keep your health, and think that you are now almost the only old friend of mine I have left; and, if it doesn't ruin you on ink and paper, write to me more often. I will beg you again to be willing to accept errands for books and such things which I need sometimes. I believe my friends think like me, so I never dream of being able to bother them.

On the topic of errands, immediately after Soor - I'm completely plundered - he sends Duhan a list of the books he lost and asks him to send replacements, mostly from Jordan's library, which makes him cry over them in the next letter.

Nov 22nd, 1745, the first of the two available Duhan letters shows how religious he was, which kind of surprised me tbh (although it's kind of hard to judge tone when there are only two very short letters to go by):
Believing Your Majesty to be on the eve of some battle, I confess to him that I do not have enough peace of mind to write to him philosophically, as he had ordered me. My whole philosophy now consists in praying to God to lead YM, to protect him from any accident, and to grant him such advantages over his enemies, that they are obliged to ask him for peace. I am convinced, Sire, that YM implores with all his soul the assistance of his Creator, that he begs him to forgive the errors into which he may have fallen, and that, in a firm resolution to cling to him, YM will give his orders with his usual intrepidity, and will expect everything from heaven's blessing.
Forgive me, Sire, for the brevity of this letter. I will write to you as a philosopher when you are victorious; now I can only speak as a Christian [...]
The second one, Nov 30th, contains a couple of thoughts on glory and virtue, but [...] I will admit to him that I find it difficult to speak alone of morality while the world speaks only of your exploits; and further, would it be possible that YM was thinking of philosophy while taking on the Austrians?

Fritz' last letter is a response to that from December 7th, in which he ruminates on the topic Duhan mentioned:
[...] You are so laconic, my dear Duhan, in your morals, that you only indicate sentences on which the ignorant and I can write commentaries. [...] Among men of merit, the first are, without a doubt, those who do good for the love of good itself, who follow virtue and justice out of sentiment, and whose actions in life are the most consistent; and those of a lower order do great deeds out of vanity. Their virtue is less certain than that of the former: but, however impure this source may be, if the public good results from it, they can be granted a place among great men. Cato was of this first order, Cicero, of the second; so we see that the soul of the stoic is infinitely superior to the soul of the academician.
But I do not know why I amuse myself with giving you a great moral sermon, you, to whom I should only speak of the esteem which your virtue inspires in me, always equal and always certain. I hope to assure you of this soon myself, when, once heaven allows me to end the horrors of war, I may, in the bosom of my homeland and my family, enjoy the sweetness of company with my friends, and give the sciences the moments that I do not owe to the state.
Farewell, dear Duhan: be sure that I love you with all my heart.

And then Duhan died not even a month later. :(

Re: Fritz-Duhan Follow-Up

[mildred_of_midgard]

Aww, thank you for this! Some of these I knew only excerpts of, without context, and some not at all.

going by his pre-1740 letters, it seems to have been quite risky to even write to him (see below).

Wow, yeah! I knew Duhan was in trouble, but I had no idea it was this difficult to write to him.

which makes me wonder if his pre-1740 letters might have been destroyed by Fritz for safety reasons.

Entirely possible.

The book edition also includes the two versions of Duhan's eulogy, one written by Formey (I assume? if he was writing academy eulogies in 1745 already)

Indeed, yes, and it's in the same volume in our library as the Peter Keith one. In fact, Formey refers to the Duhan eulogy in his Keith eulogy, saying that he got caught up in the same events of 1730 as those already mentioned (extremely allusively!) in the "Du Han" (Formey's spelling) eulogy.

The correspondence starts with an endearing one-liner you probably know, 15-year-old!Fritz's letter from 1727

I do, and mainly I remember it because one biographer gives him a hard time about talking money with Duhan, and I'm extremely indignant, because Fritz is talking about how he wants to give Duhan money! Surely he should be praised.

[Signed "Frideric Pr.R. (L.S.)" and I have no idea what the L.S. stands for...]

Googling suggests maybe "locus sigilli": place for the seal.

particularly the 1745 letters are clingy "write me more often!" ones, so much so that I was a bit surprised, until Fritz mentioned that Jordan and Keyserlingk had just died, and I remembered that he was also on the outs with Wilhelmine and Voltaire during that time.

Yep. I found the "widower (that again!) and orphan" bit, which I had seen quoted elsewhere, very touching.

The 1730s letters are very affectionate, with lots of promises to do more for Duhan once he's able to, full of encouragement (it sounds like Duhan was struggling a bit in exile, possibly with depression)

:/

Case in point, the marble quote in context, July 15th, 1733, because I have to admit, without Mildred's comment, I would not necessarily have made that connection:

Yeah, I wouldn't have either, or at least it wouldn't have been obvious. I'm following MacDonogh's interpretation, which seems reasonable to me. Especially in light of that mirror quote, which I've seen not only in MacDonogh but also elsewhere. :/

MacDonogh's exact translation: 'You know that my situation has greatly improved, but what you possibly don’t realise is that they have cut deeply into the marble, and that stays for ever.'

My father only gave me life; are the talents of the mind not preferable?

I owe you more, finally, than the author of my days:
He gave me life in his young love;
But he who teaches me, whose reason enlightens me,
He is my nurturer, and my only father.

WOW. This is so great! I always wondered how Fritz felt at this age about having a surrogate father, and I'm pleased to find he was favorably disposed toward the idea. (This is relevant for my fix-it fic WIP, where not only does Duhan show up in French exile, but Fritz ultimately gets adopted by French Comte Rottembourg.)

Duhan's father has died and Fritz writes a condolence letter...

Aww, good job with the condolence letter, Fritz. I think Fritz writes the best condolence letters when he had no emotional involvement with the person who died. When he does...watch out.

Ingratitude is a vice to which I feel an aversion of temperament

Austrians: *start coughing madly*

October 9th has the poem dedicated to Duhan, in which Fritz praises him as a mentor and as someone he should have listened to earlier instead of seeking pleasures in his youth

Ooh, interesting. Because Wilhelmine, in her memoirs, says that once Duhan left, Fritz started leading a dissipated life, which wouldn't have happened if Duhan was there. I was wondering to what extent she was struggling to come to terms with the fact that Fritz was growing up and away from her and had boyfriends now, but considering this is also the time of the Dresden trip, and Fritz was a teenage boy living in a very repressive environment, the lure of the forbidden may have been strong.

I still headcanon that Fritz did some experimenting when he was a teenager, discovered that he wasn't really into women sexually, and eventually that even with men, sex was overrated. But who knows.

when I will see that, living in the same city, you will not live as if you were separated by a hundred miles from me.

Fritz continues to have zero chill when he feels neglected. Also, this reminds me oddly of the letter in 1746 to Heinrich about living in the same house/palace as him and managing to avoid him with astonishing success.

Nov 22nd, 1745, the first of the two available Duhan letters shows how religious he was, which kind of surprised me tbh (although it's kind of hard to judge tone when there are only two very short letters to go by):

Doesn't actually surprise me; a number of Fritz's friends were, and let's not forget Duhan was appointed by FW who thought he would be a good role model. Also, he's a few weeks from dying (January 3, 1746, per Wikipedia), and I notice Suhm and Fritz's discourse gets more religious whenever Suhm thinks he's about to die.

And then Duhan died not even a month later. :(

:(

MacDonogh tells me not only Fritz but his younger brothers got to see Duhan one last time before he died, immediately after they returned to Berlin from the Second Silesian War on December 28, 1745 (peace was made in the Treaty of Dresden on December 25, 1745):

Frederick, with all three of his brothers, rode straight round to Duhan’s house. 'It was a noble sight, to see a dying man surrounded by princes, and by a triumphant monarch, who in the midst of the incessant clamour of exultation, sought only to alleviate the sick man’s pains.' Frederick was indeed touchingly fond of the man who, despite the most fervent opposition imaginable, had first incited his love of art, poetry and philosophy. Duhan died the next day and Frederick agreed to look after his old teacher’s family. His sister was given a pension, married a French nobleman, and lived next door to Princess Amalia on the Linden.

Re: Fritz-Duhan Follow-Up

[selenak]

Thank you so much for this! A few thoughts:

Charlotte smuggling Fritz/Duhan letters: this is fascinating, since Charlotte has as good a claim as any of the daughters to being FW's favourite. It varied, but Charlotte always bounced back to the No.1 spot. I've seen several biographers declare one reason for this is that Charlotte had the best sense of humor in the family and thus was able to take, say, his "another girl? We should drown them like kittens" type of statements as jokes, even reporting the arrival of her daughter Anna Amalie in the same manner. (Which Anna Amalie somehow found out later and did not take as a joke. Since she went on to become the Duchess of Weimar, the mother of Carl August and Goethe's patroness, her decision to raise her kid exactly NOT like her mother (and her mother's parents) had done was to have far reaching consequences.) While Charlotte's status as family clown is something Fritz mentions favourably now and then - as in the Mantteuffel/Seckendorff report in the mid 1730s (on the same occasion, he does say Charlotte's husband is his favourite brother-in-law, so much for you, BayreuthFriedrich) - I can't help but recall that the most prominent joke of hers we know, from Wilhelmine's memoirs, is that malicious crack about EC during the infamous 1732/1733 holidays, made in a context designed to gain SD's approval. So my impression was that Charlotte was one for playing it safe, punching downwards and submitting upwards. Which is why I'm intrigued she played courier for Fritz and Duhan. Of course, the personal risk for her isn't that great - she's not financially dependent on FW the way Wilhelmine still is, Braunschweig is a duchy with blood ties to the Habsburgs as well as the Hohenzollern, so if FW finds out, he's not able to harm her or her husband as a consequence - and since Fritz will be the next King, it could be a way to cement her standing with him.

the 1745 letters are clingy "write me more often!" ones, so much so that I was a bit surprised, until Fritz mentioned that Jordan and Keyserlingk had just died, and I remembered that he was also on the outs with Wilhelmine and Voltaire during that time.

Good point. I mean, he still had SD as a source of parental love and admiration, but while he undoubtedly loved her, I never had the impression he confided in her, either before or after ascending to the throne.

All the "you're my true father" insistence is fascinating. And maybe one reason why FW was so much harder on Duhan than on Finkenstein et al. He wasn't one to suffer competition lightly, anymore than his son would be. But he who teaches me, whose reason enlightens me,/He is my nurturer, and my only father. also almost literally matches something Voltaire's biographer Orieux when discussing Voltaire's 1746 (!) praise of his (Jesuit) school teachers: His father never had a right to such a proof of his gratitude - his true fathers were those who nourished his mind; the other - or others, since he declared three candidates for his biological father - not worth talking about!

(The phrasing is almost identical, but it's Orieux' phrasing, not Voltaire's. Orieux, by his bibliography, didn't even read a single Fritz biography - it's always "Frederic and Louis XV", "Frederic and Voltaire" etc. by French authors -, so I bet he wasn't familiar with Fritz' letter to Duhan. Must be coincidence, then.)

Fritz being plundered at Soor: Now I'm curious: Austrian Trenck mentions the war chest, Eichel, the clothing and the dogs, but I don't think he mentions the books, though I have to look it up again to be sure. In any event, given that Eichel & Biche were returned, how come the books weren't?

Duhan sounds like a kind, good man, and Fritz was lucky to have him.

Re: Fritz-Duhan Follow-Up

[cahn]

Thank you for this! This is great.

My father only gave me life; are the talents of the mind not preferable?

Take that, FW! :(

Blood ties impose silence on me on a subject where I could explain myself more clearly, and where the subtle distinction between hating a bad deed and loving the one who commits it might vanish.

...is this the diss to FW that I think it is?

And that condolence letter is... surprisingly not bad! Like mildred I figured it was because it wasn't someone he had strong emotions about.

<3

Re: Fritz-Duhan Follow-Up

[felis]

Tiny Duhan Addendum - once again looking for something else, I came across a December 1735 letter from Wilhelmine, in which she asks if Duhan could come and teach her philosophy: Since there's nobody here to teach me [philosophy], I asked my sister [Charlotte] if Duhan could come here, but he seems to be inseparable from the old duchess*. If you could persuade him to come here, it would delight me infinitely. It would be a great advantage for my mind, and I would be in your debt for this service as for everything else. Aw.
But, unfortunately, and as we know, this didn't happen, presumably too risky, see Fritz' reply: [...] allow me to tell you that I think it would be better to leave Duhan quietly in Blankenburg; otherwise we could re-awaken all the old conflicts of the past.

*the old duchess = Christine-Luise, grandmother of both EC and MT, who lived at Blankenburg as a widow and employed Duhan there. Charlotte calls her la vieille de Blankenbourg in a 1740 letter, who greatly regrets Duhan, and everyone regrets to see him go, although I see him in such good hands that I would be wrong not to let him have this happiness.

More on von der Groeben...

[felis]

... because I just stumbled across him while looking for something else! (previous thread)

a) Fritz mentions him in passing in a letter to Wilhelmine from December 15th, 1732, where he gives a list of people he dines with, and calls him "a harlequin by nature and a fop by profession".

b) I should have read both the editor's notes and the bibliographical notes at Trier, because the latter have a link to an uncensored version of both letters, provided by Volz, and while I have a hard time understanding some of it (unknown words and references + Fritz orthography + verse + blackletters = ???), I do see why they were extensively censored: lots of profanity. Like: Fritz accuses v.d.Groeben of sitting at home and lousing his "hosenbeutel" and I don't know if he means his bottom or his balls or something less personal, but he certainly tells him that "thunder should drive sideways into your arse with barbed hooks, for you devil are sitting at home and hatching your hen's eggs". (That last expression just means that he's lazy I think, because I seem to dimly remember hearing it used even in my time?) There's more in the uncensored poem, but, see above, comprehension problems.
But, on a less sweary note, he also tells him that he's lucky because he's getting enough to eat and because there's dysentery going around in the camp. And he sends him fruit and dice and possibly a (snuff?)box filled with contraband(?) ("so you don't forget me").

As for the editor's notes: Preuss and Volz can't seem to agree on much, not even the guy's name - Johann Heinrich (Preuss, which fits the state archive) vs. Joachim Heinrich (Volz, which might make him the brother of the wiki guy Mildred linked, with a 1705 birthdate and a 1738 marriage) - but they both say that he was first ensign (at the time of the letter to Wilhelmine) and then lieutenant in Fritz' regiment, and transfered to the hussars in 1738. (Preuss says he was thirty-four at the time, so it seems that he was definitely years older than Fritz.)

Preuss' footnotes also led me to two other anecdotes about him, one in Büsching p. 20 - some questionable "pranks" on preachers and their wives played by Fritz and him - and a Fritz letter to Grumbkow in 1733, where von der Groeben apparently almost got into a fistfight with a woman - Preuss says Wolden's wife - because he bothered her with his smoking, she started to insult him, he insulted back, and then "a fight of the amazons" almost broke out, except her husband intervened and the combatants made peace by drinking.

... I guess now we know why Fritz called him a devil!? (Although in this particular case, he actually called her a female one.)

Re: More on von der Groeben...

[selenak]

Good old Volz. Thank you very much indeed for the links!

"a harlequin by nature and a fop by profession".

Checking on your link, I see Volz footnotes this not just with his own translation of the Fritz/Wilhelmine letters but with the original French phrase, where Fritz uses "petit-maitre" for "fop". Which stood out to me because that's what FW keeps calling him in his rants, including in the August 1731 submission protocol.

Hosenbeutel: definitely where the balls and the penis are kept, as far as male 18th century fashion is concerned.

I recognized one quote from the letter, the one about Prince Eugene letting the imperial army drill now the way the Prussians did. Though Fritz may have written this to more than one person, he had a lot of time at his hands in this inconclusive war.

Snuffbox: giving one with your portrait was a popular way to signal favor for royals, so I assume this is what happened. As for contraband, perhaps due to the war situation the tobacco import had gotten tricky?

What strikes me about the letter other than its frat boy tone (see, AW wasn't the only one in the family!) is that Fritz uses the Du address. This is not surprising when he's writing to Fredersdorf, because Fredersdorf is a commoner and his valet. But von der Gröben is a noble and an officer, which means he's just the kind of person whom Fritz, were he writing in French, would using "vous" to address. And of course writing in German by itself is rare - writing a poem in German hasn't happened since Küstrin!

(And in Küstrin, it had been in return to the friendly gesture by Wilke.)

I note in the poem he asks "how is the pack of whores?" (Das Hurenpack.) Which could literally mean female prostitutes, but it's worth mentioning Fritz also calls undeniable male Marwitz a whore in one of the Marwitz lettrs, and he calls all the singers (female and male alike) whores in the Fredersdorf letters (with the footnotes both by Richter and by other editors assuring the readers he didn't mean it like that, it was just how one refered to singers in Those Days, which, yeah, some people certainly did...

Anyway, re: the question whether or not he had sex with von der Gröben: it more sounds like, what's the euphemism theses days employed by US politicians, army "locker room talk". Which isn't to say that he didn't! Just that I can't tell on the basis of the letter and the poem alone.

Oh, and it does crack me up that the the next previously unprinted Fritz work Volz presents in this article is the famous orgasm poem about Algarotti, "cygne de Padue"...with Volz assuring is it's characteristing for the great King that in the last lines of the poem, he prefers "the happiness one enjoys in qieteness and in one's own room" to the great glory and fame.

Re: More on von der Groeben...

[mildred_of_midgard]

Okay, I just wanted to say thank you for sharing this and it was fascinating and I still have it bookmarked to reply to--I'm not ignoring you!--but between Yuletide and health, I've decided I need to take a sabbatical from salon until the 25th.

The problem with salon is that I may, strictly speaking, have *time* to work through my backlog of comment replies, but then you all will say interesting things in reply, and then I'll want to reply to those replies, and this will eat up brainpower I badly need for Yuletide. The problem, in other words, is that salon is *too* *awesome*. :)

But I'll be back!

Re: More on von der Groeben...

[cahn]

Same here (as what mildred said)! I do want to reply to this and in general I'm sorry I haven't been around much (or really at all), but I should be around quite a bit more in salon in January <3

Back to decorating my apartment

[prinzsorgenfrei]

Uni hit me like a freight train, every professor wants some presentation or essay as proof that I'm not sleeping in their Zoom lectures and drawing in perspective is hard, so my illustrations aren't working, but one thing is working out: Copying stuff.
So I copied one of my favorite portraits of Wilhelmine because who would deserve a spot on my wall more than her? :D And oh, the difference a familiar medium (colored pencils, in this case) can make.



My phone camera makes the texture look 10 times more rough than it is and there are some flaws, but I'm satisfied with the overall result :D She's now officially the prettiest person of the lineup so far.

Re: Back to decorating my apartment

[mildred_of_midgard]

Wow, that's AMAZING! Definitely the prettiest! Your talent never ceases to astound, and you must have the best-decorated apartment in town. :DDD

(Guys, I'm way behind on comments because I'm steadfastly not doing anything that might jeopardize finishing my Yuletide fic in time, but I have starred all the ones that I want to reply to and will be chatty again at some point. :) Also, Yuletide progress is happening, yay and fingers crossed.)

Re: Back to decorating my apartment

[selenak]

Wow! It's one of my favourite portraits of her, too, and I love your version. Including how you bring out the Hohenzollern blue eyes, and the sceptical smile. A massive round applause for you!

Re: Back to decorating my apartment

[cahn]

ooooh Wilhelmine is my fave and she is so pretty and I LOVE IT. Also like selenak says, she looks like a super interesting person <3

also holy cow I didn't even know it was possible to do this with colored pencils :D I would love to see more colored pencil work! (especially since -- I really liked the other pictures too, but this sounds like it's way more fun for you!)

Re: Back to decorating my apartment

[felis]

Ah, yes! The portrait in selenak's Wilhelmine icon, which at first glance made me think that Wilhelmine decided a black strand of hair would look awesome. ;)
Love your take on it, particularly her face, the sharp and shiny eyes, and the colours. (Also, I've noticed the coarseness effect with pencil drawings before, but I like the result in your case, because it totally works both for her face and for the background.)

More silly comics from yours truly!

[prinzsorgenfrei]

It's what it says on the tin, I made another one. And I crossed something off the request list! Did I just do it to chicken out of drawing a proper monkey? Quite possibly! But I honestly feel like this style fit the situation :'D This kind of reminds me of my Keeping up with the Hohenzollerns days.

Here you go:


Also thank you very much for your kind comments on Wilhelmine :D She's honestly the best that came out of this month, artistically.

Re: More silly comics from yours truly!

[felis]

That is one demonic monkey! I really like your comic style, and one detail I love here is the smile on Fritz' face while writing to Suhm.

Re: More silly comics from yours truly!

[mildred_of_midgard]

AAAHHH OMG this is the best! Maniacal Mimi the Monkey, one of my favorite episodes! I can't get over how spoiled I am in this fandom! I request an illustration and you draw it for me! (And I request a book and cahn buys it for me and selenak reads it for me, lol.)

One little thing that's totally my fault: that quote "It seems to me that in her place, even with all my reason, I could not have reasoned better, and I would have done the exact same thing," was actually *from* Suhm *to* Fritz. When I first encountered it, I misinterpreted it as from Fritz and reported it as such, and when I realized Suhm had written it, it was too late to edit the original comment, but Rheinsberg has the correct attribution. I thought that was touching in a different way, because Suhm is apparently saying he would have burned the fruits of his own labor if Fritz was ignoring him to read them, because Fritz means more. <33

It's also worth reminding cahn that it was just a copy of Suhm's work that got burned, not the original, which I suspect is why everyone (except the guy who had to recopy it) was able to be so good-humored about it.

Thank you and keep the drawings coming as long as you're having fun, we love them to bits and pieces! <333

ETA: Oh, and the "Burn After Reading" title is GREEEAAT. :D

Oil Paint Attempt #1

[prinzsorgenfrei]

In a fit of procrastination-productivity I dug out my unopened oil paint and my free sample painting paper and tried some stuff. What happened was Katte because the piece of paper was rather small and there's this one closeup of his face that I could use as a reference.

Overall I liked it a lot better than the acrylic paint I used for poor Fredersdorf, so I might paint over that one at some point... Give him Face #4 :'D
The fact that oil paint takes ages to dry was a blessing and a curse and I definitely need to get used to working dark to light and not putting my hand onto the canvas (there's black paint all over everything I love). The result, like Fredersdorf, has its problems (we do not talk about the left side of his face) but I like it well enought so far ^^

Re: Oil Paint Attempt #1

[mildred_of_midgard]

KATTE! <333

I love your procrastination-productivity, it's the best! :D And I continue to be amazed at your ability to produce things like this. It continues to be sufficiently advanced art to be indistinguishable from magic to me!

there's black paint all over everything I love

Lol, I always appreciate getting insight into your artistic struggles, so different from the writerly struggles I'm used to.

Thank you for sharing, and looking forward to more, as always!

Opened up a new post

[cahn]

Sorry, I completely messed this up and it occurred to me that some people might still be tracking this post instead -- since we were already having Frederician fic discussion in the post I made a couple of days ago, I just turned that one into the new discussion post, so conversation is taking place there. :)

https://cahn.dreamwidth.org/181432.html