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Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 22 (or: Yuletide 2020 edition)
ETA: Whoops, I missed my cue -- this might as well be the next discussion post, I guess! :)
This is about the fic I didn't author (I have another reveals post for the fics I did author).
So my goal this Yuletide was NOT to write any historical fandom (because hard!) and just enjoy the excellent stuff that other people wrote. And... that sort of happened? I didn't end up authoring anything history-intensive? Buuuuut I ended up spending a lot more time than I did on any of my own fics working with![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mildred_of_midgard on her fic, which she was worried about being able to pull off because she had had this completely insane idea to write a long casefic about Frederick the Great that every time I turned around had another twist put in :P :) She supplied me with what we called a "rough opal in matrix" bus pass casefic, and I cut away the matrix that remained and in some cases carved the opal -- that is to say, writing additional text for some of the scenes, what we liked to call "putting in feels," and in at least two cases entirely rewriting and/or restructuring the scene she'd written. She didn't always keep what I wrote (which we'd agreed upon in the beginning), but when she did (which was most of the time :) ) she then went in and rewrote/restructured what I put in to wordsmith (some of the words I gave her were really rough) and match her style, adding even more scenes -- that is, polishing it up and adding some gold and diamonds -- and voila, a beautiful pendant, I mean, story :)
I'm really proud of it and also it was really fun and also what I could handle this year, especially because mildred did all the parts I thought were hard and also wrote all the parts involving actual history or subtle AU before I was brought in so I didn't actually have to know historical stuff (though I guess I will never forget the battle of Leuthen now), and took full responsibility for how the whole thing turned out, so all I had to do was be like "Here, I'll write some rough feels for you for this scene!" The funny part was that I would often then write a paragraph justifying why I *had* to write the scene the way I did, and more likely than not mildred would be like, "yeah, I was sure you would do that, of course it should be written like that." (The most glaring example of this was where I inserted the Letter of Doom at the climax. I was worried there was some reason she didn't want it there, but she said, no, she just didn't have time to put it in herself and was just trusting me to do that :) ) She started jokingly calling me her "other self," to which I replied that it was with 1000% less angst and frustration -- as Frederick the Great's brother was his "other self" (which actually comes up in the fic) that he could trust to do all kinds of competent things, but they had a relationship that was, um, fraught? radioactive? Whereas this was just fun :)
Mildred did so much more than I did (we estimated a 90%/10% word ratio, not even counting the part where she wordsmithed a lot of my text) that I felt very uncomfortable being listed as a co-author, but hey, ~3000 words is a respectable Yuletide fic length :)
Yet They Grind Exceedingly Small (30384 words) by mildred_of_midgard
Chapters: 5/5
Fandom: 18th Century CE RPF, Historical RPF
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Relationships: Anna Amalie von Preußen & Wilhelmine von Preußen, Anna Amalie von Preußen & Friedrich Heinrich Ludwig von Preußen, Wilhelmine von Preußen & Elisabeth Friederike Sophie von Brandenburg-Bayreuth, Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great & Wilhelmine von Preußen | Wilhelmine of Prussia
Characters: Anna Amalie von Preußen (1723-1787), Wilhelmine von Preußen | Wilhelmine of Prussia (1709-1758), Friedrich Heinrich Ludwig von Preußen | Henry of Prussia (1726-1802), Elisabeth Friederike Sophie von Brandenburg-Bayreuth (1732-1780), Wilhelmine von Hesse-Kassel (1726-1808), August Wilhelm von Preußen | Augustus William of Prussia (1722-1758), Alcmene 1 | Frederick the Great's Italian Greyhound, Voltaire (Writer), Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dysfunctional Family, Suicide, Alternate Universe - Dark, Siblings, Canon-Typical Violence, Mystery, Tide of History Challenge
Summary:
This is about the fic I didn't author (I have another reveals post for the fics I did author).
So my goal this Yuletide was NOT to write any historical fandom (because hard!) and just enjoy the excellent stuff that other people wrote. And... that sort of happened? I didn't end up authoring anything history-intensive? Buuuuut I ended up spending a lot more time than I did on any of my own fics working with
mildred_of_midgard on her fic, which she was worried about being able to pull off because she had had this completely insane idea to write a long casefic about Frederick the Great that every time I turned around had another twist put in :P :) She supplied me with what we called a "rough opal in matrix" bus pass casefic, and I cut away the matrix that remained and in some cases carved the opal -- that is to say, writing additional text for some of the scenes, what we liked to call "putting in feels," and in at least two cases entirely rewriting and/or restructuring the scene she'd written. She didn't always keep what I wrote (which we'd agreed upon in the beginning), but when she did (which was most of the time :) ) she then went in and rewrote/restructured what I put in to wordsmith (some of the words I gave her were really rough) and match her style, adding even more scenes -- that is, polishing it up and adding some gold and diamonds -- and voila, a beautiful pendant, I mean, story :)I'm really proud of it and also it was really fun and also what I could handle this year, especially because mildred did all the parts I thought were hard and also wrote all the parts involving actual history or subtle AU before I was brought in so I didn't actually have to know historical stuff (though I guess I will never forget the battle of Leuthen now), and took full responsibility for how the whole thing turned out, so all I had to do was be like "Here, I'll write some rough feels for you for this scene!" The funny part was that I would often then write a paragraph justifying why I *had* to write the scene the way I did, and more likely than not mildred would be like, "yeah, I was sure you would do that, of course it should be written like that." (The most glaring example of this was where I inserted the Letter of Doom at the climax. I was worried there was some reason she didn't want it there, but she said, no, she just didn't have time to put it in herself and was just trusting me to do that :) ) She started jokingly calling me her "other self," to which I replied that it was with 1000% less angst and frustration -- as Frederick the Great's brother was his "other self" (which actually comes up in the fic) that he could trust to do all kinds of competent things, but they had a relationship that was, um, fraught? radioactive? Whereas this was just fun :)
Mildred did so much more than I did (we estimated a 90%/10% word ratio, not even counting the part where she wordsmithed a lot of my text) that I felt very uncomfortable being listed as a co-author, but hey, ~3000 words is a respectable Yuletide fic length :)
Yet They Grind Exceedingly Small (30384 words) by mildred_of_midgard
Chapters: 5/5
Fandom: 18th Century CE RPF, Historical RPF
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Relationships: Anna Amalie von Preußen & Wilhelmine von Preußen, Anna Amalie von Preußen & Friedrich Heinrich Ludwig von Preußen, Wilhelmine von Preußen & Elisabeth Friederike Sophie von Brandenburg-Bayreuth, Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great & Wilhelmine von Preußen | Wilhelmine of Prussia
Characters: Anna Amalie von Preußen (1723-1787), Wilhelmine von Preußen | Wilhelmine of Prussia (1709-1758), Friedrich Heinrich Ludwig von Preußen | Henry of Prussia (1726-1802), Elisabeth Friederike Sophie von Brandenburg-Bayreuth (1732-1780), Wilhelmine von Hesse-Kassel (1726-1808), August Wilhelm von Preußen | Augustus William of Prussia (1722-1758), Alcmene 1 | Frederick the Great's Italian Greyhound, Voltaire (Writer), Friedrich II von Preußen | Frederick the Great
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dysfunctional Family, Suicide, Alternate Universe - Dark, Siblings, Canon-Typical Violence, Mystery, Tide of History Challenge
Summary:
January 1758. Prince William is dead, some say of a broken heart. Frederick wants to absolve himself of blame for William's death. Henry schemes to end the Third Silesian War on his terms. Amalie and Wilhelmine team up to find out what really happened to their brother. Alcmene just wants to be told she's a good dog.
Re: Katte - A Tragicomedy (the first half)
Trying for some semiserious comments on what sounds like a terrible play: Katte being that loyal to FW makes me wonder whether Burte was a fan of not even Schiller's, but Verdi's Don Carlos. (Not Schiller's because Schiller's Posa feels a bit sorry for Philip at best, but well, he starts the play conspiring for Dutch freedom, so "should I be loyal to my King or my crown prince?" never is an issue.) Otoh "how do I get my son to love me?/Why doesn't my son love me?" is actually not that inaccurate for FW as such (not as a question to Katte, for his attitude, I mean). We're talking about the man who wrote instructions to little Fritz' educators that they were never to threaten him with FW's anger, only with the Queen's, because he wanted to be loved, not feared by his son, and who according to the Braunschweig envoy loved shopping for Christmas treats himself to give his smaller kids. He just was utterly and completely unable to make a connection between behaving like a tyrant at any sign Fritz wasn't a little replica liking the exact same things FW did, and being feared.
Anyway, as it's impossible to be a German playwright and not to have read your Schiller, I do think making FW seek out Katte as a confidant was probably some backwards projecting of the Philip-Posa-Carlos constellation on FW-Katte-Fritz on Burte's part.
Re: Katte - A Tragicomedy (the first half)
Re: Katte - A Tragicomedy (the first half)
"Herr Oberst" only appears this one time in direct response to Fritz switching from "du" to "Herr Leutnant" in order to get Katte to desert the army by citing his higher rank... in the army, which is an interesting approach (direct quote following this exchange: "Ich befehle, als Vorgesetzter!"). Usually it's "du" from both of them in act 1 and Fritz in act 5 with one "königliche Hoheit" used when talking about the whole marriage thing and one "mein Prinz" in act 5.
I did recognize FW's whole "love me"-thing (he says it to Fritz himself too during the whole "will Wilhelmine become a nun" conversation that I did not write much about), I just thought the mental image of him telling Katte of all people was a bit strange. So far, Burte has not really managed to back up the claim that FW is actually the sweetest person (deep deep inside) beyond Katte telling the audience/Wilhelmine that he is, so it feels a little unwarranted from a "theatrical" point of view...? Especially because Burte usually loves exposition dumping. FW gets more stage time in acts 3 and 4 and I did not read everything too closely on my first read through, so I might find something yet.
Now I regret not having read Don Carlos, that might have been interesting for comparison :'D I'll have to look for a Katte play closer to Faust or Die Räuber
Don Carlo and Katte - A Tragicomedy (the first half)
But anyway here I come with the opera links :D (For the most concentrated Katte-extrapolated-to-play experience I'd go with the first (Hampson and van Dam) and the abridged scene with just the "looooove me" bit, but I couldn't resist giving you the rest.)
This Don Carlos (Hampson, van Dam) unfortunately only has subtitles in French but has a fabulously emo
KatteRodrigo (with a really unfortunate wig, yes); this is an older French version so the text is a lot closer to Schiller than in the below (revised Italian) version. (Selena, this is the version I sent you in audio :) ) Also Hampson is fairly young here (for an opera singer) and kind of gives me more Katte vibes than the second version, I must admit.This is the whole opera which you probably don't want to watch (and should skip the first hour anyway unless you really really like opera) but the one Rodrigo & Philip (Katte & FW) scene is not too long. Obviously there are some differences (e.g., Rodrigo is really into freedom, and there's a whole love triangle with the Prince and the King's new wife) but I think you'll see what Selena and I mean about how the Tragicomedy might have been cribbing some from it...
1:16:30 to 1:26:45 for the whole scene
1:23:05 to 1:26:45 for just the "looooove me" bit (it's super touchy feely, I love it)
But I must also give you my favorite Don Carlo Rodrigo & Philip (read: Katte & FW) -- Keenlyside and Furlanetto -- where Philip/FW just waaaaants to be looooved. Again this is the whole opera which you probably don't want to watch but the one scene is not too long: 1:19:15 to 1:32:00, and if you just want the "why can't everyone love me I am soooo saaaad help me out here
KatteRodrigo" then 1:29:05 to 1:32:00. This one has definitely gone away a bit from the Katte/Fritz/FW vibes, but I include it because you can still see some vibes and it's my fave :)Earlier there is a scene where Rodrigo is getting it on with all of Elisabeth's ladies-in-waiting, some of the directors really ship him with everyone, lol.
/trying to distract myself from the state of the country
Re: Don Carlo and Katte - A Tragicomedy (the first half)
Katte in Rodrigo's place: does not go through all the complicated plotting and actually tells Carlos what's going on, but otoh utterly bungles the interlude with impressing Philipp in the first place, because Katte is trained to never talk back to the autocrat. So no Sire, geben Sie Gedankenfreiheit!" speech. At best, it's "look, Alba and Domingo are plotting to marry your son to A PROTESTANT PRINCESS, him wanting to flee is just to avoid this!"
Rodrigo, in Katte's place: When Fritz first suggests running away in Zeithain, doesn't try to dissuade him but starts a super complicated scheme where he reports to FW about Fritz' debts (i.e. the minor, forgivable misdemeanour), thus making FW trust him and charge him with escorting the Crown Prince back to Berlin. This would have put Rodrigo in the ideal position to escape with Fritz before anyone notices, but alas, he's forgotten to tell Fritz this was the plan, so Fritz, finding out Rodrigo ratted him out about the debts, heartbrokenly confides in a Potsdam Giant. (Look, it's hard to find an equivalent to Eboli!) Disaster ensues...
BTW, I just looked, and Amazon US does offer a Schiller Don Carlos production on DVD, pretty expensive (as in 40 plus Euro), but it doesn't say whether it's regionally locked, which I expect, alas, to be the case (otherwise surely they'd advertise it being playable in the US as a plus?)
Re: Don Carlo and Katte - A Tragicomedy (the first half)
Hee, yeah, on the other hand he might still not have asked for a reward, and Philip doesn't seem to necessarily have a thing for tall guys, so Katte might have a chance? :)
but alas, he's forgotten to tell Fritz this was the plan
OF COURSE HE DID
Fritz, finding out Rodrigo ratted him out about the debts, heartbrokenly confides in a Potsdam Giant. (Look, it's hard to find an equivalent to Eboli!)
HAHAHAHAHA okay this totally made me laugh, that is an inspired Eboli substitution!
Hmmmph, yeah, from all indications I think I'd have to assume that DVD looks regionally locked. But at least they have one? I don't think they did when I was looking two years ago... maybe in another two years something will come up?