Ahhh, this is cool, because that's one of the most famous anecdotes to include Katte (I even got Mobster AU author to include a modern AU variant in her backstory!), but I didn't know where we got it from. I mean, I knew it was a story Quantz told later, but not who he told or how it came down to us. Via Nicolai, who had a lot of contact with Quantz and names his sources is pretty good! (I mean, not necessarily for every single detail, but for this event happening.)
Also, I did not know about the Haarbeutel! I knew that Fritz's hair was done up in a fancy French style as opposed to the Prussian pigtail, but not the detail of what it looked like.
while red as you probably know was what the Brits wore in this era
I don't know about Cahn, but if I'd never read a page of history voluntarily on my own, I would still have had the redcoats drummed ineradicably into my head from year after year of covering the American Revolution in school!
The later kept the books as a service to the Crown Prince, who ordered them to be taken to him one by one, according to his needs, until his complete library could be restored to him.
<333
See, Fritz had lots of people being kind to him, he just learned that kindness didn't come from the person in power. (People like his mother and the Münchows obviously had some power over him, and could have chosen to make life worse instead of better for him, but they just as obviously had very, very little power.)
Quantz finally was freed from his tight corner once the King had left; but he was extremely careful during his subsequent visits to Berlin; he especially took care never to wear a red coat again, but only a grey or a blue one.
This is interesting, because I always learned that it was Fritz who was wearing a red dressing gown! Ah, look at this, Blanning reports this anecdote and says that Fritz was wearing "a sumptuous red silk dressing gown covered in gold brocade." Not a word about Quantz's coat being red. And his end note (which I had clearly never clicked on before) references Nicolai for the anecdote, with an addendum of "Nicolai was told all this by Quantz. It certainly has the ring of authenticity."
With which I agree, but that's not exactly what Nicolai said. I suspect Blanning did the thing again where he read the source and wrote it up from memory, which we've all been guilty of, and which we've caught him in before (at least that's what I think accounts for his report that Richter spends 9 pages ranting on how Fritz and Fredersdorf just had an intense rococo friendship, when Selena says he does no such thing.
Another minor discrepancy (not Blanning's) is that I keep seeing Katte described as posted outside the door standing guard. (On AO3, for example.) But you can't tell from this account whether he was keeping an eye out at his boyfriend's request, or happened to be hanging around in the palace, got wind of FW's approach, and went running to warn Fritz.
Katte took the boxes with the flutes in the greatest hurry, and the scores, took the extremely frightened Quantz by the hand and jumped with him and the boxes in a small cabinet where they usually stored material to heat the stoves with.
Nice bit of characterization, though. Quantz is frozen with panic (it sounds like), and Katte is ON IT. Just what I would expect of him. <3 And that's even more interesting given that Quantz is the narrator and has no incentive to make Katte sound better at his own expense.
Re: The FW-Fritz-Quantz-Katte tale (Nicolai version)
Also, I did not know about the Haarbeutel! I knew that Fritz's hair was done up in a fancy French style as opposed to the Prussian pigtail, but not the detail of what it looked like.
while red as you probably know was what the Brits wore in this era
I don't know about Cahn, but if I'd never read a page of history voluntarily on my own, I would still have had the redcoats drummed ineradicably into my head from year after year of covering the American Revolution in school!
The later kept the books as a service to the Crown Prince, who ordered them to be taken to him one by one, according to his needs, until his complete library could be restored to him.
<333
See, Fritz had lots of people being kind to him, he just learned that kindness didn't come from the person in power. (People like his mother and the Münchows obviously had some power over him, and could have chosen to make life worse instead of better for him, but they just as obviously had very, very little power.)
Quantz finally was freed from his tight corner once the King had left; but he was extremely careful during his subsequent visits to Berlin; he especially took care never to wear a red coat again, but only a grey or a blue one.
This is interesting, because I always learned that it was Fritz who was wearing a red dressing gown! Ah, look at this, Blanning reports this anecdote and says that Fritz was wearing "a sumptuous red silk dressing gown covered in gold brocade." Not a word about Quantz's coat being red. And his end note (which I had clearly never clicked on before) references Nicolai for the anecdote, with an addendum of "Nicolai was told all this by Quantz. It certainly has the ring of authenticity."
With which I agree, but that's not exactly what Nicolai said. I suspect Blanning did the thing again where he read the source and wrote it up from memory, which we've all been guilty of, and which we've caught him in before (at least that's what I think accounts for his report that Richter spends 9 pages ranting on how Fritz and Fredersdorf just had an intense rococo friendship, when Selena says he does no such thing.
Another minor discrepancy (not Blanning's) is that I keep seeing Katte described as posted outside the door standing guard. (On AO3, for example.) But you can't tell from this account whether he was keeping an eye out at his boyfriend's request, or happened to be hanging around in the palace, got wind of FW's approach, and went running to warn Fritz.
Katte took the boxes with the flutes in the greatest hurry, and the scores, took the extremely frightened Quantz by the hand and jumped with him and the boxes in a small cabinet where they usually stored material to heat the stoves with.
Nice bit of characterization, though. Quantz is frozen with panic (it sounds like), and Katte is ON IT. Just what I would expect of him. <3 And that's even more interesting given that Quantz is the narrator and has no incentive to make Katte sound better at his own expense.