Re: Stratemann on Gundling's funeral.

Date: 2021-03-30 04:37 pm (UTC)
mildred_of_midgard: (Default)
From: [personal profile] mildred_of_midgard
Totally. I kind of just wanted to stop reading once I encountered the pig detail. :(

I knoooow. Katte is the kind of tragedy that's terrible to live through and be affected by, but clean enough to be enjoyable to the romantic fannish mind. Gundling's fate is just nauseating. The poor guy.

And apparently practically *everyone* stops reading when they get to FW and Gundling, and develops selective amnesia, ugh.

[personal profile] selenak, I was going to say, I was incorporating your chronology additions into the master chronology this weekend, and it was really just dizzying watching it go back and forth between "FW tortures Gundling" and "FW ennobles Gundling" and "FW tortures Gundling some more" and "FW appoints Gundling to some prestigious position." It just read like the abuser's playbook (I can't take credit for this term; [personal profile] rachelmanija used it in an email to me, and it's always stuck with me, because there are so many times you see people following this very specific pattern).

UGH FOREVER.

Re: Stratemann on Gundling's funeral.

Date: 2021-03-31 08:45 am (UTC)
selenak: (Puppet Angel - Kathyh)
From: [personal profile] selenak
it was really just dizzying watching it go back and forth between "FW tortures Gundling" and "FW ennobles Gundling" and "FW tortures Gundling some more" and "FW appoints Gundling to some prestigious position." It just read like the abuser's playbook

Doesn't it just? Though I'm entirely ready to believe FW was acting on instinct, not well thought out long term plans; I mean, we're talking about the man with zero child psychology knowledge who never could figure out why his plan of becoming the fun parent and let SD be the scary discipline parent did not work out, and why his choices to keep his sons chaste and religious teenagers really weren't best suited for such an endeavour.

But when it came to providing just enough incentive to create a state where Gundling could tell himself "it's worth hanging on for" or "I'll be worse off if I leave", and create an atmosphere of perpetual fear, he was dead on. It also makes sense that a younger man like Fassmann, after trying very hard to get the job to begin with, couldn't stand it for more than a few months. Presumably Fassmann had told himself all the humiliations were clearly solely Gundling's fault for being a coward which endured them, that FW by contrasted respected him and would never let him be treated the same way, and when he realised this was self delusion, he called it quits.

And apparently practically *everyone* stops reading when they get to FW and Gundling, and develops selective amnesia, ugh.

Including Wusterhausen guides. I think I told you when I was there the one present said re: the painting showing him "this was the King's fool", and no more.

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