Can't be beat for readability, BUT I just hit my first howler in Massie.
If you thought Orieux getting EC's name wrong (Marie Christine, was it?) was bad, wait till you hear that Frederick II's wife Sophia was the sister of George II, making Fritz G2's brother-in-law.
...
And this in 2011, when Wikipedia had been invented!
Still readable, though. As you said about the Winter Queen book, not a dull sentence to be found in what I've read of either author so far. Which makes Montefiore (who so far has not confused Fritz's wife and mother) an excellent candidate for my next German practice book.
Orieux: yes, "Marie Christine" was his mistake. And LOL about "Sophia the sister of G2" as Mrs. Fritz. Mind you, I feel a bit guilty laughing about both, since pre salon I was barely aware Fritz was married at all, but then, I wasn't writing books featuring him then. As you say, Orieux, writing pre Wikipedia, has the better excuse.
Orieux has two better excuses: he only confused her first name with a common (especially in France) one, not one person with a completely different person, and two, no Wikipedia in his day!
I can laugh totally guilt-free, though, lol, because I knew a fair bit about Fritz, EC, and their marriage already in high school days. Not as much as now (mostly thanks to you), of course! But enough that I wouldn't have called her Sophia and said that she was G2's sister. ;) (At the time, of course, I was writing a book that...I tried very hard not to let feature him, despite my Fritz-muse's desire to promote himself from tertiary character to primary character.)
Oh, and see if this Montefiore quote makes you laugh:
Potemkin gets jealous of Catherine, accuses her of having had fifteen lovers before him, and threatens to kill his rivals. She writes him an account of how she had FOUR lovers before him, insists she isn't wanton, but explains that she can't live without love for an hour. Montefiore calls this "surely the most extraordinary document ever written by a monarch."
I mean. That's a pretty strong claim to make. Heinrich would like to advance the Marwitz letters as a contender. And I'm just waiting for selenak to offer a number of other examples. :D
No kidding. The Marwitz letters do immediately come to mind, but in that century alone you have other strong contenders such as:
- Joseph's letter to brother Leopold about sister Marie Antoinette's and Louis XVI's sex troubles
- Joseph's letter to MT about brother-in-law Ferdinand of Naples
- since the Finnish Sex Machine was careful enough to demand Gustav to put it into written form that the threesome was his idea and order, that document counts, though I haven't read it!
- not sensational, but extraordinary in the sense of deeply touching and as revealing about her emotional life as that statement is about Catherine's: MT's list of how many days since FS had died, since she married him, etc. which was found folded into her prayer book after her death
(Found it again: "emperor franciscus my husband has lived 56 years eight months ten days, has died on August 18th 1765 on half bast ten in the evenig. Has lived 680 months, 2958 weeks, 20778 days, 496992 hours. My happy marriage lasted 29 years, six months, six days, and at the same hour I gave him my hand, also on a Sunday, he was taken from me. In sum 29 years, 335 months, 1540 weeks, 10781 days, 258744 hours.")
- also on a grief note: Joseph's letter to his daughter's governess ("I have ceased to be a father: it is more than I can bear. Despite being resigned to it, I cannot stop myself thinking and saying every moment: ‘O my God, restore to me my daughter, restore her to me.’ I hear her voice, I see her.")
- back to more fun versions of "extraordinary": have only read quotes from the letter, not the letter itself, but G2 telling Caroline all about his new mistress because she's his bff has to count!
And that's not branching out into other centuries. My recent reading has reminded me that Ludwig II., Wagner fan that he was, tried to write his personal letters the way people in Wagner's opera's speak, which makes most of said letters, well, extraordinary, but never more so than when he's corresponding with Wagner himself (who really did not speak or talk like that otherwise and found it incredibly exhausting, but hey, this was not any fanboy, this was the one with the cash!).
I knew you were going to come here with some document that would make me go OH RIGHT.
OH RIGHT, the Finnish sex machine and the royal threesome! We should try to get our hands on that someday.
G2 telling Caroline all about his new mistress because she's his bff has to count!
Apparently future Peter III did this with his bff, Catherine, although because they lived together, I doubt it was ever put into writing.
Wagner fan that he was, tried to write his personal letters the way people in Wagner's opera's speak, which makes most of said letters, well, extraordinary, but never more so than when he's corresponding with Wagner himself (who really did not speak or talk like that otherwise and found it incredibly exhausting
Lol, that's hilarious! I'm reminded of a physics professor I had, who said that when he first went to Germany, most of his exposure to German had come from Wagner, and that meant he did things like compliment a police officer on his "noble steed."
Police officer: ...You learned German from Wagner, didn't you? Prof: Does it show?
Apparently future Peter III did this with his bff, Catherine, although because they lived together, I doubt it was ever put into writing.
Maybe we should add he did this at a point when Catherine hadn't yet had any lovers of her own.
LOL on your Professor. The thing is, nobody ever talked the way characters in Wagner's operas do. He fashioned their language after some elements of medieval German poetry plus some elements of what 19th century linguists like Jacob Grimm had deduced about pre medieval German, mixed and mingled and was creative about it according to his needs. (For example, the reason why he uses the "Stabreim", the alliterative rhyming, so often, isn't that it was dominant in what survives of old and medieval German but that it was easiest to sing, which makes sense for a composer!
Lol, yeah, my prof said he used "Ross" instead of "Pferd," and explained that that was the equivalent of "steed" instead of "horse." Wiktionary tells me
Ross is a normal word for “horse”, alongside Pferd, in many parts of southern Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. In northern and central Germany, Ross is not part of the colloquial vocabulary and is perceived as poetic, archaic, or restricted to noble riding horses.
For example, the reason why he uses the "Stabreim", the alliterative rhyming, so often, isn't that it was dominant in what survives of old and medieval German but that it was easiest to sing, which makes sense for a composer!
On the one hand, no, nobody believes ancient Germanic speakers *spoke* in alliteration, in prose. If you went back in time a thousand years and started chatting in Stabreim, people would be just as weirded out as Ludwig's contemporaries. ;) But on the other hand, since alliteration was the dominant poetic device in all the Germanic languages, including Old High German, before rhyme took over, I'd be surprised if the ancient poetic tradition didn't influence Wagner's choice at all. The Nibelungenlied, because it's in Middle High German, is in rhyming verse, but the Norse Eddas are alliterative.
Maybe we should add he did this at a point when Catherine hadn't yet had any lovers of her own.
Yes. Yes, he did. The thing is, Elizaveta was deliberately trying to keep her nephew isolated from power, surrounded by strict/abusive guardians, and also isolated with his wife so that they'd be forced to spend time together and finally beget that heir. (Like Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, Catherine and Peter's marriage was unconsummated for several years. Like Louis, there were stories about Peter needing an operation on his penis, for the same condition.) So Peter had a limited set of people, especially in his own class, that he *could* talk to. And Catherine was doing her best to make herself liked, because her position was very insecure and she knew her husband would have absolute power someday. So she was super nice, Peter decided she was his BFF, Peter wasn't particularly interested in sleeping with his BFF, and he hit on her ladies in waiting and told his BFF all about it.
Also, per the authors I've been reading, Catherine was trying to keep her lover Saltykov a secret from Elizaveta long after Peter knew and thought it was hilarious.
(You'll think her lovers are a lot less hilarious in 1762, Peter.)
This is like Greatest Hits of Gossipy Sensationalism! :D <3
Okay, I... kinda want some of these quotes from G2 telling BFF Caroline about his mistress. Are they in the Dennison book? I do mean to read that one of these days, so if they are, that will definitely be an additional incentive!
No, the quotes are minmal and in fact based on Hervey's memoirs - i.e. what Hervey says he wrote. The passage in Dennison's book goes:
From Hanover in the summer of 1735, in a torrent of letters of forensic detail, George Augustus shared with Caroline the progress of his nascent affair with this 'young married woman of the first fashion '. He praised Amalie's face while denying her beauty or wit. 'Had the Queen been a painter ,' Hervey commented,' she might have drawn her rival's picture at six hundred miles distance.'
And that's it. Since it's a paraphrased passage from Hervey's Memoirs, I suspect the original letter(s) might no longer exist.
Ludwig writing in Wagner Opera speak both in rl and ventriloquized in the novel truly was quite...something (and sometimes touching, as when he writes to the young doctor "Du bist der Lenz" (you know, Sieglinde to Siegmund from Valkyrie), but I'm tickled about Mildred's tale of someone not Ludwig II. trying this in rl! Noble steed indeed. :)
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timeasmymeasure
Re: Sodomy and Death Penalty. (Again.)
Date: 2021-08-16 02:39 pm (UTC)Re: Sodomy and Death Penalty. (Again.)
Date: 2021-08-17 11:52 pm (UTC)If you thought Orieux getting EC's name wrong (Marie Christine, was it?) was bad, wait till you hear that Frederick II's wife Sophia was the sister of George II, making Fritz G2's brother-in-law.
...
And this in 2011, when Wikipedia had been invented!
Still readable, though. As you said about the Winter Queen book, not a dull sentence to be found in what I've read of either author so far. Which makes Montefiore (who so far has not confused Fritz's wife and mother) an excellent candidate for my next German practice book.
He was married to....
Date: 2021-08-18 05:34 am (UTC)Re: He was married to....
Date: 2021-08-19 10:12 pm (UTC)I can laugh totally guilt-free, though, lol, because I knew a fair bit about Fritz, EC, and their marriage already in high school days. Not as much as now (mostly thanks to you), of course! But enough that I wouldn't have called her Sophia and said that she was G2's sister. ;) (At the time, of course, I was writing a book that...I tried very hard not to let feature him, despite my Fritz-muse's desire to promote himself from tertiary character to primary character.)
Re: Sodomy and Death Penalty. (Again.)
Date: 2021-08-18 12:20 am (UTC)Potemkin gets jealous of Catherine, accuses her of having had fifteen lovers before him, and threatens to kill his rivals. She writes him an account of how she had FOUR lovers before him, insists she isn't wanton, but explains that she can't live without love for an hour. Montefiore calls this "surely the most extraordinary document ever written by a monarch."
I mean. That's a pretty strong claim to make. Heinrich would like to advance the Marwitz letters as a contender. And I'm just waiting for
Extraordinary documents by monarchs, you say?
Date: 2021-08-18 05:27 am (UTC)- Joseph's letter to brother Leopold about sister Marie Antoinette's and Louis XVI's sex troubles
- Joseph's letter to MT about brother-in-law Ferdinand of Naples
- since the Finnish Sex Machine was careful enough to demand Gustav to put it into written form that the threesome was his idea and order, that document counts, though I haven't read it!
- not sensational, but extraordinary in the sense of deeply touching and as revealing about her emotional life as that statement is about Catherine's: MT's list of how many days since FS had died, since she married him, etc. which was found folded into her prayer book after her death
(Found it again: "emperor franciscus my husband has lived 56 years eight months ten days, has died on August 18th 1765 on half bast ten in the evenig. Has lived 680 months, 2958 weeks, 20778 days, 496992 hours. My happy marriage lasted 29 years, six months, six days, and at the same hour I gave him my hand, also on a Sunday, he was taken from me. In sum 29 years, 335 months, 1540 weeks, 10781 days, 258744 hours.")
- also on a grief note: Joseph's letter to his daughter's governess ("I have ceased to be a father: it is more than I can bear. Despite being resigned to it, I cannot stop myself thinking and saying every moment: ‘O my God, restore to me my daughter, restore her to me.’ I hear her voice, I see her.")
- back to more fun versions of "extraordinary": have only read quotes from the letter, not the letter itself, but G2 telling Caroline all about his new mistress because she's his bff has to count!
And that's not branching out into other centuries. My recent reading has reminded me that Ludwig II., Wagner fan that he was, tried to write his personal letters the way people in Wagner's opera's speak, which makes most of said letters, well, extraordinary, but never more so than when he's corresponding with Wagner himself (who really did not speak or talk like that otherwise and found it incredibly exhausting, but hey, this was not any fanboy, this was the one with the cash!).
Re: Extraordinary documents by monarchs, you say?
Date: 2021-08-18 12:28 pm (UTC)OH RIGHT, the Finnish sex machine and the royal threesome! We should try to get our hands on that someday.
G2 telling Caroline all about his new mistress because she's his bff has to count!
Apparently future Peter III did this with his bff, Catherine, although because they lived together, I doubt it was ever put into writing.
Wagner fan that he was, tried to write his personal letters the way people in Wagner's opera's speak, which makes most of said letters, well, extraordinary, but never more so than when he's corresponding with Wagner himself (who really did not speak or talk like that otherwise and found it incredibly exhausting
Lol, that's hilarious! I'm reminded of a physics professor I had, who said that when he first went to Germany, most of his exposure to German had come from Wagner, and that meant he did things like compliment a police officer on his "noble steed."
Police officer: ...You learned German from Wagner, didn't you?
Prof: Does it show?
Re: Extraordinary documents by monarchs, you say?
Date: 2021-08-19 04:28 am (UTC)Uhhhhh. Wow.
Police officer: ...You learned German from Wagner, didn't you?
Prof: Does it show?
Hee!
Re: Extraordinary documents by monarchs, you say?
Date: 2021-08-19 05:48 am (UTC)Maybe we should add he did this at a point when Catherine hadn't yet had any lovers of her own.
LOL on your Professor. The thing is, nobody ever talked the way characters in Wagner's operas do. He fashioned their language after some elements of medieval German poetry plus some elements of what 19th century linguists like Jacob Grimm had deduced about pre medieval German, mixed and mingled and was creative about it according to his needs. (For example, the reason why he uses the "Stabreim", the alliterative rhyming, so often, isn't that it was dominant in what survives of old and medieval German but that it was easiest to sing, which makes sense for a composer!
Re: Extraordinary documents by monarchs, you say?
Date: 2021-08-19 01:52 pm (UTC)Ross is a normal word for “horse”, alongside Pferd, in many parts of southern Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. In northern and central Germany, Ross is not part of the colloquial vocabulary and is perceived as poetic, archaic, or restricted to noble riding horses.
For example, the reason why he uses the "Stabreim", the alliterative rhyming, so often, isn't that it was dominant in what survives of old and medieval German but that it was easiest to sing, which makes sense for a composer!
On the one hand, no, nobody believes ancient Germanic speakers *spoke* in alliteration, in prose. If you went back in time a thousand years and started chatting in Stabreim, people would be just as weirded out as Ludwig's contemporaries. ;) But on the other hand, since alliteration was the dominant poetic device in all the Germanic languages, including Old High German, before rhyme took over, I'd be surprised if the ancient poetic tradition didn't influence Wagner's choice at all. The Nibelungenlied, because it's in Middle High German, is in rhyming verse, but the Norse Eddas are alliterative.
Maybe we should add he did this at a point when Catherine hadn't yet had any lovers of her own.
Yes. Yes, he did. The thing is, Elizaveta was deliberately trying to keep her nephew isolated from power, surrounded by strict/abusive guardians, and also isolated with his wife so that they'd be forced to spend time together and finally beget that heir. (Like Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, Catherine and Peter's marriage was unconsummated for several years. Like Louis, there were
stories about Peter needing an operation on his penis, for the same condition.) So Peter had a limited set of people, especially in his own class, that he *could* talk to. And Catherine was doing her best to make herself liked, because her position was very insecure and she knew her husband would have absolute power someday. So she was super nice, Peter decided she was his BFF, Peter wasn't particularly interested in sleeping with his BFF, and he hit on her ladies in waiting and told his BFF all about it.
Also, per the authors I've been reading, Catherine was trying to keep her lover Saltykov a secret from Elizaveta long after Peter knew and thought it was hilarious.
(You'll think her lovers are a lot less hilarious in 1762, Peter.)
Re: Extraordinary documents by monarchs, you say?
Date: 2021-08-19 04:27 am (UTC)Okay, I... kinda want some of these quotes from G2 telling BFF Caroline about his mistress. Are they in the Dennison book? I do mean to read that one of these days, so if they are, that will definitely be an additional incentive!
AHAHAHA Wagner-opera-speak! Oh, lol, that's hilarious.
Re: Extraordinary documents by monarchs, you say?
Date: 2021-08-19 05:35 am (UTC)From Hanover in the summer of 1735, in a torrent of letters of forensic detail, George Augustus shared with Caroline the progress of his nascent affair with this 'young married woman of the first
fashion '. He praised Amalie's face while denying her beauty or wit. 'Had the Queen been a painter ,' Hervey commented,' she might have drawn her rival's picture at six hundred miles distance.'
And that's it. Since it's a paraphrased passage from Hervey's Memoirs, I suspect the original letter(s) might no longer exist.
Ludwig writing in Wagner Opera speak both in rl and ventriloquized in the novel truly was quite...something (and sometimes touching, as when he writes to the young doctor "Du bist der Lenz" (you know, Sieglinde to Siegmund from Valkyrie), but I'm tickled about Mildred's tale of someone not Ludwig II. trying this in rl! Noble steed indeed. :)