Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 30
Sep. 8th, 2021 09:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cahnIn which, despite the title, I would like to be told about the English Revolution, which is yet another casualty of my extremely poor history education :P :)
Also, this is probably the place to say that RMSE opened with three Fritz-fics, all of which I think are readable with minimum canon knowledge:
The Boy Who Lived - if you knew about the doomed escape-from-Prussia-that-didn't happen and tragic death of Fritz's boyfriend Hans Hermann von Katte, you may not have known about Peter Keith, the third young man who conspired to escape Prussia -- and the only one who actually did. This is his story. I think readable without canon knowledge except what I just said here.
Challenge Yourself to Relax - My gift, I posted about this before! Corporate AU with my problematic fave, Fritz' brother Heinrich, who's still Fritz's l'autre moi-meme even in corporate AU. Readable without canon knowledge if one has familiarity with the corporate world and the dysfunctions thereof.
The Rise and Fall of the RendezvousWithFame Exchange - Fandom AU with BNF fanfic writer Voltaire, exchange mod Fritz, and the inevitable meltdown. (I wrote this one and am quite proud of the terrible physics-adjacent pun contained within.) Readable without canon knowledge if one has familiarity with fandom and the dysfunctions thereof :P
Also, this is probably the place to say that RMSE opened with three Fritz-fics, all of which I think are readable with minimum canon knowledge:
The Boy Who Lived - if you knew about the doomed escape-from-Prussia-that-didn't happen and tragic death of Fritz's boyfriend Hans Hermann von Katte, you may not have known about Peter Keith, the third young man who conspired to escape Prussia -- and the only one who actually did. This is his story. I think readable without canon knowledge except what I just said here.
Challenge Yourself to Relax - My gift, I posted about this before! Corporate AU with my problematic fave, Fritz' brother Heinrich, who's still Fritz's l'autre moi-meme even in corporate AU. Readable without canon knowledge if one has familiarity with the corporate world and the dysfunctions thereof.
The Rise and Fall of the RendezvousWithFame Exchange - Fandom AU with BNF fanfic writer Voltaire, exchange mod Fritz, and the inevitable meltdown. (I wrote this one and am quite proud of the terrible physics-adjacent pun contained within.) Readable without canon knowledge if one has familiarity with fandom and the dysfunctions thereof :P
Re: Reading group: In the Shadow of the Empress - second half of ch 3
Date: 2021-09-24 07:52 am (UTC)-Wilhelmina spelled her name with an a?
she did not. We can look up the scans of her letters at the Wilhelmine's travel website if you want to check for yourself, but I distinctly recall an e at the end of Wihelmine. I see two possibilities here: either Nancy Goldstone wanted to use the usual anglisized spelling to differentiate her from the earlier sister-in-law to the Emperor and didn't want to admit it, or she read Wilhelmine's memoirs in an English where the name is given the anglisized form ending with an -a, and for some reason assumed this was literally true. In which case one wonders wehther she believes Maria Theres(i)a to have called herself THeresa the English fashioned way, too, or Friedrich Wilhelm Frederick William, etc.
Anyway: the FW and Fritz intel sounds so far as if they're all from either Wilhemine's memoirs or Voltaire's memoirs plus the earlier anonymous pamphlet which SOME GUY wrote. Especially this:
'Farewell friends, I am better mounted than you are'
Pure Voltaire, either from the pamphlet or the memoirs, I can't recall right now which one. He really, really did not. Even dedicated Fritz deconstructionists like Jürgen Luh never took that to be true and knew it was satiric slander of the ex. True Hohenzollern believers of course were fuming, but seriously, the whole Mollwitz situation is pretty well documented, especially Schwerin sending him from the field, and Fritz' reactions, both short term and long term.
-Did Fritz really write "Thank God that's over!' after his wedding night?
Sounds familiar, though more from the engagement night letter to Wilhelmine, yes.
Also I am suuuuuper side-eyeing the "he felt hte need to distance himself from Frederick's homosexuality for fear it would reflect on him and that others would then discern his secret." That also seems very very modern to me.
Well, quite. Do I think FW may have had repressed gay tendencies and that added extra bile to how he treated Fritz? Sure. But Not for this particular reason (of feeling outed via his son, so to speak.) Let's not forget he's living in a century of licentiousness where everyone considers him a freak already for not having favourites (of either persuasion). Also, if we're doing far distance diagnosis of sexuality, it should be remembered that while he most likely ("is a bad smelling vagina normal?") really only had sex with SD, he was attracted to at least two other women - Caroline as a teenager, and much later Fräulein von Pannewitz.
I do appreciate Nancy Goldstone is unambigous about his treatment of FRitz being abuse, though!
Re: Reading group: In the Shadow of the Empress - second half of ch 3
Date: 2021-09-24 04:19 pm (UTC)Voltaire's memoirs plus the earlier anonymous pamphlet which SOME GUY wrote.
I gotta say I laughed a lot at this one :D
'Farewell friends, I am better mounted than you are'
Pure Voltaire, either from the pamphlet or the memoirs, I can't recall right now which one. He really, really did not.
I'm pretty sure it's the pamphlet -- I read the Memoirs for RMSE, didn't think to look up this particular pamphlet (clearly I should have, LOL FOREVER), and I'm betting "I am better mounted" would have jumped out to me. I do remember Maupertuis showing up in the memoirs though! Lolololol Voltaire, though.
he was attracted to at least two other women
Oh RIGHT! (I knew that of course! Just wasn't thinking. Which is why I'm so glad you guys do that thinking :P )
Re: Reading group: In the Shadow of the Empress - second half of ch 3
Date: 2021-09-24 07:50 pm (UTC)She totally misses out his Sorceress Alcina quality, though. :) Voltaire would be disappointed.
More seriously, she does grant him becoming a great general in his second (and onwards) battle, and sharing MT's hardcore work dedication and discipline. And she's not wrong in drawing a connection between his childhood and youth abuse and his need for constant aggrandizement (also far from the only one to do so). But going from there to "he learned to despise honor, loyalty etc." belongs in a novel, not in a book of non-fiction.
Though Lavisse might have said something similar - Mildred, did he? Still haven't read him.
Re: Reading group: In the Shadow of the Empress - second half of ch 3
Date: 2021-09-24 08:04 pm (UTC)Right? That part is true. But it's not only that there were other factors at work (the quest for glory was kind of in the cultural air, FW or now FW). He was also far from the only one to flamboyantly lie to your face while preparing to invade your country (let me tell you about Peter the Great, it was amazing, I will have to share this story at some point). It doesn't make it right, it's just that I think Fritz's geopolitics go back less to his childhood than the way he treated the people around him.
But going from there to "he learned to despise honor, loyalty etc." belongs in a novel, not in a book of non-fiction.
Agreed.
Though Lavisse might have said something similar - Mildred, did he? Still haven't read him.
Ehhh, sort of? Not like this, though. (Or at least not that I remember.) It's more like, "Fritz was more machine than man, ready to do great things on the European stage," (great from the perspective of a Frenchman writing after the Franco-Prussian War, so not in a "Prussian destiny" way, in more of a "Watch me side-eye him" way), not "Fritz was THE WORST because he was psychologically abused."
What I'm reminded of is Bisset's snark that honor and Fritz were at best nodding aquaintances, if not altogether strangers. :P
Re: Reading group: In the Shadow of the Empress - second half of ch 3
Date: 2021-09-24 05:36 pm (UTC)Exactly what I thought.
Also, if we're doing far distance diagnosis of sexuality, it should be remembered that while he most likely ("is a bad smelling vagina normal?") really only had sex with SD, he was attracted to at least two other women - Caroline as a teenager, and much later Fräulein von Pannewitz.
Oh, good reminder, thank you! Yeah, he might have been repressing attraction to
very tallmenin uniform, but homosexual as opposed to bi leanings I doubt.I do appreciate Nancy Goldstone is unambigous about his treatment of FRitz being abuse, though!
Yes, this. We've definitely had the reverse experience of authors with better facts and worse opinions.