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: Empress Ch 7-9
Date: 2021-10-01 06:25 am (UTC)I wondered about this as well and decided it's because Goldstone doesn't want to include another Wilhelmine who could confuse her readers. BTw, speaking of reader confusion, I noticed this in the first two Silesian wars already, but when she names battles - which she rarely does, and with the exception of Mollwitz only when the Austrians win -, she uses the current day Polish or Russian names. This is understandable if she wants her new readers to know where these events took place and able to look it up, but a headache for those of us who are used to the German names in all the other books read on this.
(Not a complaint on my part, a "fair enough" statement.)
Re: "the deeper reason" - once I finished her account of the 7 Years War, it dawned on me why she invented the whole "MT wanted to prevent Fritz' inevitable future invasion" reason to begin with - so she could give her a victory, when from an Austrian pov there really wasn't one. Everyone was right back where they started, except MT had given up on Silesia for good, Fritz had won the propaganda war completely and was now seen as the modern underdog hero winning against the evil old Catholic powers, and Prussia was a European superpower. Which was just the opposite from the one overall war aim beyond recovering Silesia Kaunitz had outlined in writing before the war - make Fritz the Margrave of Brandenburg again. MT had had the underdog status and sympathy bonus in the first two Silesian Wars, but no more, and she had achieved exactly none of her goals. But Goldstone doesn't want to end seven years of bloodshed on a downer, so she has to declare victory for her main character somehow.
I also note that a bit later when FS dies there is absolutely no mention that Joseph managed to salvage the gigantic 7 Years War debts with Dad's private fortune, nor that this caused arguments between Joseph and Leopold as well as Joseph and Mimi, who were all "it's fine that you want to use your inheritance to balance the state budget, but we want the cash!" only to be told "but I'm the Emperor, and so I say it all goes to relieve the war debts!" Perhaps those arguments will be told later retrospectively. Though explaining why FS, who when marrying MT had definitely no riches to spare, ended up as one of the wealthiest men in Europe would had necessitated to explain he did more than hunting and wenching in something other than a single footnote.
-Because it hasn't been true all the other times she pulled this, I'm not going to believe that MT made Charles commander because she couldn't say no to her husband :P (Also because it makes no sense this time either...)
Quite right. In none of the other books I've read was it said that Charles' apppointment - one of MT's most critiqued tactical decisions - had been her husband's idea or suggestion. And she could very much say no him. As in, rejecting any suggestion to make up with Fritz for real in the lead up to this war, for example. It's Goldstone trying to keep MT from looking bad again. This is frustrating - MT is no less interesting because she makes mistakes! Fritz made plenty of mistakes in this same war, too!
The Imperial Family Celebrating Saint Nicholas really is a rather sweet painting <3 Also a little less formal than I'd been led to believe royal families were?
Well, it's a depiction that would have been unthinkable for anyone but a family member to paint at this point. (If you got depicted, it was in 99% of all cases in your state or festive robe, not in something you actually wore every day.) But in terms of royal families' formality, Wilhelmine would like to point out to Hohenzollern Christmas celebrations where she'd love to have had a bit more ceremony and a bit less abuse.
Anyway, in terms of positive-vibing informality, yes, this is unusual.
wait, did I know that Mimi showed Joseph Isabella's letters??
No, and neither did I, despite having three Joseph-heavy books - a biography I didn't rec because I couldn't, the Five Princesses book and "Der Kaiser reist incognito". Which is why I would love to know Goldstone's source on this, if any. This is a really important twist in the story, and I wish she hadn't shot her credibility with us at this point due to all the earlier stuff.
Whatever [Joseph's] potential capacity for compassion, trust, and generosity of spirit withered and died that day." Wow. Goldstone seems... really invested in her characters being one-sided, doesn't she
Apparantly so, and it's about as rethorical hyperbole has having 19th years old Fritz hate honor, loyalty etc. from his submission onward. As for compassion, at this point Joseph still has prison and hospital reforms in his future. And various heartfelt condolence letters when people lost loved ones, precisely because he knew how that felt. Trust: I definitely had the impression he trusted the Five Princesses and his two male friends. Generosity of spirit: ditto. He also could be tremendously difficult with them, but the same Eleonore von Liechtenstein who complained quite often about what a jerk he could be to her sister Leopoldine (another member of the circle) also praised him for just this quality (and at any rate didn't critisize him to people outside of the circle).
But I think I know where this is going - Joseph has a lot of clashes with Mimi and her husband in his future, and Nancy Goldstone will side with Mimi in them.
Something else: either whichever Goethe translation Nancy Goldstone used (I suspect none, and that she has those quotes from other books quoting from Goethe themselves) is really bad and editing out all the irony, or she's skewering again when saying he sounds "breathless" and way impressed with the Imperial Crowning ceremony at Frankfurt, and only "grudgingly" has to admit Joseph looked ridiculous in his oversized robes. She has that backwards (again). Joseph drowning in those robes is a feature, not a bug, in a description meant to show what was the HRE's last hooray (more or less) as an ancient regime masquerade. It's meant to be funny, not "breathless" or impressed. Goethe is writing this looking back at a point when Napoleon has already come and gone, for God's sake. He's also making fun of his teenage self who as you'll recall was a passionate Fritz fan and therefore biased against Team Habsburg anyway, prone to consider these guys so uncool compared to his idol, as proven by this creaky overblown ceremony, but if Goldstone has read the original text (which is in "Dichtung und Wahrheit", Goethe's autobiography of his early years) at all as opposed to quotes from it, she's editing all the Fritz stuff out, including mighty fandom battles because while Goethe, his sister and his father were Fritz fans, his maternal grandparents were strongly Team MT.
ETA: One more Joseph thing - Goldstone continues her weird depiction of MT's attitude re: her husband now with her son by basically presenting it as her making Joseph co-regent out of the goodness of her heart and because she wants him to learn the business. Again, this is not how any of this worked. As with FS, a woman could not be Empress in her own right in the HRE, so a male member of her family had to be Emperor if they didn't want to lose the Imperial crown (and it was discussed whether to let it go, but as I mentioned before, the Wittelsbach Emperor had proved that someone else in that position could still be tremendously useful to her enemies). Moreover, back when MT's Dad had been alive, the idea certainly was that once she'd given birth to a male heir, first her husband and then her son would rule all her lands, not her. As an adult male heir and with MT female, Joseph could in theory have taken over the lot right then and there in 1765. But MT was no more able than Fritz was of stepping aside in favor of the next generation, despite occasional grumblings about what a burden office was. She knew she could rule, she had done it for years, and so she would until her death. Making Joseph co-regent - and thereby setting the two of them up for fifteen years of tense coalition government because unlike Dad, Joseph definitely wanted to rule and had so many ideas diverging from Mom's of how to go about it - was a compromise with this and a way to remain in power, not something nice she did for him. /ETA
"Maria Theresa skewed her decision [on Joseph's new wife] toward availability"... isn't... that... par for the course for royalty?? (Though yeah, sad that MT got to marry for love and her kids didn't)
Indeed to both. MT was doing the standard thing here. Also, remember how young FW talked about F1 promising him he wouldn't have to marry sight unseen for politics? How young Fritz had a lot to say about having to marry according to Dad's wishes? How young FW2, and so forth, and so on? They all, in their turn, still married the next generation off according to realpolitik anyway. (Except for Mimi.) (And Heinrich, who wasn't married off for any political advantage or to help procreate the family but because Fritz wanted to roleplay Dad.)
Was it Albert's smallpox or Mimi's hard birth that meant they couldn't have more kids? I guess it's probably hard to tell at this point...
Quite. We just know that they didn't, and hence had to adopt one of Leopold's kids later.
One more observation re: Mimi - where I'll give Goldstone credit is her explaining the strong dislike young future Marie Antoinette and Maria Carolina had for their older sister as a tittle tattle by saying it was probably the inevitable result of Mimi wanting to be a responsible older sister and being resented as an authority person close to Mom. I could see that happening.
Re: Empress Ch 7-9
Date: 2021-10-01 04:57 pm (UTC)(Not a complaint on my part, a "fair enough" statement.)
I've noticed more modern authors trying to use the current day names as a political correctness move or at least apologizing if they don't and explicitly saying that this is for familiarity, not a political endorsement. Turns out some people are still have ~feelings~ about German history in that region. ;)
Having done the video map in which I looked up the modern names for all the 18th century names of everywhere Fritz ever went, I actually know them! But the older names are more familiar and it's definitely a thing where I have to stop and think, "Right, [Czech place name] = [German place name]."
And she could very much say no him.
I got the impression from SR that her default was "I do what I want" and his default was, "I won't die on this hill." (Goldstone says he didn't want to do politics and administration; SR says that's slander and he was just more conflict-averse than MT.)
As in, rejecting any suggestion to make up with Fritz for real in the lead up to this war, for example. It's Goldstone trying to keep MT from looking bad again. This is frustrating - MT is no less interesting because she makes mistakes! Fritz made plenty of mistakes in this same war, too!
Right! This history reads a lot like a novel: "This is what I want my readers to feel about the protagonists, so I will tell it this way," as opposed to "This is what happened, history is complex, people are complex, deal with it."
er husband now with her son by basically presenting it as her making Joseph co-regent out of the goodness of her heart and because she wants him to learn the business. Again, this is not how any of this worked.
ZOMG.
where I'll give Goldstone credit is her explaining the strong dislike young future Marie Antoinette and Maria Carolina had for their older sister as a tittle tattle by saying it was probably the inevitable result of Mimi wanting to be a responsible older sister and being resented as an authority person close to Mom. I could see that happening.
Speaking as someone who was the bossy oldest of 5, I can also see this happening. ;)
ETA: No, and neither did I, despite having three Joseph-heavy books - a biography I didn't rec because I couldn't, the Five Princesses book and "Der Kaiser reist incognito".
This is why we need to get our hands on Beales! I can access volume 1 on archive.org, but I don't know if you can in Germany, or if you prefer to use up one or two of your Stabi slots to have a more reader-friendly copy. It'll be a while before I get to it, because Great Northern War, and also Great German Language, which I'm still fighting the good fight with. I know you're also busy and with a long list (don't forget Kloosterhuis's tall guys! Every time I try to buy that book online, there's only one copy and it's like $125. Beales is much more likely to happen.)
Son of ETA: What's the one you can't rec, so I can avoid it?
Re: Empress Ch 7-9
Date: 2021-10-02 04:10 am (UTC)And the antagonists are so one-dimensional, which is also something I hate in novels :P
Re: Empress Ch 7-9
Date: 2021-10-02 04:09 am (UTC)Ohhhh, yeah, that makes sense. Although she was cool enough without that!
Though explaining why FS, who when marrying MT had definitely no riches to spare, ended up as one of the wealthiest men in Europe would had necessitated to explain he did more than hunting and wenching in something other than a single footnote.
This is one of the things I super love about FS! I'm definitely salty that Goldstone isn't giving him that credit.
It's Goldstone trying to keep MT from looking bad again. This is frustrating - MT is no less interesting because she makes mistakes! Fritz made plenty of mistakes in this same war, too!
UGH. Yes, MT is much more interesting as a fully-fleshed-out human being!
Which is why I would love to know Goldstone's source on this, if any. This is a really important twist in the story, and I wish she hadn't shot her credibility with us at this point due to all the earlier stuff.
Or -- maybe it's good she has already shot her credibility with us, if it turns out this is also completely inaccurate :P
Again, this is not how any of this worked.
GAH. Seriously, MT doesn't get less interesting if you position her as someone who likes to rule!
Re: Empress Ch 7-9
Date: 2021-10-02 05:03 am (UTC)I suspect a great many people are wired to think that if you're not a Cincinnatus, giving up power the first moment you responsibly can, and only assuming it in the first place because other people urge you to, you're a bad person. Or at least not a sympathetic one.