cahn | 18th-Century Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 35

In the previous post Charles II found AITA:

Look, I, m, believe in live and let live. (And in not going on my travels again. Had enough of that to last a life time.) Why can't everyone else around me be more chill? Instead, my wife refuses to employ my girlfriend, my girlfriend won't budge and accept another office, my brother is set on a course to piss off everyone (he WILL go on his travels again), and my oldest kid shows signs of wanting my job which is just not on, sorry to say. And don't get me started about Mom (thank God she's living abroad). What am I doing wrong? AITA?

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From:

felis

Kind of fascinating that they cast Kaunitz of all people as the bad guy, ineffective or not. Did they need one and he was around or what?

Historical Kaunitz: I can only conclude the King of Prussia was a co-author of this script. After all, he never forgave me for outwitting him diplomatically and kept bitching about me and my in his opinion undeserved reputation as a political mastermind. Making me an incompetent swindler who can't even deliver a marriage sounds like his kind of slander.

Me: Heeee.

Fritz: As always, Count Kaunitz likes to hear himself talk. May I point out what I wrote about him in 1770 [to my Envoy Rohd in Vienna], after I had to spent hours upon hours listening to him in Neustadt:

[...] I tell you in secret that he has indoctrinated me long enough. I think I have understood his character. I take him for a man of great mind, he has sound and clear judgment, but he is so prejudiced about himself that he thinks himself an oracle in politics and the others schoolboys whom he wants to indoctrinate. As for me, I think he only took me for a soldier who had no idea of politics, and I can't deny that he amused me a little.

See also my memoirs: This man had a good mind but was full of quirks. To interrupt him while speaking meant to insult him. Instead of conversing, he gave speeches, because he liked listening to himself more than to anyone else.

Also, when I told young Emperor Joseph everything we'd talked about, he appreciated that very much, since [Kaunitz] treated him very condescendingly and more like his subordinate than his master.

(Maybe I see why they cast him as the bad guy after all, ha.)

Joseph: But I want to live a useful life NOW!
MT: I have a useful marriage lined up for you.

AW: Seems familiar.

Isabella: *wanders somehow to Dr. Swieten's smallpox hospital in her nightgown and infects herself deliberately with smallpox so she may die*

Oooooookay then. What the.

Joseph: Well, I had a great role model.

Ha. Also, I'm amused that FS was amused by this.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Instead of conversing, he gave speeches, because he liked listening to himself more than to anyone else.

Fritz's retinue and visitors: *simultaneously start coughing*

Or, to quote Shaw:

When a lion meets another with a louder roar "the first lion thinks the last a bore."

From:

felis

;)

To be fair, though, I got curious, skimmed PolKor, and lest you think Fritz is exaggerating, here's Kaunitz in just a few of his own words, from his report to MT:

[...] As soon as I entered his study, the King made me sit down, and, to further my project and without giving him time to start the conversation, I told him first: that I had come to profit with great pleasure from the honor which he wished to do me by conversing with me; but that, as I did not in any way resemble either my predecessors or my contemporaries in politics, I was far from taking the advantage that was, according to them, in being able to listen and not having to place your bet first. As I wanted our conversation to be of some use, I begged him to kindly begin by listening quietly and without interrupting me to everything I would say to him. That I thought I had to do it that way, because I was very happy to put him in a position to be able to judge by the things I would say to him, what he thought he could say to me from his side, as well as the tone which he could take with me after having heard me.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Lol! Well, that checks out. :D

And no, I don't think Fritz was exaggerating--I think Fritz was telling the truth, and that he was someone who would be particularly put out by an encounter like this, since *he's* supposed to do most of the talking!

From:

cahn

Also, when I told young Emperor Joseph everything we'd talked about, he appreciated that very much, since [Kaunitz] treated him very condescendingly and more like his subordinate than his master.

(Maybe I see why they cast him as the bad guy after all, ha.)

Hee! What does Joseph say about Kaunitz?

From:

selenak

Well, overall, given that Joseph kept Kaunitz as de facto PM after MT's death, and even Leopold did at first (Kaunitz: got really old, surviving both Joseph and Leopold who were a generation younger than him), he did think Kaunitz was That Good. (Kaunitz: kept the office of Chancellor for freaking' 41 years and through three very different monarchs - MT, Joseph and Leopold - until he retired.)

In detail, when Joseph was younger and MT was still alive, he shared some ideas with Kaunitz (they both wanted to reduce the influence of the Church, for example, and Kaunitz was generally on Team Enlightenment, just not at the speed Joseph wanted it to happen), but was very impatient regarding the later's ponderous ways, and there were arguments all around in various combinations among the ruling trio, with one of the three usually falling back on the offer of retirement as the last weapon. One item where it was Joseph + Kaunitz against MT was the first partitioning of Poland, which the two guys were all ready to do from the start. (Apocryphical Fritz snark not withstanding, MT really did have to be dragged into this.) OTOH, it was Kaunitz + MT against Joseph in the mess that was the War of the Bavarian Succession.

re: Kaunitz as a Diplomat - his big coups in that capacity were, in addition to the Diplomatic Revolution (which he largely accomplished while Austrian Envoy in Paris): years earlier, in the first two Silesian Wars, he won the support of Victor Emmanuel III. for MT against Fritz (clearly, sending Algarotti to do this hadn't had the same effect), and he managed to get MT's youngest son Max as Coadjutator in Cologne and Münster after centuries of the Wittelsbachs having a lockhold on the job. (This was important because it meant the Habsburgs regained some influence among the Northern German princes.) His reputation for vanity was definitely deserved, but he did have the skills to back it up. It should also be said that with Kaunitz, MT and Joseph all three having powerful personalities, it's a not so minor phenomenon that they were able to work with each other, arguments and occasional "fine, be like that, I'm going to retire!" threats not withstanding, for fifteen years. Conversely, Fritz had capable people in his administration, too, but there's no example of him being able to work with someone else on that level. (Fredersdorf had a personality of his own, of course, but he was entirely dependent on Fritz, which is a different situation.) At least in peace time; Heinrich in the 7 Years War comes closest, which brings us to Beales' comparison again (that Heinrich/Fritz = Joseph/MT).

From:

cahn

It should also be said that with Kaunitz, MT and Joseph all three having powerful personalities, it's a not so minor phenomenon that they were able to work with each other, arguments and occasional "fine, be like that, I'm going to retire!" threats not withstanding, for fifteen years.

Yeah, that is really something, especially when one is used to Fritz :) But even aside from Fritz's example or lack thereof, I feel like you would have to be pretty strongly functional to do that with three strong personalities for that long, no matter what the context.

At least in peace time; Heinrich in the 7 Years War comes closest, which brings us to Beales' comparison again (that Heinrich/Fritz = Joseph/MT).

and there were arguments all around in various combinations among the ruling trio, with one of the three usually falling back on the offer of retirement as the last weapon.

I mean. Yeah.
Heinrich: But I actually did resign from the army! Because Fritz was that much worse.