cahn | Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 39

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Last post, along with the usual 18th-century suspects, included the Ottonians; changing ideas of conception and women's sexual pleasure; Isabella of Parma (the one who fell in love, and vice versa, with her husband's sister); Henry IV and Bertha (and Henry's second wife divorcing him for "unspeakable sexual acts"). (Okay, Isabella of Parma was 18th century.)

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From:

felis

Oh, hey, of course the Orgasm Poem is read by Fry later on, once again returning to Algarotti. Not a single other love(r) is mentioned throughout the whole thing (apart from Katte at the beginning of course). Also, all the siblings are Not Appearing In This Podcast. No Wilhelmine, no AW, no Heinrich (Fritz is the Big Mastermind of the Polish partition of course, Catherine who?, and somehow they think he invaded the country).

Sanssouci is "filled almost exclusively with homosexual or bisexual men" -

Voltaire: The worst!
D'Argens: ... well, I got to bring my wife.
James and George Keith: *didn't notice anything*

- and "the staff only speak French".

Fredersdorf: Figures.

Of course they take Voltaire's bottoming anecdote as is, without any context or anything (and that's basically the only detail they even mention when it comes to their relationship), but I'm laughing that Zimmermann's "everyone believed he was gay" gets quoted but that they leave out the "BUT IT WAS ALL A CUNNING PLAN" bit entirely. He's totally rolling in his grave.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Oh, hey, of course the Orgasm Poem is read by Fry later on

I figured it would be. It got pretty popular, which is part of the reason Algarotti is on everyone's radar (and faithful Fredersdorf's not).

Also, all the siblings are Not Appearing In This Podcast.

Sigh. One passing mention and it was WRONG.

no Heinrich (Fritz is the Big Mastermind of the Polish partition of course, Catherine who?

Fritz: Score one for my history-rewriting!

Sadly, this is a pretty common take, as is the (Fritz's) story that Fritz and Joseph totally planned it all out at Neisse. Even respectable histories have it.

Sanssouci is "filled almost exclusively with homosexual or bisexual men" -

Lol! I've seen this take too, but...less respectably.

Of course they take Voltaire's bottoming anecdote as is

Oh FFS.

but I'm laughing that Zimmermann's "everyone believed he was gay" gets quoted but that they leave out the "BUT IT WAS ALL A CUNNING PLAN" bit entirely. He's totally rolling in his grave.

Fritz: My cunning plan worked! Everyone believes I was gay! ~~because I was~~

ETA: Also, thank you for your tolerance for listening to things that are WRONG on the INTERNET! It is a great service to salon. (I think our comment count on this post almost doubled in the space of an hour. :P)

Edited Date: 2022-12-14 07:54 pm (UTC)

From:

selenak

It got pretty popular, which is part of the reason Algarotti is on everyone's radar (and faithful Fredersdorf's not).

In the English speaking world, my dear. Back when I had reason to google all those 2012 German articles dealing with Fritzian sexuality apropos the big centennary, not one of them mentioned Algarotti or the poem, which is why I learned of Algarotti's existence only through salon, but a great many of them quoted from the Fredersdorf letters, especially your favourite one. Gott bewahre Dir!

Seriously though, given that and the Bad Gays podcast, I wish one of us would do a podcast of their own where we could do an hour introduction to Fritz, friends and foes wherein we prove there's more than enough sensationalist gossip to be head which actually bears some resemblance to reality so you don't have to resort to demonstrable falsehoods.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

In the English speaking world, my dear.

Well, yes, this is an English-speaking broadcast we're discussing. I expect what's well-known and what's not to be different in the German speaking world!

Seriously though, given that and the Bad Gays podcast, I wish one of us would do a podcast of their own where we could do an hour introduction to Fritz

I agree!

From:

selenak

You are my heroine for listening till the end so I don‘t have to. Algarotti as the only lover (other than Katte) mentioned really looks like a shipper has struck. :)

(I think I‘ll do a boyfriends poll, if I can figure out good questions. Or write a filk. Or something. And then, separately from the longer term boyfriends, there‘s a special category for ill fated dashing hussars:

Glasow, Giorgi/Grigory, Deesen: Sigh.)

The lack of siblings, alas, I‘m used to. Usually when I talk to people I‘m lucky if they know about Wilhelmine, let alone any of the others, and to be fair: at the start of salon, I only knew Heinrich existed, had been gifted and gay and not getting along with Fritz, and that was it, and I would have had trouble naming any of the other non-Wilhelmine ones by name, let alone have any ideas of their personilities. Am similarlily unsurprised at the Partition of Poland - even the Stanislaus Poniatowski biographer whose book I read as part of my story research two Yuletides ago seemed to be under the impression it was a long term evil Fritzian Masterplan, and while he mentions Heinrich‘s trip to Russia briefly, it was in one sentence and in a „sent his brother Heinrich to Catherine“ way. (No mention of Heinrich arranging that trip behind Big Brother‘s back, let alone any longer term connection between Heinrich and Catherine.)

ROTFLOL on Zimmermann. BTW, was just reminded the other day that there‘s one non-Fritzian connection in which Zimmermann shows up in literary history - he kind of introduced a young Goethe to Charlotte von Stein by showing Goethe the silhouette he‘d made of her and told him about her. It‘s a small German speaking ancient regime world.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

The lack of siblings, alas, I‘m used to. Usually when I talk to people I‘m lucky if they know about Wilhelmine, let alone any of the others, and to be fair: at the start of salon, I only knew Heinrich existed, had been gifted and gay and not getting along with Fritz, and that was it, and I would have had trouble naming any of the other non-Wilhelmine ones by name

You were WAY ahead of me, all I knew was he had a brother who fathered FW2! That's it! No Heinrich, no Wilhelmine, nothing.

I did, however, come in knowing quite a bit about the details of his marriage. ;)

ETA: Meant to say, but also, you and I were not presenting publicly on the subject: we would have done more research first!

Am similarlily unsurprised at the Partition of Poland - even the Stanislaus Poniatowski biographer whose book I read as part of my story research two Yuletides

And the otherwise good book you recced about Joseph's travels, Der Kaiser Reist Inkognito, makes this mistake too, as I recall. Fritz worked very hard to make sure everyone would make this mistake! It was all a cunning plan!

Edited Date: 2022-12-14 08:08 pm (UTC)

From:

mildred_of_midgard

You are my heroine for listening till the end so I don‘t have to.

Yes, this! We all know I wasn't going to listen anyway, but thank you for listening so Selena didn't have to!