Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 42

[cahn]

Last post, we had (among other things) Danish kings and their favorites; Louis XIV and Philippe d'Orléans; reviews of a very shippy book about Katte, a bad Jacobite novel, and a great book about clothing; a fic about Émilie du Châtelet and Voltaire; and a review of a set of entertaining Youtube history videos about Frederick the Great.

Comments

Re: Charles Hanbury-Williams: Russia (The Life III)

[selenak]

Yeah, I was surprised by that! Isn't that story of their meeting from her memoirs anyway? Which would indicate she retained a positive impression of it years later.

Honestly, I think both that she told H-W what he wanted to hear - I mean, he wasn't exactly discreet about hating on Fritz when arriving in Russia -, and he probably blew it up even larger in his reports home. Because let's face it, Berlin hadn't exactly been his finest hour as an envoy. And then he goes and alienates MT, too. So being able to say "see, not only does the "young court", i.e. de facto the Grand Duchess like me, but they completly agree with my view on Fritz, so won't have to worry about her and her husband teaming up with him!" must have been important to him. (Remember, when he arrives in Russia he has no idea that an England/Prussia treaty is in the works, and "ally with us AGAINST Fritz" is his major selling point of the Russia/England treaty to Elizaveta.