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cahnBackground: The kids' school has a topic for "Unit" every trimester that a lot of their work (reading, writing, some math) revolves around. These topics range from time/geographic periods ('Colonial America') to geography ('Asia') to science ('Space') to social science ('Business and Economics'). (I have some issues with this way of doing things, but that's a whole separate post.) Anyway, for Reasons, they have had to come up with a new topic this year, and E's 7/8 class is doing "World Fairs" as their new topic.
Me: I know E's teacher is all about World Fairs and I know she is great and will do a good job. But I feel like if we had a different teacher who wasn't so into World Fairs, they wouldn't do such a good job and another topic would be better.
Me: Like... the Enlightenment!
D: Heh, you could teach that! But you'd have to restrain yourself from making everything about Frederick the Great.
Me: But that's the thing! Everyone does relate to each other in this time period! Voltaire -- and his partner Émilie du Châtelet, who was heavily involved in the discourse of conservation of energy and momentum -- well, I've told you Voltaire had a thing with Fritz -- and then there's Empress Maria Theresa, who went to war with him a few times -- and Catherine the Great --
D, meditatively: You know --
Me: *am innocently not warned even though this is the same tone of voice that is often followed by, say, a bad pun*
D: -- it's impressive how everyone from this 'the Great' family is so famous!
Me: *splutters*
D, thoughtfully: But of course there's probably selection bias, as the ones who aren't famous don't get mentioned. You never see 'Bob the Great' in the history books...
Me: *splutters more*
Me: I know E's teacher is all about World Fairs and I know she is great and will do a good job. But I feel like if we had a different teacher who wasn't so into World Fairs, they wouldn't do such a good job and another topic would be better.
Me: Like... the Enlightenment!
D: Heh, you could teach that! But you'd have to restrain yourself from making everything about Frederick the Great.
Me: But that's the thing! Everyone does relate to each other in this time period! Voltaire -- and his partner Émilie du Châtelet, who was heavily involved in the discourse of conservation of energy and momentum -- well, I've told you Voltaire had a thing with Fritz -- and then there's Empress Maria Theresa, who went to war with him a few times -- and Catherine the Great --
D, meditatively: You know --
Me: *am innocently not warned even though this is the same tone of voice that is often followed by, say, a bad pun*
D: -- it's impressive how everyone from this 'the Great' family is so famous!
Me: *splutters*
D, thoughtfully: But of course there's probably selection bias, as the ones who aren't famous don't get mentioned. You never see 'Bob the Great' in the history books...
Me: *splutters more*
Re: Chevalier d'Eon I: Russia
Date: 2023-12-12 06:23 am (UTC)Salongoers may remember him as the Comte de Broglie's unofficial boss
Well, I do now :P Thanks for the reminder!
Chevalier d'Eon: Well, my father wanted a son, but he got a girl instead. So he decided to raise me as a boy–
Is this the Chevalier telling her story in memoirs? Or some other documentation?
Re: Chevalier d'Eon I: Russia
Date: 2023-12-12 02:32 pm (UTC)That's why I included the reminder: I thought salongoers might *not* remember him!
Is this the Chevalier telling her story in memoirs? Or some other documentation?
The Chevalier, yeah. But memoirs weren't the only place she constructed her narrative; she forged *all kinds* of documentation to back up her "I was a woman before and you were okay with it!" story. I tracked down her papers in the archives (they're at the University of Leeds), and the description on the website says:
This archive is especially difficult to handle. It contains many forged reports, letters, bills, accounting sheets, etc. D'Eon even produced fake authenticity letters to certify that forged documents were genuine.
Things like receipts for women's clothes supposedly dating from before 1770, etc. I'm actually not sure if there's anything relating to her supposed childhood as a girl being raised as a boy, but definitely a bunch of stuff from her time in Russia and England.
D'Eon even produced fake authenticity letters to certify that forged documents were genuine.
Kates: See, this kind of thing is why I'm 100% sure you were capable of being the one who started the rumors about your gender in 1770 and then pretended to be shocked and horrified.