Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 47

[cahn]

We haven't had a new post since before December 25, so obligatory Yuletide link to this hilarious story of Frederick the Great babysitting his bratty little brother, with bonus Fritz/Fredersdorf!

Comments

Re: Micromegas - Voltaire

[selenak]

The Micromegas is something I've been meaning to read for a while but never did, so thank you very much indeed for the write-up! It sounds very Voltairian indeed.

the narrator of TLtL calls perhaps the first science-fiction story.

Cyrano de Bergerac wrote a satirical novel about the main character attempting to visit the moon which I haven't read but which I knew about, and wiki tells me is inspired by Lucian, and also published in 1657, i.e. definitely predating Voltaire by two generations at least.

Why was Voltaire against that one and for Catherine beating up the Greeks later? It appears from the conversation in the text because he thought the former was about land, while you told me in salon that he thought Catherine's sally would be about human rights?

What Mildred said, and also, yes, the Turk/Russian war of 1736 - 1739 features a Russia ruled by a very unenlightened autocrat and Voltaire sees it being solely about a land grab, i.e. whoever wins, the people exchange just one tyrant for another, whereas Catherine later in his rationalisation is enlightened and will free the Greeks from Ottoman tyranny and will bring back freedom back to Greece.

The European enthusiasm for the Greek War of Independence decades later, btw, was also a weird illustration of how many projected themselves onto the idea of Ancient Greece as the source of European civilisation while being angry and sneering at the present day Greeks for not fitting with their idea of how the descendants of Pericles and Leonidas should be like once non-Greek volunteers got there. (Not Byron himself, though, not least because as a young man on the Grand Tour, he'd actually been to Greece before joining the Independence War years later, so he knew the country and the people.) If you read travelogues (again, not Byron's) in prose or verse from the first two decades of the 19th century, there is a lot of anti-Greek bias, and Greek interpreters or tradespeople show up as cowardly and treacherous, especially in accounts written by English folk, with the not so subtext that the TRUE heirs of ancient Greece are, of course, you guessed it. And post War of Independence you get that attitude by other Europeans, especially the Germans, as well. (Shadows of this show up periodically even now when the Brits have to justify keeping the Elgin marbles.)

Now Voltaire obviously never visited Greece, but I think if he had, given that quote about how awful it is to think of the Muslims disgracing the tombs of *insert heroes of Ancient Greece* etc., is that the actual Greeks were deeply and intensely religious and far more imprinted and relating to their Byzantine past than to the pre Christian one. At that point, and not only then. I remember visiting the Athens Book Fair in the year where everyone was talking about the upcoming visit of the Pope (the first by a Pope to Greece), and would he apologize for the sacking of Constantinople by the Latin Crusaders in 1204. Constantinople and the Byzantine era was the big, big topic and identification point. Since Voltaire's beef was with very strictly organized religion in general, God knows what he would have made of the Greek Orthodox Church. (Or the Russian one, but he never encountered that one in practice, either.)

1739 vs 1752 - if that's the debated year of publication, do we have a likely year of origin? I mean, given how long it took for the Pucelle to get officially printed for censorship reasons, I can believe there are decades in between, but if 1739 is possible, I take it there are reasons to believe (as in, maybe references in his letters?) that Voltaire wrote it in the later 1730s?

Re: Micromegas - Voltaire

[cahn]

The European enthusiasm for the Greek War of Independence decades later, btw, was also a weird illustration of how many projected themselves onto the idea of Ancient Greece as the source of European civilisation while being angry and sneering at the present day Greeks for not fitting with their idea of how the descendants of Pericles and Leonidas should be like once non-Greek volunteers got there.

Oh oof. I can totally see this, and... ugh.

1739 vs 1752 - if that's the debated year of publication, do we have a likely year of origin? I mean, given how long it took for the Pucelle to get officially printed for censorship reasons, I can believe there are decades in between, but if 1739 is possible, I take it there are reasons to believe (as in, maybe references in his letters?) that Voltaire wrote it in the later 1730s?

At least according to Wikipedia, there is no real known year of origin (there are scholars who debate it). I was just thinking that it seems odd to me that Maupertuis' expedition would have been referenced so centrally if it had been written more than ten years later, but that's nothing as convincing as a textual reason like a letter reference. In the wikipedia article there's a link to an article which I believe is summarizing the arguments, but I can't easily read it without paying.

ETA: The Gutenberg edition says, "Voltaire's lengthy correspondences do not contain anything that might indicate the period in which Micromegas was published. The engraved title of the edition that I believe to be the original displays no date."

Re: Micromegas - Voltaire

[mildred_of_midgard]

I can access both the article with the summary as well as the book arguing for 1739, and I gave them both a quick skim earlier this evening. I'll try to summarize for salon in the next few days, but no promises.

ETA: Or there's my tried-and-true "send to Selena" approach. ;) It's only about 30 pages total. Selena, let me know if you want them.

Re: Micromegas - Voltaire

[selenak]

Next week, maybe. I have something major coming up on Sunday for which I must prepare.

Re: Micromegas - Voltaire

[mildred_of_midgard]

Apparently I forgot to hit enter on this?

What Mildred said, and also, yes, the Turk/Russian war of 1736 - 1739 features a Russia ruled by a very unenlightened autocrat and Voltaire sees it being solely about a land grab, i.e. whoever wins, the people exchange just one tyrant for another

My current plan is to cover the 1730s next time I feel the urge to study foreign policy, so hopefully we can learn about this war sometime in 2024!

Thank you for the additional Byron context! I knew just enough to prompt you. :)

there is a lot of anti-Greek bias, and Greek interpreters or tradespeople show up as cowardly and treacherous, especially in accounts written by English folk, with the not so subtext that the TRUE heirs of ancient Greece are, of course, you guessed it.

Haha, exactly like Orlov.

(I had a response here on the 1739 vs. 1752 question, but Cahn has already responded.)