cahn | Frederick the Great and Other 18th-C Characters, Discussion Post 31

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cahn

And in this post:

-

luzula is going to tell us about the Jacobites and the '45!

-I'm going to finish reading Nancy Goldstone's book about Maria Theresia and (some of) her children Maria Christina, Maria Carolina, and Marie Antoinette, In the Shadow of the Empress, and

selenak is going to tell us all the things wrong with the last four chapters (spoiler: in the first twenty chapters there have been many, MANY things wrong)!

-

mildred_of_midgard is going to tell us about Charles XII of Sweden and the Great Northern War

(seriously, how did I get so lucky to have all these people Telling Me Things, this is AWESOME)

-oh, and also there will be Yuletide signups :D

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

selenak

Holy cow, I can see why one might get depressed, with a childhood like that.

That, or one developes a very different kind of temper. Michail's grandson Peter during his childhood saw an uncle of his and a close advisor of his mother's torn apart by the Strelitzki (not sure whether this is the right spelling in English - think Praetorians in Rome) during the struggle for the Regency between his mother and his older half sister (Sofia, who won). Spoiler: this did not work out well for the Strelitzki in the long term.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

I would love it if someone read and reported on a biography of Sofia. I found her *fascinating* in my recent reading.

From:

selenak

There's a reason why in the minisieres based on Massie's Peter biography Vanessa Redgrave when offered her choice of parts went for Sofia and promptly went an Emmy for it,deservedly, because she's that rarity (especiallyiin the 80s), a female Worthy Oppponent to the main character who is older, neither sexualized (i.e. evil vamp) nor asexual (we see Sofia with her beloved), ruthless, smart, and thoroughly enjoying herself in power. As I said in my rewatch review, her final scene when she and Peter meet before she's off to her last banishment, and she chides him for chickening out of killing her, he first tries to sound noble and says "I'm not shedding family blood", she says, amused, "You will before this is over" (true, see also, Alexei), and he then says "let's just say I see something of me in you and leave it at that" I remembered so well that when I rewatched after decades I still recalled almost every word.