Horrible Histories- George I- Doesn't Understand English..

Ah, the benefits of a Hanoverian monarch! Not only does one avoid the Hapsburg jaw, one gets both German and an inherited case of porphoria.

Our Daily Bread> Your Angst

The Amateur Historian has a particular fondness for literary feuds. Though Mark Twain's scathing criticisms of the literary offenses of the Deerslayer tales are still the Amateur Historian's favorite, William Makepeace Thackeray had some salient criticisms of Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther:

Werther had a love for Charlotte
Such as words could never utter;
Would you know how first he met her?
She was cutting bread and butter.

Charlotte was a married lady,
And a moral man was Werther,
And, for all the wealth of Indies,
Would do nothing for to hurt her.

So he sighed and pined and ogled,
And his passion boiled and bubbled,
Till he blew his silly brains out,
And no more was by it troubled.

Charlotte, having seen his body
Borne before her on a shutter,
Like a well-conducted person,
Went on cutting bread and butter.

Giddup

As mentioned in an earlier post this week, Pitt the Younger's favorite way of spending the evening was to drink three bottles of port with his close friends and cabinet ministers. His favorite drinking partner was Dundas, who could not quite match Pitt's three bottles, but not from lack of effort.

During what seems to be one particularly memorable dinner party hosted by Charles Jenkinson in Croydon, Pitt and Dundas decided that they were sober enough to ride.

They were not.

The Prime Minister of England and the most famous Scottish MP of the time took it into their heads to gallop through an open toll gate separating Streatham and Tooting, and were shot at by the toll keeper.

Talk about taking a shot at greatness....

Bunga bunga certainly sounds like a nonsense word

In a world of bunga-bunga parties with minors and Prime Ministers as the main guests, the Amateur Historian finds it something of a relief to turn from Berlusconi's antics to William Pitt the Younger's.

Pit the Younger was notoriously uninterested in women, his one "fling" with Eleanor Eden ending with an oft-examined letter explaining to her father, Lord Auckland, why they couldn't be married. Though that is the subject of another post (the Amateur Historian is sure her Gentle Readers will be thrilled with a quasi-scholarly examination of Pitt the Younger's sexuality or lack thereof), Pitt's own parties were, to be quite honest, not very good. Pitt's idea of a wild evening was to drink three bottles of port with Dundas, Wilberforce or any of his other ministers in attendance, and then to rehearse Parliamentary debates. Slow down, wild man!

Part of this has to do with the early death of his beloved sister, Harriot, in 1785. Her role as his political hostess forced him out of his customary reserve and extreme shyness and, at her death, Pitt was left to the mercies of the Duchess of Gordon. To say that Pitt very soon disliked the Duchess of Gordon, who called him "pet" and tried to set him up with her daughter Charlotte, may be summed up in the following exchange:

Duchess of Gordon: Well, Mr. Pitt, do you talk as much nonsense now as you used to when you lived with me?

Pitt the Younger: I do not know, madam, whether I talk so much nonsense, I certainly do not hear so much."

Horrible Histories- Admiral Nelson's Death/Stupid Deaths

Everyone loves a naval hero, except if said naval hero pukes on your shoes.

Horrible Histories -George IV is Fat

The man wasn't nicknamed "the Prince of Whales" because of his fondness for marine science, after all.

Horrible Histories - Pupil Rebellion -HD 1080p

The British school system was, I think, much more entertaining back in the Georgian era. If this was the sort of education that gentlemen of rank and fortune received, it is very easy to see how British parliment evolved the way it did. The Amateur Historian is personally very fond of how British MPs can boo each other at will.

Shake it, shake it, shake it like a Tesla Oscillator

Many times has an older relation or land-lady complained that a younger person has been playing their music so loudly/otherwise do something believably anti-social they would bring the house down. This hyperbole has mostly passed into cliche, save when one adds Nikola Tesla to the mix.

Nikola Tesla, possibly the world's only real mad scientist, was Edison's rival and a multi-talented scientist. Though Tesla is famous for his alternating current electricity, which is still in use today, he also experimented with mechanical devices. One was an earthquake which, you guessed it, Gentle Reader, causes earthquakes. The machine uses resonance frequency to shake buildings and the earth. Though MythBusters says it is only a legend, Tesla allegedly caused a small earthquake in his lodging house and had to take a sledgehammer to his device before the police arrived.

I am sure it put the whole neighborhood into a quake thereafter.

Immortal Beloved Review

It is always difficult dealing with a mystery that has plagued the academic community for years. When one is... not actually an academic, it most likely necessarily follows that the answer to that mystery is going to be a) academically unfounded and b) a little bizarre. However, to give credit where credit is due, the director a) brilliantly picked Gary Oldman to play Beethoven, b) did an extremely good, if sometimes overtly violent job at matching images to Beethoven's music, c) has a beautiful first act where one of Beethoven's potential Immortal Beloveds falls in love with him and realizes that he is deaf, and d) cast Gary Oldman in a cravat role.

Take a look, Gentle Readers:

The director performed a service to humanity with that bit of casting. The Amateur Historian, at least, personally feels that her life was better for seeing Gary Oldman storm about Romantically in period costume.

The plot is relatively simple. After Beethoven's dramatic death in the middle of a thunderstorm, underscored by the beginnings of his 5th Symphony, his biographer, Anton Schindler (actually Beethoven's first biographer, so good job movie) finds three letters addressed to Beethoven's Immortal Beloved. This leads Schindler on a quest throughout Austria and through the flashbacks of the candidates for the title of Immortal Beloved. It is a very different and ingenious way to explore the tumultuous life of a great composer, and, to the movie's credit and certainly to Mr. Oldman's, Beethoven is presented precisely as he was in life: passionate, paranoid, tumultuous, brilliant and completely over-the-top. Whether it's music or life, Beethoven must HAVE IT ALL and he must HAVE IT HIS WAY OR HE WILL BREAK SOMETHING.

However, like Beethoven, the movie is not without its flaws. It is extremely bloody-- a trait which will perhaps recommend it to certain Gentle Readers, but not to the Amateur Historian-- and the third act of the film is an incredible disappointment. When the dramatic denouement, underscored with Beethoven's own music and the apparently requisite thunderstorm, unfurls, the end is somewhat inexplicable and disappointing. For no easily discernible reason, Beethoven's Immortal Beloved agrees to meet Beethoven in a hotel, where he will presumably propose, but then she leaves the hotel and then marries someone else, leaving Beethoven to hurl chairs about in rage.

Jeez, Immortal Beloved, I know your boyfriend has hearing problems, but you should have just invested in a fan.

Bref, the movie is not without its merits, though it fails to live up to the high standard it set for itself in its first act, where Beethoven's loss of hearing is handled with such beautiful artistic delicacy. For the romance novelists out there, the first act is also very helpful in terms of very late 18th century undergarments, as there is a surprising amount of nudity, dressing and undressing that occurs. However, the ending does not make very much sense once the film is over and the final moment of beauty, where Beethoven's Ode to Joy is playing in the background as Beethoven, as a young boy, lays in a lake reflecting the stars and the camera pans back to see the entire Milky Way, is eclipsed by the randomness of the script's solution. Immortal Beloved, you are not who all the actual scholars say you are.

Horrible Histories - Georgian Pinching Match

The summer is the best time to begin a new sport or exercise regime, Gentle Readers, and so the Amateur Historian suggests looking back to history. Pinching matches are sure to be all the rage at your next outdoor party! It gives any gathering that touch of old British civility.