""Be Honest Your Majesty..."" Topic

In the movie Amadeus there is a scene where Mozart is explaining to the Emperor Joseph II about the Opera he wishes to write- (Abduction from the Seraglio) and he is admonished to use a more elevated theme, and he mocks the elevated theme with "people so elevated you think they marble." He then asks

"Be honest your majesty, wouldn't you rather listen to your hairdresser than Hercules?"

A short time ago a friend was talking on my Yahoo Group, "The Society of Daisy" a group dedicated to humor and whimsy in gaming, that he liked to study the personalities and personages of history and he found them far more entertaining than people made up in Imagi-Nations.

Perhaps, and there are a lot, but most of them have been nipped and tucked and plastered over and pablamized and bowdlerized till they are caricatures and kewpie dolls. It strikes me that most people of history may be great and grand or villainous, but I imagine that most were crashing offensive bores, probably had poor hygiene, and little able to talk about anyone but themselves and entirely all to self justifying. Admittedly there were a few like Washington or Einstein, or Schweitzer of the guy from Nazareth, but the great men of history are also often the great criminals of history. I would not relish a table top chat with Hitler or Stalin over dinner.

For me, I'd rather talk to my hairdresser.

Talk about a sweeping generalisation!

There are very many great men (and women) of history who have nothing to do with the military, politics or power!

Dear Legatusshedlius

Really, name a few great men and women of history who have nothing to do with the military, politics or power.

That was my point. However we don't hear about them. Remember, you said, military, politics, and power. That was specifically the people I was talking about. I don't see how they get great without the power and politics.

In Laurel Thatcher Ulrich's great book, "Diary of Martha Ballard: Journal of a midwife on the American frontier" (in the 1804 period), there is a tale where Ballard is called out to administer a birth to a woman. The woman and child die in the birth and they are laid out side by side. I'd like to hear that woman's story. In Brady's photographs of the American Civil War there is a famous one of the dead at Antietam we have all seen, lying there. I'd like to hear that guys story. I'd like to hear about Jane Austin's life, or even Jane Austin's hairdresser.

Otto You are kidding right there are thousands of famous people who meet your criteria of nothing to do with military politics or power. Many were involved in the Sciences and the Arts.

Scientists like Marie Curie, Newton, Einstein, Hawking, Pasteur, Volt, Marconi,Tesla, Aristotle

Artists like Michelangelo Rembrandt Eubens, Monet, Rodin and many other great masters as well as artists who represented everyday life, Monet, Degas, Van Gogh, Rodin,

Writers Dickens, Dostoevsky, Faulkner, Brontes, Austen, Wilde, Tolstoy, Tolkien. Fitzgerald, Clemens etc

Poets, Frost, , Wordsworth, Browning Keats, Angelou,etc

If you want some dinner companions try a table with Samuel Clemens, Will Rodgers and Virginia Wolfe and then go drinking afterwards with Hemingway, I think that the conversation would have been lively to say the least

Dear Toronto 48
Oh agreed, but none of those people have power. I was talking about the usual suspects war gamers want to talk to, Napoleon, Alexander, Hitler, Lee, Grant, etc. That's the type my friend was talking about.

The sciences and the arts are always more interesting, and for me, especially-- the arts. Rossini was not only a brilliant composer of Operas but a fabulous cook as well. Verdi was a giant of his times and someone who loved wry jokes. Hitler (or for that matter Wagner) never cracked a joke in his life, so some artists would be as excruciating to talk to as well.

But again, none of these people have power. War gamers on the other hand are besotted with people with power. Don't think so? Only people with power have armies, they are the expression, the essence, the living embodiment, the ne plus ultra of power.

How many times have you heard on these posts when people ask "Who would you like to have three or four hours or a dinner to talk over with a famous person" have you heard them answer Charlotte Bronte or Jonas Saulk?

Otto

pablamized, I've googled it and the fact that it only gave 4 hits (one this thread) suggests I'm not the only one to have no idea this word exists, nor what it means.

'Really, name a few great men and women of history who have nothing to do with the military, politics or power.'

'Oh agreed, but none of those people have power'

Thought you were talking about great men and women, not power. Re power, if you're going to use power in your definition of 'great' then it seems a bit obvious that people without power cannot be great. Personally, I would disagree with that idea.

Pablum, cereal for infants, became pablum, boring or insipid fair (Wiki). Should have a U, and be hyphenated for coined variation.

Doug

I'd argue that Darwin wielded more power than Napoleon ever did.

Newton spent half his career cozying up to the powerful in order to land positions of power for himself.
Einstein wrote to FDR imploring him to build an A Bomb.
Marconi's radio revolutionised military theory and practice.
Aristotle's was a philosopher who philosophized about political power and was executed by the State.
Dicken's books were not only popular, but helped shaped the social climate and attitudes to poverty. We still tend to view Victorian poverty through his eyes.
Michelangelo designed bastions to help defend Florence.
And I'd certainly agree that Darwin exerted power. He changed the world.

I am not familiar with the careers of many of the other artists mentioned, but science and art are not necessarily removed from power, politics and war.

'I would not relish a table top chat with Hitler or Stalin over dinner.'

I think it was Albert Speer who wrote of the banality and stupidity of high-ranking Nazis' dinner conversation. On this, if nothing else, I suspect he was telling the truth. Dinners with Stalin apparently tended to be drunken affairs, with the excitement of wondering if you were next on his list. Neither are my idea of a good time.

Dear Whatisitgood4atwork.

Agreed. If you read ANYTHING on the real people Speer's observations come out in spades. Richard's Evans' trilogy on the Third Reich, or Bulloch's biography is the same.

Who the heck wants to bear up with Hitler's halitosis and belching and eat his lousy weak barley broth! As for Stalin- exactly, it well could be a hangover you will never wake up from.

Me? I'd rather "be in my cups" with a group of Russian artillery officers from 1816. I bet the booze women and food consumed would be "decidedly astonishing".

If we are discussing late 16 and the 1700s then, dismissing the egregious self justifications of later war criminals, easily find a mass of detail on personal characters in biographies and memoirs. The little detail we have on supreme rulers like William of Orange and Queen Anne and George I suggests they were dull as ditchwater. They could not, anyway, be known personally by anyone who would or would dare write about them in the Age of Absolutism. Generals are there many of whom are described in biography memoir and even if it is only to criticise them there are many anecdotes. Marlborough and Eugene holding transvestite soirees etc. The lives of women soldiers and the recollections of officers such as Parker or de Colonie. I dont think we can ever make up personalities from scratch, like novelists we recycle our own reading and experience. There is plenty of both to make for an unending supply of personages who can shock,cause amusement, fascinate etc. But the key is that in a World of Imaginations they should argue with each other enough to go to war! The key to a good game and definitely to a good campaign is to know what you are fighting about and it is the personages wot does it. But they have a character which draws on contemporary materials that can rarely come from any idea of what rulers or great captains were really like.
In Imaginations hairdressers should rule !