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Your favourite king?


Who is your favourite king?  

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I'm surprised no-one's mentioned King Edward II.

For those with little knowledge of English history his demise was so painful it inspired the name of a traditional English folk-reggae band..."Edward II and the Red Hot Polkas"*

Think about it!

(*sadly they truncated their name to "Edward II"...and more recently to "EIIK")

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For those with little knowledge of English history his demise was so painful it inspired the name of a traditional English folk-reggae band..."Edward II and the Red Hot Polkas"*

Think about it!

i did think about it...That's gonna leave a mark.

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But I thought Mervyn Le Roy directed The Wizard of Oz...

Victor Fleming was the original director, King Vidor finished the last month or so (from what i've read), but i'm not sure why.

Mervyn LeRoy was the producer. :D

I stand corrected. :g

Guess 1939 was the year for changing directors on films, a la "Gone With the Wind."

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The more I think about it (and the celery thing notwithstanding), my vote goes for the Sun King, Louis XIV. He reigned for 72 years (!), and turned France into one of the most powerful countries in the world. Probably set the stage for the French Revolution as well...

Louis1701.jpeg

He gets props for Versailles alone, if nothing else. 10,000 people lived at the palace in his day. Pictures don't really do it justice.

VerVidSverhu.jpg

VerGlassGallery.jpg

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The more I think about it (and the celery thing notwithstanding), my vote goes for the Sun King, Louis XIV.  He reigned for 72 years (!), and turned France into one of the most powerful countries in the world.  Probably set the stage for the French Revolution as well...

It could be argued that he inherited one of the most powerful countries in the world thanks to the work of Richelieu and Mazarin and the inherent wealth of Europe's most populous nation.

He used that for a mere 25 years to expand the borders slightly. After that it was all downhill.

His last 15 years were marked by constant military defeat (apart from a last minute face-saving goal at Denain), economic stagnation, dreadful harvest failures and serious social unrest. And Versailles was a cold and miserable place as a consequence! Had the coalition sorted out its differences and put its mind to the job France would have been at least partially occupied sometime between 1704 and 1712 (it was invaded).

He did, on the other hand, have some very good spin doctors. Try 'The Fabrication of Louis XIV' by Peter Burke, 1992.

I could take you up on the French Revolution but that would take all day...

Edited by Bev Stapleton
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Bev -

You clearly now French history far better than I do, so I won't challenge what you're saying. I agree that Mazarin wielded LARGE influence on his early years (even "donated" his niece to Louis), but that makes sense to a degree, since Louis ascended to the throne when he was 4 years old. And I'll certainly agree that his later years were marked by military defeats. The Revolution comment was conjecture on my part.

I wish I had paid better attention during my history lessons...

-Erik

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Erik,

Like arguments about who matters most in jazz, squabbles over what really happened in history go round in endless circles. And no-one's right!

That's where the fun is.

[On the Revolution there are a million and one interpretations - popular history views Louis XIV creating a regime that had so many internal contradictions that revolution was inevitable. I tend to be more convinced by the view that the revolution happened through the particular failure of Louis XVI and his ministers to deal with the stresses of the 1780s rather than any deep seated inevitability.]

Edited by Bev Stapleton
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What about King Ubu :P

Cool!

Hell, I only saw that thread today.

I vote for King Ubu because, he, roi des polonais, is nowadays the true winner of the war in iraq (as polish writer Andrej Stasiuk said in the german newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung some months ago). He prevents Sadam from stealing all those beautiful blonde polonaises... B)

Another personal favorite: King Bumibol (of Thailand, sp?). He jammed with Benny Goodman. The only jazz-addict king known to me.

Bev, how's that Peter Burke book? I read some of his stuff, but not this one.

Have you read that little book by Robert Darnton (in german it was called "Poesie und Polizei", I would have to look up the original title) on those nice poems about Mme Poisson etc?

ubu

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