Talk:Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

References for the article

Reliable sources
I am creating a list of references to rewrite this article. Those that are crossed out, I have read and taken notes on:

• Grossman, Lev. "Of Magic and Men", Time (August 8 2004).
• Maguire, Gregory. "Hogwarts for Grown-ups", New York Times (September 5 2004)
• Dirda, Michael. "Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell", Washington Post (September 5 2004)
• Miller, Laura. "When Harry Potter met Jane Austen", www.salon.com (September 4 2004)
• Alexander, Matthew. "Magical history tour", The Telegraph (September 15 2004)
• Faber, Michael. "It's a kind of magick", The Guardian (2 October 2004)
• Brown, Laura. "Under her spell", The Telegraph (15 September 2004)
• Charles, Ron. "Harry Potter for adults", The Christian Science Monitor (31 August 2004)
• Craig, Amanda. "With the fairies", New Statesman (27 September 2004)
• Maslin, Janet. "Wellington's wizardry wasn't all his", New York Times (17 September 2004)
• Berry, Michael. "A wave of the wand and magic is reborn in 1800s England", San Francisco Chronicle (19 September 2004)
• Nawotka, Edward. "Magical 'Jonathan Strange' makes spellbinding reading", USA Today (15 September 2004)
• Hendrix, Grady. "Do you believe in magic?", Village Voice (24 August 2004)
• Feeley, Gregory. "The Magic of England", The Weekly Standard (18 October 2004)
• Murray, Charles Sharr. "The Magician's Apprentice", The Independent (17 September 2004) LexisNexis.
• Saunders, Kate. "Away with the faeries". The Times (18 September 2004). LexisNexis.
• Kaveney, Roz. Times Literary Supplement (1 October 2004)
• Shulman, Polly. "Fantasy for Grown-ups", www.slate.com (16 September 2004)
• Robinson, Tasha. "Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, www.theonion.com (27 September 2004)
• "Fogbound", The Economist (18 September 2004)
• Oppel, Kenneth. "Surpassing Strange", The Globe and Mail (18 September 2004). LexisNexis.
• Reese, Jennifer. "Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell", Entertainment Weekly (3 September 2004)
• Freeman, John. "A fantasy that rings true - Susanna Clarke's new novel shows how fun reading can be". Houston Chronicle (19 September 2004). Access World News.
• Johnson, Cynthia. Library Journal (August 2004)
• Zimmerman, Sacha. New Republic - do we have more info on this one? - can't find more on this one
• Canfield, Kevin. "Making magic of magic". Chicago Sun-Times (26 September 2004). Access World News.
• Shawl, Nisi. ""Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell": An enchanting blend of mundane and magical in an alternative 1800s", Seattle Times (12 September 2004)
• Hodgman, John. "Susannah Clarke's Magic Book", New York Times Magazine (1 August 2004)
• Harper's Bazaar
• People
• Sykes, Tom. "English Magical Mystery - Susanna Clarke Crafts a Spirited Tale of Brit Wizards". New York Post (29 August 2004). Access World News.
• Linskey, Annie. "'Strange' mixes brew of practical magic, history". Baltimore Sun (3 October 2004). Access World News.
• Linskey, Annie. "Stranger than Fiction - After 10 years of writing, Susanna Clarke has found overnight success, and perhaps a bit of the old Potter magic, with her debut novel". Baltimore Sun (29 September 2004). Access World News.
• Vidimos, Robin. "Magic marries history Enchanting debut invokes Dickens". Denver Post (5 September 2004). Access World News.
• Freeman, John. Atlanta Journal Constitution - same review
• Cleveland Plain Dealer
• Kelly, Christopher. "Casting a spell - Grown-up Harry Potter fans, rejoice! Now there's something even better". Fort Worth Star-Telegram (12 September 2004). Access World News.
• Grossman, Wendy. "Ten years - but Susanna's book is worth the wait". Daily Telegraph (London) (7 October 2004). LexisNexis.
• O'Gorman, Rochelle. "Invention and Detection, In Tales Thick and 'Thin'", The Boston Globe (3 April 2005). LexisNexis.
• Rose, Hilary. "Her dark materials". The Times (London) (2 October 2004). LexisNexis.
• Dawtrey, Adam. "London Eye". Variety (20 September 2004). LexisNexis.
• Reynolds, Nigel. "Hollywood buys 'Harry Potter for adults' film rights". Daily Telegraph (London) (16 October 2004). LexisNexis.
• Fleming, Michael. "Scribe inks a 'Strange' deal". Variety (3 March 2005). LexisNexis.
• Hopkins, Nick. "New Line pays £1m for 'Strange' film option". The Times (London) (19 October 2004). LexisNexis.
• Freeman, John. "Author interview: Susanna Clarke". St. Petersburg Times (Florida) (12 September 2004). LexisNexis.
• Miller, Laura. "Fantastic friends" (interview). www.salon.com (8 October 2005). LexisNexis.
• Freeman, John. "Magic to do: Faux footnotes, social observation, and wizard rivalry stir the pot in Susanna Clarke's 19th-century tale". The Boston Globe (3 October 2004). LexisNexis.
• Newman, Andrew Adam. "How Should a Book Sound? And What About Footnotes?". New York Times (20 January 2006). LexisNexis.
• Derbyshire, David. "Book a fortune in advance - by buying limited editions". Daily Telegraph (London) (30 April 2005). LexisNexis.
• Smith, David. "First time novelist weaves £1m magic: Historical tale billed as Harry Potter for adults set to be a world blockbuster". The Observer (22 February 2004). LexisNexis.
• Stevenson, Jane. "Strangely strange, but oddly normal". The Observer (3 October 2004). LexisNexis.

Sources whose reliability needs to be determined

• Interview with author - on Clarke's website

Plot summary

Writing a plot summary for an 800-page novel! Ah! Anyone want to help? Awadewit (talk) 23:34, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Awards listed in the paperback version

Which of these should be mentioned in the article?

• Time magazine #1 Book of the Year - yes?
• Book Sense Book of the Year
• Shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award - yes
• Shortlisted for the Hugo Award - yes
• Longlisted for the Booker prize - yes
• People Top Ten Books of the Year
• salon.com Top Ten of 2004
• New York Times Notable Books of the Year
• Christian Science Monitor Best Fiction 2004
• Nancy Pearl's Top 12 Books of 2004
• Washington Post Book World Best of 2004
• San Francisco Chronicle Best Books of 2004
• Chicago Tribune Best of 2004
• Seattle Times 25 Best Books 2004
• Atlanta Journal-Constitution Top 12 Books of 2004
• Village Voice "Top Shelf"
• Raleigh News & Observer Best of 2004
• Rocky Mountain News critics' favorites of 2004
• Kansas City Star 100 Noteworthy Books of 2004
• Fort Worth Star-Telegram 10 Best Books of 2004
• Hartford Courant Best Books of 2004

Along with the awards, erhaps just mention that the book was included on many "Best Books of 2004" lists? Awadewit (talk) 15:16, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Questions

• Clarke describes her inspiration for the book as a "waking dream" - this is clearly a reference to Mary Shelley's "waking dream" that inspired Frankenstein. One, this makes me doubt the entire story (is she just mimicking Shelley?) and two, do any reliable sources mention this connection? Awadewit (talk) 16:42, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

• Is there more on the Keats connection somewhere? That would be nice to have. Awadewit (talk) 18:05, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

• If we could get a bit more on the illustrations, we could probably include one under the fair use rationale. Awadewit (talk) 18:05, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

• Does any critic comment on Clarke's Austenian habit of ridiculing the novel? I haven't seen the connection made to Austen yet. Awadewit (talk) 18:18, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Infobox removals

Whilst I appreciate the efforts you are putting into this article, I return the infobox. The reasons for removal you give are basically personal aesthetic views and not based on objective criteria. It is normal (not required as you say) for books to have an infobox with basic publication information relating the the most significant edition (normally the first edition). :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 16:45, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

All important publication information will be included in the article - have no fear. We need a reason to have the infobox - it will be unnecessary once I have fleshed out the article. It was also incorrect and misleading, as most infoboxes are. For example, the number of pages listed was incorrect. Moreover, it listed "alternative history" and "fantasy" as the genres. After reading the reviews, I have found that there is not agreement on these points - one review describes the novel as "historical fiction", for example. This is why I dislike these subjective fields, in particular. The box does not help the reader understand the novel in any significant way - it reduces the novel to facts that are largely irrelevant (ISBN, page numbers, etc.) I therefore suggest that remove it. Awadewit (talk) 16:51, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

yes I can see the alternative history is less appropriate. I have changed these tag to "historical" which appears more so. :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 17:12, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Agreed the page count was wrong - I have now made corrections to that field. The answer is to correct the information rather than remove the whole infobox. :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 17:21, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

You have missed my point about the genre entirely: the point is that reviewers don't agree on the genre. Some say fantasy, some say alternate history, some say historical fiction, some say a combination of two of those, etc. In listing all of them, we mislead the readers. In listing some of them, we mislead as well. The genre of this book is not reduceable to a word. This is why I so dislike these fields. Moreover, why do we even need the infobox? It is only repeating information in the article. I still don't see an argument for it. Why do you think we need the box? Nothing should be added to the article without a reason. Awadewit (talk) 17:25, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

And yet more information in the box is confusing and/or wrong. For example, the ISBN is for the first US edition. Is that the first edition or not? According to the box, the first edition was published in Britain. According to an uncited fact in the article, the first edition was published in the US. I have, as yet, come across no sources on which was published first. If you want an infobox, please at least check the information in it. I am going to remove the information from these fields until some of this can be figured out. Again, I would prefer to remove the entire infobox, as this is precisely the sort of confusion that often arises. Awadewit (talk) 18:33, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Please be careful about adding information to the infobox. You have now added an ISBN without correctly identifying it (I have fixed it) and you have sourced the publication date to a specific edition, which is not the same as the ISBN, therefore the publication information and the ISBN do not actually match. We need to go slowly and get this right. Awadewit (talk) 20:38, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Ah I can see a confusion, I was read a cache of the Bloomsbury webpage where the ISBN and publication date information was correct AND consistent. The updated page has the more recent reissue. You are quite correct in identifying the US edition as first. :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 10:35, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

Poor sourcing

"During the week of the 24th November 2008, Julian Fellowes revealed on Richard & Judy's New Position television programme that he had completed the screenplay for Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. On 29th January 2009, The Friends of English Magic web site approached Ileen Maisel, formerly the Senior Vice-President of European Production at New Line Cinema, about the current status of the film. FoEM was told that the rights to the film have now been fully acquired by Amber Entertainment and Cuba Pictures and that a director for the film was due to be cast during April 2009"

This information has been added to the article, but it is sourced to a fan site (no editorial control). I'm going to remove the information until we can find a reliable source. Awadewit (talk) 11:40, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Okay, please explain how I can get FoEM to be considered a reliable source. I've been in touch with Susanna Clarke and Colin Greenland since 2005, have been in touch on the odd occasion with Susanna's literary agent, Bloomsbury, New Line and a number of her peers. The information on FoEM is as accurate as I can get it. Short of being unprofessional and revealing the emails with all the information, I've got no idea in your eyes how to persuade you the information I have provided is accurate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Movielad (talk • contribs) 14:10, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately that sounds rather like original research. That doesn't of course make it wrong but wikipedia does try to maintain very high standards for verifiability. :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 14:35, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

WT:RS is the right place to bring up discussion on whether a source can be "blessed" as reliable AFAIK. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 14:42, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Information on Wikipedia must be verifiable and meet our reliable sources policy. Please stop adding material from this fan site, which does not. Verifiability, not accuracy, is the measure of inclusion here. Thanks. Awadewit (talk) 15:53, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Having read the reliable sources discussion and other articles, it seems all far too open to personal interpretation, and quite frankly I do not have the time nor inclination to argue this point to death. Nor do I wish to make enemies. Unfortunately I am not in the habit of revealing the personal emails addresses of the subject being discussed from my edits. Perhaps if things work out with the new rights owners to the film property and that an official web site for the film or PR agency is involved, I guess you can use that for verification purposes. If anybody does have a suggestion on how I can get this information verified to make it fit in with the 'rules', I'm always open to suggestions as right now, I've not a clue. --Movielad (talk) 20:17, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Quote box changes

A while back, I updated our quotes to use the {{quote box}} template to offset them to the right rather than heading up each section. Recently, these were modified to use a more customisable template, {{quote box2}}, along with setting various tweaks to the fonts and colours. I don't believe that there is any need for this additional styling - the box has a border, which adequately sets it off from the rest of the page already, and the default background colour makes the text in the box very easy to read. I think this should be reverted, as the arbitrary use of different fonts and colours for article elements has long been discouraged and the defaults seem perfectly reasonable to me. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 00:11, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

There is nothing arbitrary about it. It follows the example at Template:Quote box2 and there is no requirement in the MOS to follow the quote box style that you prefer. I find it much harder to read, since it doesn't clearly separate the box from the main text. Awadewit (talk) 00:15, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

So it's subjective. I'd rather we used the defaults, rather than an arbitrary colour which happens to be used in an example for the apparent purpose of demonstrating the utility of the template. In my opinion the quotes were more than distinct enough already, what with being floated, bordered, padded-out and in smaller text than the article body; furthermore, they were not arbitrarily-styled so as to make the article less consistent with others, and nor were they as distracting. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 00:23, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

You are acting as if all quote boxes across all of Wikipedia are the same - they are not - nor is there any rule making them so. Moreover, I cannot easily read the boxes when they are only set off with the little line and floating and I am the one editing this article. I offered a compromise on my talk page - a lighter blue. Why will this not work? Awadewit (talk) 00:30, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

I've left a suggestion on your talk as to how to proceed. I don't think that simply picking a different colour here addresses my concerns, but changing the default colour of {{quote box}} would. For now, I'll leave the colour as it is, but there's been a strong trend towards standardisation on WP (while not all quote boxes are the same, more use {{quote box}} every day) and eventually I'd like to see this article conform to that. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 00:40, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Man, you guys are picky ;) Kaldari (talk) 04:49, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

The whole point of having a field for color in the template is so that it can be changed. I see no reason to change a template when it can so easily be altered - when, in fact, the point of its design is to allow changes. Awadewit (talk) 12:31, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

That it may be changed does not imply that it must be changed, nor that changing it is preferable. Think back to how the project was in 2006, when every navbox / infobox / table had its colours chosen randomly from whatever its author thought was nicest - horrors like this were commonplace. The whole point of templates is to make it easy to reproduce similar designs on different articles - If you don't think that the default background colour is a good idea, which of these solutions is more practical - to change every single template you come across in an article individually, or to change it once centrally and have every article inherit it? Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 12:49, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

FWIW, light blue is a pretty commonly used background color for pull-quotes on wikipedia. Obviously, it's not as common as light grey, but it's used a lot. I agree that we don't want to have a dozen different random colors used for pull-quotes, but a little bit of color, used tastefully, isn't such a bad thing, IMO. Kaldari (talk) 15:50, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not necessarily opposed to "a bit of colour", so long as it's used consistently across the project. There are already ~2000 deployed {{quote box}}es and another >500 {{quote box2}}s, most of which use the default shade. If there were to be central discussion (say, on the village pump) about changing that shade to something with a bit more contrast against the page background than the current colour then I'd be happy to go with the outcome. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 16:12, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

If that's how you feel, you may be better served by stating your case at the {{quote box2}} talk page rather than arguing on an article by article basis. Speaking of color, I fixed that horrible photo of Susanna Clarke. Now she doesn't look like she's suspended in a tank of urine. Kaldari (talk) 16:36, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Ah, but the thing is that I like the current default colour. I would rather it were not overridden on an article-by-article basis. I was simply suggesting to Awadewit that getting the default changed would be a good compromise. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 17:33, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, I have no more time to debate this. Awadewit (talk) 20:00, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

To do before FAC

• Peer review
• Copyedit
• Check notes
• Check images (waiting on FUR check)
• Check links
• Proofread

Nominate! Awadewit (talk) 01:41, 17 March 2009 (UTC)