Talk:Ernest Hemingway - Misplaced Pages

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World Record

I have heard that Hemingway once held the world record for having caught the world's heaviest Marlin. Someone could verify this and add it to the article. I think it was the biggest tuna.

A clean well-lighted place

A critic of; A clean well-lighted place'

The short story, A clean well-lighted place, was first published by Hemingway in 1933 while living in Spain, during a worldwide great depression, and after he fought in the First World War. Ernest Hemingway’s writing is honest, simple, open-ended, and yet still provocative. The reason it is provocative, is not because it is complex or detailed, it is because the details are left to the reader to fill in the absent details. Hemingway leaves much of the detail up to the reader. There are no names of characters, no description of the café, there is nothing more than a simple story that the reader can interpret for himself. This type of writing gives a reader opportunity in many aspects; one could be to see himself. A clean well-lighted place is the essences of a man’s soul. A man’s life can be broken down into three simple phases in life. Each phase represents different point, values, needs, wants, and desires. What this short story really gives the reader is an opportunity to look at their own life. In this simple easy to read short story it seems that Hemmingway has left much of the imagery and description of characters up to the reader. All this emptiness forces the reader to fill the story with their own thoughts and ideas of what and where this story is taking place. The most interesting part of the story is not in the nothingness, although that does play an important part, or who is really saying what lines, rather it is in the three characters of men. Each represents a different point in one man’s life. Hemingway is giving the reader a chance to look at his own life in retrospect before he regrets what it may become one-day. The reader is given a young impatient waiter, an older waiter, and an eighty year old man with lots of money. This is the life cycle of a man’s life. The young waiter represents the first stage in a man’s life. Young men are more often impatient and unaffectionate of the world around them. They can be sloppy and immature many times. They care more about their wants and needs then the rest. This is seen twice once when the young man says about the old man; he has no regard for those who must work. The other time is when the young waiter is pouring the brandy and slopped it all over the place spilling it. The young man assumes everyone should be considerate of him, but does not care about how he treats others. The young waiter thinks he is more important. When many young Americans went to Europe to fight in the First World War they saw it as a glorious task and they were invincible. What they were doing was more important in their own eyes. After the war many of them had changed in ways they could not have anticipated. The older waiter represents the second and longest stage in a man’s life. A young man ceases to be young once he understands that there is more to his world then just his ideals. That he is not always right and controls nothing more than the time he spends in this world. This only happens when a man’s life is altered by forces stronger than his own, just as Hemingway’s was when he was injured in Italy. The older waiter is more understanding of the old man staying to drink and enjoy his life. He is in no rush because he has a greater understanding of life. This is obvious when the older waiter asks the younger waiter, why didn’t you let him stay and drink. Despite anything else what is important is that nothing else matters except respect of each other. This is the cardinal rule that the older waiter has come to understand. The older waiter has nothing left in life to prove he does not need to rush home or waste an hour doing something else he does not really need to do. All he has left to do in his life is his job, simple and easy. One day both of the waiters will become the old man. The old man represents the final stage in a man’s life. He represents the point that a man reaches when he has done all he can and has seen all he wants. The old man wants nothing more than to leave the world only to be rescued by his loved ones. The old man is clean and dignified despite the treatment of the young waiter he is tempered and only wishes to drink more. The old man has the young waiter fill his brandy glass telling the waiter a little more; the glass is the symbol for life. The glass is filled and overflows with brandy. The old man is telling the reader his life is full. It is not half empty or half full but fulfilled. When the young waiter refuses to serve the old man anymore the old man leaves without becoming angry or upset, showing the young waiter that nothing more than integrity and respect matter. The young waiter shows how selfish he is to the reader. Hemingway is depicting one man’s life through the three men in the story. Each has something to give but nothing to lose; each of the men is telling the reader about their own life depending on what point they are at in their life cycle. Each man represents a stage in a man’s life; one of youth with the whole world before him, another who has lived long enough to know nothing else matters than how you treat others, and the last one is the old man who has lived his life ready to leave this world with dignity. The openness of this story allows the reader to place himself in each man in the story at his own local café, pub, bar, or bodega. This opportunity gives the reader the chance not to make the same mistakes that lead to a lonely life. The young waiter is so selfish eventually he will lose his wife becoming the older waiter because it is too late for him to reconcile and finally becoming the old man in the café waiting for death to take him. This leaves the reader with an understanding that in life all anyone has is a small window in time, and in that window is an opportunity. What a person does with a given opportunity is up to them. That is what Hemmingway is telling the reader and the proof is in one simple question, what is an hour?

Needs a rewrite also

Understanding Hemingway

Throughout Hemingway’s work there are reoccurring themes that revolve around life. It is this reoccurring theme that dominates his work and it is what makes it so important in day’s life. This theme is also what makes Hemingway’s work ageless. The agelessness of his writing makes it easy for any person from any generation to slip themselves inside the story. Because the stories leave out in-depth detail about individual and scenery one could place themselves as any character as well. What Hemingway’s is telling his audience is about life, just as other critics, David Daiches did in 1941 and Bern Oldsey did in 1963, have stated.

Hemingway’s writing is simple and allows the audience to follow it and to fill in the details to fit the reader so that way they feel they are in the story. The structure of the sentences is calming and easy flowing, giving the reader the feel that they need to continue on the story.

A Clean Well Lighted-Place, The Snows of Kilimanjaro, and The Old man and The Sea are perfect examples of Hemingway’s lean yet complex work. Each one presents the audience with unique characters. All are men either searching out something or coming to grips with a part of their life coming to an end. A clean well lighted place gives the reader three men each at different stages of life. The young waiter is brazen and cares for no one except what he wants. The older waiter is understanding and shows compassion for others. The old man in the story has lived his life and accomplished everything he wants in life. Each of these men can be seen as the different stages of life in one man’s life. But, they can also be seen as something more. The young waiter is the man in Kilimanjaro who is injured by his own fault. Because he cared for no one else, not even his wife who loves him so dearly, he loses everything. It is in the last moments in his life that he realizes what truly matters. The older waiter is the old man in The Old man and The Sea. He is the old man because he understood what is important to life and realizes that life is a struggle and in life man must look beyond today and always push forward. The old man is a mentor to a young boy to teach him that humans cannot hesitate. The audience is able to see themselves as the boy since in a way they all being mentored by the old man and Hemingway. From the trials and tribulations that Hemingway went through in life he is attempting through his writings to warn men of the faults and vices and focused of the virtues in life. The Old Man and the Sea tells the reader that even in defeat there is some sort of victory. It is what a man makes out of life that determines what happens in his own life. Simply said combine all the works the main theme is that in life there are more important things then war, victory, self-interest, momentary pleasures. It’s the long term part of man’s life that is important. At any given moment it could all be swept away and in that everything that was thought to be important is gone and all that is left is what was real to everyone. The reader must ask themselves a question about life, their actions, and Ultimately each one of use will face the same fate with death. Not one person will ever know for sure when they will die. All Hemingway was telling the world is, do not take this life for granted. Enjoy it for what you have and when the opportunity presents itself be ready to act just as the old man did when he lowered his six lines in the sea to create his own luck. When humans think of life we all attempt to quantify it with either a cup half full or climbing a mountain or even attempting to catch the big fish to prove we are still worthy to ourselves and the world. In that all readers can gain the respect that Hemingway deserves for all his work. That is why he published many of his short stories together in a single book called, The Fifth Column and the First Forty-Nine Stories. Hemingway’s experiences throughout his life gave him a more understanding of humanity and life and published the stories with the hope that others would see the truth about their own life and not to make the mistakes of the previous generations. It is the hope of every generation that the next one will be better than the previous one and Hemingway shows the world the truth about humanity instead of sugar coating it. At the end the audience interprets the stories their own way, this interpretation leads one to conclude that maybe there is more to the story then just what Hemingway was writing and that there are deeper meanings for everyone depending on their point in life.

http://en.wikipedia.org/Ernest_Hemingway:_The_Collected_Stories

one more

Ernest Hemingway’s legacy

Key West celebrates Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway spent ten years of his life living on the Key West Island. While there he spent his time writing some of the greatest classics, which include “The Snows of Kilimanjaro”. He spent much of his time, while living in Key West, at his favorite watering hole Sloppy Joes’ bar. Each year Key West hold’s a celebration in honor of Ernest Hemingway, named Hemingway days festival. Throughout the celebration members of the community come together to honor one of the greatest writers in American history, in various ways, the celebration last over a few days culminating in a look-alike contest at Sloppy Joes. During the Hemingway days, there is a short story contest fishing contest, along with readings from authors. The 2008 celebration included some members from Hemingway’s family, his grandson Edward Hemingway and granddaughter Lorain Hemingway. His grandson is a writer and illustrator and used the celebrations to showcase his new children’s book. Edward said while at the festival “I imagine my grandfather would get a kick out of the festival. The spirit of his life is here in Key West.’’ http://www.miamiherald.com/577/story/611618.html

Minor typo

In the penultimate line in the introduction, the word 'considerable' is misspelled.

Dubious

Gellhorn left Hemingway. Either an inaccurate or unclear statement that should be changed. Gwytherinn (talk) 14:48, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Can you reference that assertion? I'm removing your tag till you do...Modernist (talk) 14:59, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Moorehead, Caroline (2003). Gellhorn: A Twentieth Century Life. Henry Holt & Co. ISBN 0805065539. Though to some extent it is already described in the last paragraph in the section "Spanish Civil War and World War II". It is also mentioned in this article: "Remembering Martha Gellhorn". The Atlantic. Retrieved 27 June 2011. Gwytherinn (talk) 15:21, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Given that he was no longer living with her, and involved with another woman, I think it's a question of semantics about who left whom. She did walk out of a hospital room where he was being treated for a headwound. I have read all of the Hemingway biographies, and can tell you the sequence of events, but truly it's much too much for this page, and honestly I'm not happy with the current fix. Moreover, the link you provided above is incorrect: in fact Hadley was the first of his wives to leave. This is amply supported by Hemingway biographies. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 15:33, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Well, that's quite vexing concerning the inaccurate source. I would agree that the current fix isn't great - according to the Gellhorn biography, they had already split when Hemingway took up with Welsh. Gwytherinn (talk) 14:32, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

"Hemingway's fiction was successful because..."

The intro has the sentence, "Hemingway's fiction was successful because the characters he presented exhibited authenticity that resonated with his audience." I see a few problems with this claim: it is a fairly speculative claim (evaluating the reasons behind someone's success always is), but the tone suggests absolute certainty; it pretends to distill the success of a complex writer whose influence can be felt in a variety of ways on modern literature into a single simplistic statement (i.e. he was definitely successful not just because his characters were "authentic", but this sentence does not give that impression); the word "authenticity" is vague and needs definition; it is not clear this is an especially distinctive characteristic of Hemingway's writing. A simple fix is "Himingway's characters exhibited authenticity that resonated with his audience." An even better fix is to leave this out: the way it is, it does not contribute much to the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.207.153.182 (talk) 03:58, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for posting. I agree; it is the opinion of a few critics and still exists in one of the subsections, but shouldn't be presented in such an unequivocal manner so early in the lead. I've removed it. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 11:06, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Islands in the Stream

Reference to this book in "Notes" section links to Kenny Rogers/Dolly Parton song of the same name. Please fix. Relgif (talk) 11:41, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for noticing. I've fixed it. Truthkeeper (Talk) 13:19, 22 August 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from Funkygerbil, 14 September 2011

This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Please change:

Miller, Linda Patterson (2006). "From the African Book to Under Kilimanjaro". The Hemingway Review. 25 (2): 78–81}.

Miller, Linda Patterson (2006). "From the African Book to Under Kilimanjaro". The Hemingway Review. 25 (2): 78–81.

because of a syntactical error Funkygerbil (talk) 14:23, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Done — Bility (talk) 16:53, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Please add: — Preceding unsigned comment added by JohnandreRIP (talk • contribs) 19:48, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

I've added the link below. I think that's what you're requesting. Truthkeeper (talk) 20:18, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

External Links Addition

Hemingway legal files collection, 1899-1971 Manuscripts and Archives, New York Public Library. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JohnandreRIP (talk • contribs) 21:45, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Writing style section

This section is choppy. I propose the following changes: the fourth paragraph is about two totally different things: his what-if scenarios and the iceberg theory; the content changes abruptly. Starting with "The concept of the iceberg theory", the rest of the paragraph should be placed back in the third paragraph, which deals with the IT. The first part should be added between "experience of world war" and "After World War I" in the second paragraph, which will tie the WWI experiences together and then provide a transition to the IT in the third paragraph. The sixth paragraph also splices two totally separate things—the simplicity of prose and the supposed disdain for emotion. "Many of Hemingway's followers misinterpreted" should start a new paragraph and the lines before it in that paragraph should be merged into the previous one. The last part of the sixth paragraph (starting with "This use of an image") is also unrelated to anything else in that paragraph, and it should be made its own paragraph dealing with his influences. 68.54.4.162 (talk) 18:15, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

It's had a number of editors add to it over time, and as it was being written. I'll have a stab at it, but not immediately. Truthkeeper (talk) 18:19, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not demanding change right away this second, particularly since it looks like that section made it through FAC in mostly the present form. I just think some of the paragraphs have unrelated parts and I'm hoping to work toward making it better. 68.54.4.162 (talk) 18:29, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I need to think about this and certainly anyone else can take a stab. The section is 800 and some words long - doing a section about a topic such as EH's writing style in 800 words is almost impossible. Much of it is developed and expanded in daughter articles. The section begins chronologically - describes his early review for The Sun Also Rises and also the reason for the Nobel Prize - prob his two biggest achievements. It then explains the change in style after WWI, explains (in two paras because one is too long) the iceberg theory with specific examples and then discusses the grammar. The last para needs work, is a hodge-podge written by multiple editors and I believe was on the page from god knows when or added to during the 10 month long rewrite. Anyway, will think about it and see what can be done. Truthkeeper (talk) 18:40, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I've reorganized a bit and see that the section has degraded a bit too. Since you're aware of what FAC is, you should know this also went through a GA, and I wasn't the only editor to work on the piece. In fact about half of the writing style section was written by another editor. Feel free to make and account and add, change, whatever needs to be done if you have access to sources. It's a tricky section to get right. Truthkeeper (talk) 22:06, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Tripe on his death

I have already violated the rules of the forum by the title. I think that Mr. Hemingway would be offended (actually perhaps prone to action.) Yes, he liked to drink. What a waste of space on a great man and author. Should be removed.

Writing in "Ernest Hemingway: A Psychological Autopsy of a Suicide", Christopher Martin evaluates the causes of the suicide: "Careful reading of Hemingway's major biographies and his personal and public writings reveals evidence suggesting the presence of the following conditions during his lifetime: bipolar disorder, alcohol dependence, traumatic brain injury, and probable borderline and narcissistic personality traits". Martin claims suicide was inevitable because Hemingway "suffered from an enormous burden of psychiatric comorbidities and risk factors for suicide", although without a clinical evaluation of the patient, Martin concedes a diagnosis is difficult. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.188.154.235 (talk) 02:22, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Most of EH's contemporaries thought the "great man" more or less wasted the last 15 or so years of his life in a bottle. That's a large fraction of his adult life, and almost the same amount of time he spent writing great prose. Why should this part not get some significant attention? S B H arris 02:53, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

age upon death

shouldn't his age at death be 72? basing this on dates of birth and death as stated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.191.142.243 (talk) 07:50, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Citations

Rather than tagging citations or fixing, let's get rid of the Harv style because they are difficult to use and not user friendly. I'm am willing to do this - I still have access to all these sources. Would like consensus please. And btw - the page did not have harv references when I began work on it; I added them without being aware that consensus was necessary. Truthkeeper (talk) 17:15, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

A better option than removing the Harvard references is to convert them to {{sfn}} references. I find them easy to use and maintain. The article is stable enough for this approach, and I could do the converting. Please see Ted Bundy for an article that has been converted to this style. --Dianna (talk) 17:21, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I would like to have no templates at all. In fact am considering starting immediately. There's really not a single argument to keep templates on this page, particularly given the size. To be clear: I'd like consensus to remove all templates. And please do not convert to sfn. Truthkeeper (talk) 17:24, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I disagree with the removal of the templates. --Dianna (talk) 17:46, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your opinion. Let's let some others weigh in, shall we. In the meantime it's not time effective to fix templates that might be taken down, imo. Truthkeeper (talk) 19:11, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

The only thing that matters is internal consistency. After that; dont worry unless you come across a warrior. TK, also dont listen to friendly admins pushing you towards cite templates. A reality is that a lot of content editors, esp in the humanaties, might land on a page and rather than help will run in horror at the sight of them. They scream beginner but you already know this. Ceoil (talk) 17:54, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm in agreement with Ceoil; as long as things are consistent, there's no reason to use a template. I personally find the Harvard template utterly confusing, and I can only imagine how it must appear to new users who wish to contribute. In comparison, short footnotes are so easy to add, alter, and decipher. It really comes down to what the major contributors are most comfortable with, however, since they're the ones who will have to deal with it most. María (yllo submarine) 20:48, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Ceoil is of course perfectly right; all that matters is a consistent presentation whether you use templates or not. I pretty much always use the {{Harvnb}} template and I find it very easy to use, but hey, it's a big world; use whatever citation style you're comfortable with. Malleus Fatuorum 20:55, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Consistency is really the key here, in my opinion. I tend to use the cite templates if I'm creating an article from scratch, but otherwise I just go with whatever is is place and clean it up if need be. Kafka Liz (talk) 21:02, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

This is a nightmare. I've converted all the citations in the references but can't save w/out breaking everything. I've started converting in the text, but it's full of multiples and what I do I'll break some (?), a lot (?) of cites. The page does need work, I've known that for a while but didn't want to deal with it because it's so big. Right now, I have to decide to leave it as it is this very moment, or to try to convert and break and fix. Help! Truthkeeper (talk) 21:53, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Well... I propose we leave it for this evening. The wiki won't explode. In the meantime, let's divvy up the paragraphs that need fixing. I'll take half, but I can't really do them until tomorrow. Send me the text of what you have, tell me which paras. you will do, and I'll work on the rest. Kafka Liz (talk) 22:01, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Or make a sandbox, if that way is better.:) Kafka Liz (talk) 22:03, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Got an edit conflict, tried to back out, closed the wrong window and now the issue is moot. But yeah, I've done some sandboxing. Truthkeeper (talk) 22:09, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

This happens; used to be it was possible to recover things, but either I'm doing it wrong or Firefox is. Guessing it's me, but link me to the sandbox and I'll have a look. Kafka Liz (talk) 22:19, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks everyone for the helpful advice. Maria, I respect your opinion as a fellow FA writer about Am Lit and you've been with me on this since the beginning when I was very new and green. I agree that the Harvard templates are difficult for casual editors and I'm finding - given the list below - that it's difficult to maintain. Also I click into here fairly often when I'm working on related pages and have noticed that it takes much too long to load - it's way too template heavy. I'm converting to non-templated short notes, not the template sfn version that Dianna recommends. To everyone else - yeah I know it has to be consistent and it's a bear of a page to maintain, so might as well give it thorough going over and fix prose issues and other things while I'm at it. Liz, I'm working here in my sandbox and moving over para by para so I'd don't lose my mind and we don't get too many interim edits. With the Thanksgiving holidays I'll have to step away after today, will try to hack out some of it today, but I don't see it as a crucial has to be done immediately sort of thing. Anyway, if you're not working on anything else would love some help. The prose needs polishing too and I know you're good at that, so go for it! Truthkeeper (talk) 17:52, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Ok, I'll see what I can do. I'm a bit rusty these days, so bear with me if I screw it up. :) Kafka Liz (talk) 00:24, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

You won't screw up. At the moment all I'm doing is removing the templates and freewriting as shortnotes, going para by para. I'm in the Paris section. When that's done, I'll bundle up some to reduce the blue on the page. Then I'll move in the reformatted sources. Then it will be done. Easy as pie. Truthkeeper (talk) 00:29, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Already had an ec - I wasn't sure you were still around! I made a few small copyedits - eliminated a couple of passive voice sentences, etc. - but I'll move down to the Key West section and work there. I'll stay in the sandbox and let you move the paras over to the main article. Kafka Liz (talk) 00:53, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry about that - I kept the edit window open while I was copying over. We can hopscotch - when I'm done with Paris I'll jump to the war section or whatever comes after Key West. I'm not thrilled with the writing but it's really hard with these big pages and I burned out with it, so any fixes are great. I'm adding inlines as I go along as a reminder to come back to some particularly bad sections. Truthkeeper (talk) 00:58, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

I also disagree with the removal of the citation templates. This is being done without consensus and I'd favour the adoption of {{sfn}}, as it will simplify the ref/Harvnb that have been the established style until just some days back. Alarbus (talk) 14:24, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Although the sfn template seems superior to harvnb in some ways, I think an existing style should not be changed without consensus.MW 14:44, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Plain and simple TK has consensus, among all the main editors of this article...Modernist (talk) 15:05, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I need to point you at ownership, again? You don't get to discount the opinions of "trespassers". Alarbus (talk) 15:10, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Clearly you need to read up on WP:OWN, WP:NPA, and learn about the creation of these feature articles...Modernist (talk) 15:16, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

TK, Kafka Liz, Maria, Ceoil, Malleus, me, hmm looks like consensus...Modernist (talk) 15:18, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I been have reading up on the whole featured article debacle:

Alarbus (talk) 03:12, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

It's all yours Alarbus. I don't care what happens here anymore. If anyone else cares they can fight it out. I'm not into it and am unwatching the page and walking from here.Truthkeeper (talk) 04:13, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

(ec) I believe this falls under Misplaced Pages:Ownership of articles#Featured articles. The article has become less-than-stellar since its star was awarded; this is of course do to the heavy traffic it receives every day, which is both a blessing and a curse. Things simply degenerate over time. The citation style has become a large part of that, and rather than deal with future issues of confused template styles/inconsistent formatting, TK and others familiar with this article have decided to switch to simple, shortened footnotes. The process is almost complete, as you can see, and I think it's a great improvement. María (yllo submarine) 15:20, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I think it a regressive step that is a diservice to readers. Alarbus (talk) 15:27, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Your opinion, others do not hold that opinion - re-read WP:NPA before continuing this crusade...Modernist (talk) 15:29, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Not sharing your opinion is not a personal attack. Alarbus (talk) 15:33, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Well I suppose this comment which directly preceded your comment here was just you kidding around? , and here ...Modernist (talk) 15:37, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I can make a strong and compelling argument why it's better to change the citations, but am my way out the door. Will do so later. For now let me just mention that there wasn't an "established" style until I introduced the Harvard templates without consensus, which was wrong. But I was a new editor and didn't know. As for owning, FA stewardship gives latitude to that, but it's really irrelevant. The arguments are what count. Will be back later. Truthkeeper (talk) 15:24, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

And to add (I really don't have time for this today!) go ahead and argue if you want, but please respect the women who have worked on this. It will be better when done. And I will bring forward arguments for the reasons. In the meantime, because I've copyedited heavily in mainspace, I'd respectfully request that no one change the standing version at this time. Thanks all. Truthkeeper (talk) 15:35, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Citation problems

Cites #48 and 49 call for a book by Mellow but don't state which one.
Cite #80, 81: There is no book in the bib written by Mellow in 1985.
Cite #103: There is no book in the bib written by Lynn in 1995.
Cite #134 calls for a 1999 book by Reynolds, but there is no such book listed in the bib.
Footnotes #171 and 175 call for a book by McCormick, but there is no such book listed in the bib.
Footnote #178 cites Baker but there are three books in the bib by Baker. Which one is it?
Jamison-Redfield is listed in the bib but is not referenced in the article.
Lingeman, Richard is listed in the bib but is not referenced in the article.
Reynolds, Michael S. (1997) is listed in the bib but is not referenced in the article.
Starrs, Roy is listed in the bib but is not referenced in the article.

--Dianna (talk) 18:01, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Fixed. Please stop tagging. Truthkeeper (talk) 18:47, 19 November 2011 (UTC)
And please strike the "problems" above. Thank you. Truthkeeper (talk) 00:58, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Diana, offer trivial complaints to sate sour grapes often? listed in the bib but is not referenced in the article. O for fuck sake. Get a life. Such moral superiority and arrogance from a person who has not interest or knowledge of the subject matter. You are the enemy, you are the problem; an admin who is now persuing an editor from bitterness over a seperate and equally trivial argument. Nice. Ceoil (talk) 19:02, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

It would have been easy to fix. People come along and dump stuff in; this page gets 10,000 views each day. This was absolutely not necessary. At any rate, I'll be dismantling all the templates so it will be easier to edit. This was my first FA and I shouldn't have used template. Truthkeeper (talk) 19:07, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Your just cross fire TK, dont worry about these pricks. The edits were even unnessary; biblo does not equal sources. Ceoil (talk) 19:09, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Ceoil, I remind you for the second time to comment on the content, not the contributors. Thanks. --Dianna (talk) 19:22, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Dianna, will you please explain how you became involved with this and why you're doing it? Yesterday you lectured me how much work there is to do regarding a content dispute that wasn't a content dispute; on your talkpage, after I nicely apologized for snappiness you counseled a Buddhist sense of non-attachment, then came to my talk and told me to use Harv references when I was in the middle of trying to write an article and reading a very difficult source; then you came here and put up a list of "mistakes" from a page that went through FAC in May 2010, has 10,000 views per day, and needs constant update, which doesn't always happen. Please explain the reason for the long list above - am I to drop everything I'm doing to see that it's fixed? Also, your attitude, while not uttering a single incivil word, is incredibly rude by taking writers away from writing, and yet you feel it necessary to warn an editor not once but twice in this entire episode. Although you are an administrator, I don't appreciate the "drop-what-you're-doing-and-see- to-my-demands" attitude; nor do I appreciate the warnings. I think the list you've posted above is far and beyond more rude than anything Ceoil could ever say. So please explain to me what's happening so I can get the right wiki attitude. Truthkeeper (talk) 19:50, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I came across the edit war by chance last night, as I have been editing a lot of templates lately. Alarbus gave you a place where you could check the contrast level yourself, but he was not very clear about why the colour is important, or how to check it out yourself. So I got involved in that discussion. Today, I had a look at the Hemingway article to see how the grey you had chosen fit in with the other templates on the page, and the citation section was bright red; there were many Harv errors. So I went to your talk page to let you know about the cool script which enables easy location of Harv errors so that your could make the required corrections. Your response was not to install the script and view the errors, but to come here and suggest immediate removal of the Harvard templates. This would be a great way to make the red go away, but it is not the way to get the citation errors fixed. So I listed them here on the page. It was not my expectation that you would drop everything to fix this, and I am sorry if it seemed that way. Sorry that I have hurt your feelings. --Dianna (talk) 20:05, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

It was your intention to have me fix. You see something in bright red because you have a script; in my view a script is not the answer. This is a complicated page and I've been thinking for months that the citations need to be redone because people keep editing it and dropping stuff in - that's why you see errors w/ your script that I don't want to install because I'm trying to write. If it wasn't your intention to have these things fixed you could have fixed them yourself - except for the html files that don't have page numbers everything else would have been easy to fix. Instead you tagged heavily, made a list, pulled me away from something I was doing, warned Ceoil when he called you on it, and now say it wasn't your intention. Then please explain why the list and tagging. I'm truly confused. Truthkeeper (talk) 20:14, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I did fix many of them myself. I fixed all of them that I could resolve myself before I posted the list. I have to go out now and will not respond any further today.--Dianna (talk) 20:27, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

That's fine, don't bother to respond. Many could have been fixed. But, hey, I'll stop work on the page I was working on and fix this page. Truthkeeper (talk) 20:31, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

But I do have a question when you're in a position to respond: why did you, as an administrator, ignore a one editor's 5 reversions which we all know is a bright line, and yet issue two warnings on separate pages for civility to another editor. This is something I need to understand before I can return to editing. Thanks. Truthkeeper (talk) 23:28, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I've seen myriad articles with sources listed in the references that are not directly cited in the article. Some reading has to be done for background, after all, yet may not serve best to back specific statements. Another factor to consider is the circumstances of an addition to a bibliography. I've found that sometimes drive-by editors add works of tangential value, and I know from experience that it can be exhausting to track and evaluate such additions. It's important to evaluate each inclusion and each removal as best possible, challenging as it may be. Kafka Liz (talk) 19:46, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Certaily true, but its not all that relevant to what is actually happeningn here. Diannaa is being disingious and we all can see that fairly clearly. As TK pointed out she was quite clealy meant to respond, NOW! OR ELSE!, and note the tearsness and self satisfaction of Diannaa's listy post, obviously intended as a QUD, a so there. I would love if WP:OWN had provisions aginist this sort of rubbish; as it is now it gives licence to tourists and can only be met with the much older and more innate DEFENDEACHOTHER. The pity is that defend is becoming all the more necessary. Ceoil (talk) 21:34, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Way too much in the way of incivility going on in here. Suggest that anyone who's feeling really frustrated and snappy take a breather for a few days. Do something quiet and gnomish. And read this. Pesky (talk …stalk!) 22:20, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

With all due respect; fuck that, and the editors here (Dianna excepted) are far from gnomish. Why can I not call a spade a spade. Whats actually going here is bitchiness bordering on bullying. CIV should not trump the right to see and call things as they actually are. In other words fuck off back to your cave and let grown ups face and answear each other. Ceoil (talk) 22:33, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Ceoil, Pesky's just trying to pour oil on troubled waters... no need to jump down his throat. He's not the issue here. Kafka Liz (talk) 22:41, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Sure, sorry Pesky I insuniated that you were a well intended but cluless bollicks. Ceoil (talk) 22:42, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Anyway, I like the Freudian slip: "answear". :-) Malleus Fatuorum 22:44, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

That's just John Donne. Kafka Liz (talk) 22:56, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Diannaa, first I'd like to thank you for bringing to my attention the problems here w/ sourcing. The result will be a much better sourced, and hopefully at some point copyedited page. So in that sense it's a winner - an improved page is always a better product. That said, as a final comment I just want to say that this could have been handled better. There was no reason to put a list of "problems" on the talk page or to change the syntax in the article. What you couldn't have known is that after tonight, between family obligations, holidays, and work, I won't be very active on wikipedia until January. So from my point of view it had to be taken care of b/c I don't like seeing a laundry list here. I'd ask again for you to strike your comments. I'll be mostly offline for the next few days because of the holiday in America, and then very busy at work. As I have a chance I'll fix the remaining issues: some books need publisher locations, others dates, etc. And the copyedit needs to be finished and then I'd like to reduce the citation clutter. Once that's all done, maybe by January, I'll ask someone to look over the sources very carefully because inevitably I always miss something. So bottom line: it's a better page. For that, thanks. Truthkeeper (talk) 23:13, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong in posting a list of problems. It is an attempt to draw attention to problems so that they can be fixed by anyone who has an inclination to do so. There's nothing more to it, apart from being helpful. Thanks.MW 13:50, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Minor typo and missing info

- In 1.1 Earlife:

Clarence and Grace Hemingway lived Grace's father, Ernest Hall for a short period after their marriage, for whom they named their first son.

Shouldn't there be a preposition (IN) and a HOUSE somewhere as well as a comma after Ernest Hall as in :

lived IN Grace's father'S HOUSE, Ernest Hall,

Good catch! However, Ernest Hall was a person, not a house. :) I've changed it to "lived with Grace's father, Ernest Hall, for a short period..." I'll leave your second comment for TK or another more knowledgeable than me. María (yllo submarine) 13:56, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

- In 1.2 World war I

Early in 1918 Hemingway responded to a Red Cross recruitment effort and signed on to be an ambulance driver in Italy.

I see no mention of the reasons for his "choice" of enlistment (ambulance driver). Was it because the US was still officially neutral or of possible physical problems (eyes? near-sightedness?), keeping him thus from actual fighting which, if I remember well, was one of the great regrets of hs life: not having been able to get into a real fighting unit? Or a bit of both? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.162.116.66 (talk) 04:42, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

The US wasn't neutral in 1918 and EH had no worse eyesight than Harry S Truman who went to war at the same time (having used a ruse for the eyesight test) and fought as a U.S. soldier in Europe (as did so many others). It was do-able. I can only guess that EH wanted the romance and the Italian nurses, and not the bootcamp! And also the chance to say "screw this war, I'm out of here" if he ever wanted to-- as indeed the hero finally actually does, at the end of Farewell to Arms. That's a lot more difficult thing to do, if you're actually in the regular American army and you're not some romantic foreign volunteer. S B H arris 03:21, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I missed this. He joined because of a recruitment effort in Kansas City. It's a good question and can easily be added. Will take a few days though. Truthkeeper (talk) 03:46, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit request 23 November 2011

This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Please change:

Scribner's agreed to a full-length book verision

Scribner's agreed to a full-length book version

because of a spelling error

Thanks, I've fixed the typo. María (yllo submarine) 14:15, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Reasons for removing templates

First some background & restating from above I think: I began work here as a new editor when I thought it was required to use citation templates. For a page like this with this many citations, it's not possible to add the full citation one after the other (which is how I began) so I learned how to use the Harvnb style, and never really liked it, but it seemed a good enough solution.

Eventually with experience I learned that we are not required to use citation templates, and for about six months I've planned to come back to this page to fix the citations. The problems with the citations are this:

the writing is choppy. I thought that each and every sentence had to be wrapped up in a citation template which gives very little movement for writing that flows when using many sources. So I would write short little sentences, add a Harvnb template, etc., all the way to bottom.
It's better bundle cites and add at the end of a section. The problem with Harvnb is that they don't lend themselves well to bundling; I know I've tried.
the templates are expensive. I tried very hard to keep this page within a reasonable load time, and I think if the casual reader were to have the choice between images or templates, they might prefer images. I need to look closely at the page size tool, but I know size of the page has shrunk. That's good from a loading point-of-view, and good because more details (words!) can be added.
The templates are inflexible. Certain things simply are very difficult to do: to indicate a source that's an html article w/ no page numbers, to deal w/ multiple authors, or multiple editions, or a single author who published four sources, two in the same year, and so on.
Writing out sources by freehand is easy. We don't need templates to render a certain way: names, titles, publisher, ISBN, stuff like that - it's easier to format without the template.
Templates are confusing to new editors. This page gets a lot of activity and seeing something like this:

{{cite book |title=New Critical Approaches to the Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway |editor-first=Benson |editor-last=Jackson J.|chapter =Actually, I Felt Sorry for the Lion |year= 1990|publisher=Duke University Press |location= |isbn=0-8223-1067-8 |ref=CITEREFBaym1990|last=Baym |first=Nina}}}

is mind boggling. Also for some reason in that example someone moved the name to be at the end of the parameter list. Dunno why. When I first saw these as a new editor I wanted to run. Here's the alternative:

*Baym, Nina (1990). "Actually I Felt Sorry for the Lion". in Benson, Jackson J. (ed). ''New Critical Approaches to the Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway''. Durham: Duke UP. ISBN 0-8223-1067-8.

It looks much better in the edit window and is more inviting to new users.

What Harvnb has to its advantage is that a user can click from cite to source. That's very cool, at least so I thought until I realized they don't render that way on all browsers. I tend to test out what I'm doing on as many different browsers as I can. So if they're expensive and don't always bring a benefit, there's really no reason to use.

To make a better experience for the reader I still intend to bundle cites to eliminate the sea of blue, hopefully cut by about 20%, perhaps more, and play around w/ the formatting. Of course the other really big problem is that not all browsers support columns - I can set this to three columns making a very short distance from cite to source, but anyone running IE will only see a single long column of 200 cites. That's unfortunate and hopefully will be fixed some day.
Finally, when the formatting issues have been sorted, the really important part will be to copyedit and make the writing flow better - which truly is the most important issue to consider.

I realize this is long. I hope it explains to Alarbus and MangoWong and the rest of the world what we're doing here. We are not ruining the page; we're making it better. Truthkeeper (talk) 19:42, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm mostly just a wikignome, although by now a pretty experienced one. And I have to agree with Truthkeeper, that there have indeed been times when I was confronted with an article that was such a maze of formatted cites that I simply threw up my hands in horror and did nothing. Awien (talk) 23:57, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

TCO supports removing templates and opposes defacing FAs and distracting writers

Sorry, for making a new header, but the above battle is really long and can't be arsed to read all of it, but I got the gist.

1. If the main writer wants to go with plain citations, I support her. First she is doing the work. Second, the templates slow the page down big time when saving or for first time users (SV was right, Mall was wrong; and I like Mall more than SV but...they ran the test and it is smoking gun).

2. Defacing the article to have an edit war is some really nasty practice. And it is amazing that someone with a FORMAT NIT would be dissuading the most important person (the content provider).

3. I support full protection if needed. Serious.

RetiredUser12459780 (talk) 04:15, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

P.s. Sorry to grandstand, but not sure if my work is being used to imply FA is bad...and that therefore TK is wrong. Heck, this is the sort of article I want more of! It's fucking Ernest Hemingway! Nobel Prize plus mega hit count. Plus my doc has a lot of different analyses and messages and questions and ideas. Reducing it to FA is evil is strange (but then, this is Wiki).

-TCO

Removed inappropriate addition

As per above...I removed an inappropriate, and intended to be personal attack on this featured article and the people who have contributed more than 1000 edits to its creation. It also didn't make any sense in the context of the above threads, except as one editor's crusade against this article...Modernist (talk) 04:28, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

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