Talk:Gadsby (novel)/Archive 1

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vote regarding lipogram

Is it strictly obligatory that this composition is a lipogram??? It's funny at first, but it's obvious that such things shouldn't stay on this wiki.

I think it's great!!! Nice work!!! Gkhan 11:28, Jan 11, 2005 (UTC)

Actually, it's almost a lipogram, thanks to including Ernest Vincent and the letter 'e'. But I must say this is a minor fault. I also must say that this paragraph I just put on this Wiki is a lipogram, if you don't count what I put this way. — JIP | Talk 09:51, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

There is no need to exclude the letter E. We are detailing a book. Not following a style from the book. Taylor 06:54, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Live a little. It's just a subtle clever joke that does nobody any harm. Jigglyman 21:41, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Agreed. And frankly, I didn't even notice that it was a lipogram until reading this page... richdiesal 20:35, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Agreed, doubly so. I suspected something was up when the article called a typewriter a 'typing contraption'. Heh. Keep up the good work! --T-Boy 21:59, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

Agreed, once again. Clever and amusing for those who catch it; There's obviously no need for it, but unless someone plans on typing up a better, more informative article, what's the point in changing it? Telesque 18:40, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

Mmm. I don't mind it, although it's probably not strictly in accord with WP policy. But I do think "Links Not In Wiki" is too conspicuously clumsy, and it's OK to apply our lipogram to just 'body' writing, and not to such captions. Robin Johnson 16:49, 28 Nov 2005 (UTC)

I changed it to the somewhat inaccurate "citations". Superm401 | Talk 04:49, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

This should be moved to Gadsby (book). Novel has an e.--Cuchullain 06:00, 1 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Agreed, keep it a lipogram. I didn't even notice! Nice work!!! Tempshill 19:49, 6 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Agreed. Not that I think that the issue is relevant anymore. --Kizor 19:16, 9 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Voting for. I'm a fan of this approach. As a book that has utility strictly as a lipogram of significant girth, our writing stands to gain from not using such glyphs as lack in Gadsby. This would work to show its particular quality. Such portrayal would not wildly malign official policy, in my opinion. It is indubitably a fact that WP imparts much information, particularly math and physics, in ways that limit casual visitors' ability to absorb it, owing not only to difficult topics but also to using particular wordings and symbols. Why may not this composition contain a lipogram, so long as it truly imparts what our contributors can say? Is this lack of a particular symbol, or such wording as follows from this, such a bad hack that our contribution automatically has to qualify as substandard? Is it not akin to what I said about math and physics: applying a form common to this topic? That it also has artistic quality and honors Gadsby as a work of art should not, I think, disqualify this motion. Also, coming contributors can add to our work without following any lipographic notation; wordsmiths that want to polish our writing may do so if no information is lost this way. A bit of sophistication in carrying it out can also avoid a too rigid form, by not just choosing synonyms but using variant layouts, paraphrasing and colorful composition. This is not to say that visitors should find it hard to grasp it, only that it can qualify both as a lipogram and as a fitting composition for this collaboration. Zuiram 09:23, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Voting for. I support lipogrammaticity. Kudos to Zuiram, its champion. I know of no ban on "fun" nor any policy against it. Dpbsmith (talk) 16:59, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your laudation. As a majority is for this approach, I will try to find a wording for this composition that will maintain its clarity without straying from such constraints as laid down in my proposal. If I can do it, it will call for painstaking caution and many hours of work, I think, so do not count on having it on hand soon. My postings on this topic lack such quality as would avoid provoking disapproving contributors; a good wording calls for additional work, as this writing is non-trivial. Obviously, names and links will not follow such constraints as apply to its body, as this would impair visitors' ability to fully grasp it without difficulty. This also allows showing which glyph is not used in Gadsby. Any contributors that wish to aid in this composition can contact me via my account. Zuiram 07:53, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Jesus H. Christ I don't think I've ever heard something so goddamn retarded in my entire life. Someone please rewrite this piece of shit article. Holy hell. Czoller (talk) 04:51, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Seconded This is an encyclopedia, not a themed coloring book. 24.230.44.102 (talk) 04:53, 25 July 2008 (UTC) 24.23.44.102 (talk • contribs) has had only two contributions not on this topic. I think this IP is a sock of Czoll, looking at timing, additional possibly sockish activity, WP:DUCK, and Czoll's dropping off wiki on 25 July. JJB 17:01, 3 Oct 2008 (UTC)

Thirded Wikipedia is not the venue for people to showcase their skills. There's no explicit ban on "fun" because that's already covered under the principle that content should be encyclopedic in nature. Tzinacan (talk) 03:03, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Vote in favor As long as the article's readability is not seriously compromised (and I don't think it has been), I think doing the article in this manner is not merely amusing; it nicely illustrates what the lipogrammatic writing in the novel is like, for those not familiar with the concept. Also: I think the gratuitous insults of some of the anti votes are completely uncalled-for. Remain civil, please. Qaqaq (talk) 18:39, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Strongly favoring: What with contributors waking up again in this part of our discussion, I thought I should formally avow my strong advocacy for maintaining a lipogram too. I am also happy to discuss any conflict solution in a distinct part of talk. I do think a goodly majority favors this approach, as I just said, downwards a bit. JJB 18:45, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Strongly and civilly opposing the lipogrammatical version: Crikey, I had no idea I was stepping into such a minefield. As amusing as the lipogram is to some, it strikes me as an irritating affectation. Circumlocution counters the idea of an accessible encyclopedia. Why not instead host a lipgrammatical version on one's user (sub-)page, or on a place like Uncyclopedia? To my mind, the key point in deciding is this: what do our readers expect, want, and need? I think it is fair for readers to expect a readable article that makes its point succinctly. Tying one arm behind one's back in a boxing match is a feat of skill, but it does not make for an efficient win. I don't particularly want to debate the issue further. But may I suggest a more central/neutral location for discussion, perhaps on a dispute resolution page? Given my assumption that readers' needs come first, it is logical to involve editors who don't edit this article. -Phoenixrod (talk) 19:00, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

In favor of lipogram. I did notice the lipogrammicity after a few minutes or so, but thought that the readability and informativeness of the article was in no way sacrificed. The very fact that quite a few here did not notice the conceit until checking the discussion shows that efficiency was not abrogated here.

In favor of lipogram. The lipogram should definitely be broken if it is causing a problem to the article. But this should be a readability problem, not the problem of its simple existence. If there are specific phrases that are not clear, let's work to fix them (and break the lipogram rule if it's really necessary). But the circumlocution here strikes me as pretty straightforward, especially considering the kinds of users who are likely to be reading an article like this one. JTFK (talk) 19:56, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

I had trouble reading the article. Maybe I'm just dumb? Can you make it read like ENglish please? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.48.245.74 (talk) 17:14, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

In favor of lipogram. I enjoyed the slow realization that the article itself was a lipogram omitting 'e'. Kudos to whomever did all that fine work! 67.142.130.20 (talk) 23:09, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

In favor of lipogram. Just because Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, doesn't mean that it should be boring. Get a life, and have some fun. AustinBH (talk) 21:19, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Opposing lipogram. I enjoy a bit a whimsy as much as the next guy. However, I have one major problem with the article in its current lipogram form: Describing the novel as an "Anglic-group lipogram" is as close as it ever comes to accurately stating that the novel omits the letter e. If you can't come up with a sensible way to describe the novel's most notable feature while staying within the restrictions of your word game, then it's time to give up that game. --Cornprone (talk) 09:55, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, but did you look at all of it? It says plainly that Gadsby's vocabulary list skips from d to f. A discussion is ongoing about if this is worthy of first-paragraph status or not. JJB 14:02, 24 Oct 2008 (UTC)

Now that you've pointed it out, I see the "d to f" statement. I guess I didn't notice that due to the article being extremely difficult to parse. I think, at the very least, this should be made clearer in the introductory paragraph. --Cornprone (talk) 05:56, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Also Opposing. Ha ha ha, we all get it, very funny. Now that you've giggled to yourself, remember that this is an Encyclopedia. The opening paragraph should state that the book "does not contain the letter E". The "skipping from d to f" and "most common glyph" nonsense is ridiculous. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.253.30.146 (talk) 14:40, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Unofficial count

For nitpicks, totals by my rough count: 48 favoring, 33 (including vandals; plus four probably socks) against. A goodly majority of all chiming in favor a lipogram.

Favoring: (From history:) Wikifun's original author; Mindspill; Lupo; Dysprosia; Koavf; this contributor; Lubaf; Pakaran; Dyna; this undo; 401; 4.154.7.99; 65.190.164.211; No Parking; Dpbsmith; 209.2.60.97; Dogbox; 206.230.48.34; 12.47.208.34; Florian B; 67.160.208.249; 67.86.0.32; (From talk:) 81.134.54.129 (it's probably sarcasm to say in full, "Is it strictly obligatory that this composition is a lipogram??? It's funny at first, but it's obvious that such things shouldn't stay on this wiki."); How; 118.136.59.137; -ling; Gkhan; JIP; Jigglyman; rich; T-Boy; Cuchullain; shill; Kizor; Zuiram; Dpbsmith; JJB; Qaqaq; 71.191.44.93; 86.68.123.166; Xyz; Ô.ô wow ô.ô; JTFK; 67.142.130.20; AustinBH; Zzo38; Orv; Synchronism.

Against: (From history:) Arj; 4.246.3.155; 159.91.116.185; Andy; stuart; Kizor; 81.153.91.187; a guy from our fiction workgroup; this "uncool" contrib; Irishguy; this undo; Robin Johnson; 83.199.82.153; 24.230.44.102*; Czoll*; 83.204.177.74; rod; Soap; Jond*; 76.21.247.127* (backing up to Czoll's wording); Q Binary; 80.202.174.246; 86.163.107.149; 71.55.100.21; 128.227.53.230; 99.194.68.155; (From talk:) Tzinacan; Ilyan; Cotton; 219.90.139.250; 128.250.204.118; Taylor; Connor H; Yngvarr; 134.48.245.74; CrashGordon94; Corn. *Probably socks (WP:DUCK).

Unknown (didn't talk about lipogrammaticity, possibly without noticing): 193.252.1.200; 82.3.32.73; Bibliomaniac15; Bwiki; Bfinn; curtain3; math; 66.9.172.83; Axman89; 68.44.28.9; 128.250.204.118; 63.144.166.5; Aaronbrick; 24.165.10.21; 70.231.240.95; 72.95.179.114; many additional. JJB 10:33, 20 Oct 2008 (UTC)

JJB, I think this section of the talk page is highly unproductive. Furthermore, accusing editors of being sockpuppets is, at the very least, problematic—and certainly a violation of WP:AGF if you have no evidence of deceptive intent. It is quite possible that the camps you dub "favoring" and "against" have socks, but you are only leveling unfounded accusations at those who apparently disagree with you. Do you honestly find this "unofficial count" important? It certainly doesn't do much to demonstrate a consensus. -Phoenixrod (talk) 05:57, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Two things: see Wikipedia:Polling is not a substitute for discussion, and 2005 on Wikipedia was a lot different than 2008 on Wikipedia. Cheers, —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 16:14, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Sales

Did the book sell any copies after its publication? Sales data and a contemporaneous review would be nice. Tempshill 19:49, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Lipogram removed

It was fun while it lasted, but I just edited the article to remove the lipogram, for various reasons:

• it isn't a very encyclopedic thing to do, and certainly not in keeping with house style;
• there have already been the beginnings of edit wars in this article;
• it was responsible for some serious ugliness in the article, and Plain English is a good thing;
• the more information that gets put in to the article, the harder it will be to write, and we don't want to discourage expansion of the article.

If people want to see an example of a lipogram, they can follow the link to the novel itself. Robin Johnson 16:32, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Information should be communicated in an interesting way! I think it added significantly to the article that it wa a lipogram (seriously), as it illustrated the concept. The fact that it had a slightly different style that the rest of Wikipedia is no big deal. I say, bring it back. Thue | talk 17:26, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Leave it delipogrammed because that seriously made the article very ungramatical. This is an encyclopedia, not a farmer's almanac (or whatever...it's 11:25 PM right now) — Ilyanep (Talk) 05:25, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I just reverted a revert by User:No Parking to attempt to get the lipogram in (which left 'typewriter' and 'accidentally' and 'key' in anyway.) I won't do this again myself, but please let's discuss it here before making this major change again. Robin Johnson 15:38, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Copyright status of this work?

Can anyone confirm, or even point to some evidence that suggests, that this work is in the public domain now? If it is, I'd like to add it to Project Gutenberg. It definitely doesn't qualify under the "easy" public domain rule (meaning it was published after 1923), so the only chance is that the copyright lapsed before the rules were re-written in the Seventies. Anyone know for certain?

I can even provide a lead - Douglas Hofstadter excerpted sections of Gadsby in his 2004 book, "Le Ton beau de Marot", and I checked the "Acknowledgements" section in the back and there were no mention of copyright holders or permission. If the book was still under copyright, Hofstadter and Basic Books would've had to credit somebody, right? Just a thought...

Just because someone else is doing it usually isn't a good reason ;) — Ilyanep (Talk) 05:26, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I have a copy of Gadsby - actually a photocopy of the original edition, made for me by Cambridge University Library - and can confirm it is out of copyright, or at least was when they made the copy for me (in c.1991) - can't recall if the copyright period changed after then. It has the publication date in it so I'll look it up when I get a chance. Ben Finn 14:18, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Lipograms Redux

I think it is rather sad that we cannot have a lippogrammatical version of this article. I don't think such a constraint necessarily means losing a great deal of clarity - and if this can be agreed upon, then it is rather humbug to force more vowels onto us. If the Ancient Hebrews did not need vowels (well, sort of), then I think we can do without the much-overrated epsilon.

Anyway, here is my attempt at it (copied-and-pasted from the main page, 23/10/06, and not without immense debts to the previous attempts):

GADSBY is a book by Ernest Vincent Wright, "A Story of Over 50,000 Words" dating from around 1939. It is famous for not using any word with an 'e' in it. Wright's book is a lipogram and (arguably) the most popularly-known occasion of an unusual sylistic constraint. Nor was this particular handicap without difficulty for Gadsby's author, who admits in his introduction to sticking down parts of his old Smith-Corona whilst typing it, so to avoid having any of his lipagrammatoi (or missing symbols) "slip in" to his writing - though still "many did try to do so!"

Synopsis

Gadsby's plot is an account of how its protagonist, John Gadsby, transforms his local town of Branton Hills into a bustling city by tapping into his own youthful vigour and capacity for original thought. Quoting from its first paragraph:

"If youth, throughout all history, had a champion to stand up for it; to show a doubting world that a child can think; and, possibly, do it practically; you wouldn't constantly run across folks today who claim that "a child don't know anything." A child's brain starts functioning at birth; and has, amongst its many infant convolutions, thousands of dormant atoms, into which God has put a mystic possibility for noticing an adult's act, and figuring out its purport."

(This combination of odd punctuation, tortuous grammar, and arguably disjoint air carry on throughout). In addition to having to avoid common words (and particularly pronouns), Wright adds complications to his task by writing of the (uncontinuous) past, whilst also having to avoid constructions such as '-ed' and '-ve'; finally taking a still more valiant risk by writing about things that ordinarily contain 'e', such as a "Thanksgiving National Bird" or "an astonishing loaf of culinary art"...

A popular account has Wright dying in 1966, just days prior to his book going into print; though this is uncomfirmed [NB - sounds apocryphal, add a citation if not].

Gadsby was his last work. A similarly lipogrammatic book is Georges Perec's La Disparition (1969; trans. 1994 by Gilbert Adair as 'A Void').

[Well, there you are. Is this really substantially less clear than the current version, with 'e's and all? I would be interested to hear your comments; I hope you appreciate that I did not simply change the page as I saw fit without first discussing it here.] Dogbox 19:47, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I too think we should use a Lippogrammatic version - yes, it will be slightly less clear, but it will make the article much more interesting :). Thue | talk 15:43, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Change

You know what, I'm in a daring mood tonight so I'm going to change it to the lipogrammatic version and see if anyone complains. Dogbox 20:16, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm complaining. The lipogram makes the article harder to read and much harder to maintain - both completely against the goals of Wikipedia. It's just not part of encyclopedic reporting. Robin Johnson (talk) 23:11, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

It is kind of cool though. Robin Johnson (talk) 23:16, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

But you've missed several e's. Robin Johnson (talk) 12:14, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Where it would have been obviously ridiculous to avoid the letter 'e', like in the author's name or so on, I've left an 'e' in, of course. If you want to revert it back then I won't meddle any further. But as for encylopaedic reporting, surely 'easter eggs' appear in lots of resources like maps and so on, and its not like fiction is being presented as fact. See also http://www.qwantz.com/index.pl?comic=879. And as for maintenance: I really, really, doubt that much more will be said on the subject of Gadsby, I've never seen it in a bookshop or heard it mentioned for any reason other than its use of lipogrammatoi. And even if it is, then there's no flashing light saying "don't update this article unless you can play along with it".Dogbox 17:35, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

You have 'more' and a few 'the's. And 'unconfirmed', if that counts (notes like that shouldn't appear in article text anyway. Maybe I'll fix it.) Robin Johnson (talk) 18:13, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

One thing that kind of bugs me about the lipogrammatic version is that it took me a bit to understand what the lipogram in the book is, that it avoids the letter "e". The article is certainly a triumph, but I don't think we should be sacrificing clarity for cuteness. Cherry Cotton (talk) 04:20, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Eugh. This article is an encyclopedic mess. It just feels so wrong. You can see through the revision history that the usefulness of the article has been really compromised by this lpogram silliness. 219.90.139.250 (talk) 07:03, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Compromise on article style

This article can't be a lipogram and still clearly get the message across. Those who want a lipogrammatic version should host it on a user page / project page / etc. — DIV (128.250.204.118 08:25, 27 August 2007 (UTC))
...and each can link to the other. 128.250.204.118 08:26, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Oops!

How unoriginal, I didn't look at talk prior to my composition. I'll look at history and add accordingly, but not right now. Favor moving to Gadsby: Champion of Youth, an original titling. 209.243.55.22 (talk) 00:49, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Lipogram should be restricted to article text only

Categories, edit links and whatnot are not part of the article text and should be outside the constraints of the lipogrammic exercise. For example, adding __HIDDENCAT__ to Category:Lipograms then effectively removes that category for the other articles in there, just to satisfy a desire to keep this article free of Es. Likewise, I'm restoring the TOC and section edit links here. howcheng {chat} 18:12, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

This page should also be moved backed to Gadsby (novel), for this is the standard use for title, plus most links are to that title. 83.204.177.74 (talk) 20:39, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Don't modify built-ins; WP isn't what this link points to. But still avoid all fifth orthographic glyphs that isn't built-ins, link URLs, HTML tags, and so on. Following a link will still display Gadsby (book), and it still works OK, so don't modify. --zzo38(✉) 18:31, 3 Oct. 2008 (UTC)

Why I reverted the article again

To John Bulten: Yes, I know that it was an admin who started the project of turning this article into a lipogram. I don't think that that alone means that it's valid forever and that people should be unable to object. Nevertheless I am too busy right now to bother getting into a revert war over this article and so if it means that much to you, I've made it easy for you by reverting all at once, so all you have to do is click the Undo button and you can have it back the way you like it. Since the question of whether a lipogrammatic article is valid has not yet been settled, I think that we should call in some outside judges to decide once and for all which way the article should read.

Please use this space to explain your revisions. What is the etymology of faRO? Are people expected to know who it is on sight? What about words like "conflagration" for fire? Is "two to four thousand dollars" an exact quote? Why do you sometimes create redirects such as Cat in a Hat and Vocalic, and at other times just accept the word as it is (e.g. typewriter)?

Please note, I am not saying that 100% of your edits are bad ... I can see a good argument for "fiction" as the genre instead of "novel", but I don't have the time right now to go through the entire edit history and separate the good from the bad, and I expect that there will be a future conflict over this article that will end up overwriting those edits anyway. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 20:38, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Hi Soap! This minor back-and-forth has not had any actual fix that I know of, so I'm hoping you and I can find a harmony swiftly. First, naturally, our maintaining a lipogram is not forcing you or any contributors to maintain it too— just as your working toward a nonlipogram isn't forcing any of us to maintain a nonlipogram. I don't know of any contributor taking a position that taboos lipograms outright; just that maintaining such is a pain. But thinking about improving our contributions, I would hold that an almost-lipogram is worst of both worlds— comparing to both a full lipogram, and a full contribution with no trying for lipogrammaticity at all. That is also how I found this topic— as an almost-lipogram, that is, a failing. A difficult job, asking for finishing.

Judging or conflict-solving is not what this situation calls for, I think. What you and I actually want is a happy guiding paradigm: All camps must work toward improving this topic. Lipogrammaticists must truly work out conflicts point-by-point and still push quality upward, if artistic constraint is so important to us. My camp can truly point out (a) a good majority favors lipogram and (b) ignoring all rulings has a bit of applicability against naysaying (not too much, naturally); but my camp must also back off if not consciously improving it.

All points against lipogram stand on that old carp which Wright also got so oft, that a lipogram simply can't occur and still work in good idiom. (And that any lipogrammaticist is slightly kooky.) So point-by-point findings of "what is a good idiom" ought to do it, right?

(1) "faRO" is that author's writing nom; I just did about 20 folks in that club. This actually is asking about all citations. In my happy opinion, if a citation is wholly taboo to a lipogram from start to finish, anybody could try cutting or changing our using that particular work; it's not a roadblock. Wikilinks (that is, clicking "faRO") put all info right into anybody's hands. So partial citations may stand comfortably, I would think.

(2) "Conflagration" charitably backs off from graphically talking about a burning building gratuitously.

(3) No quotation; my link says actually "try for about $4000" and also has $3000 in 2006. Click it at "Anonymous".

(4) Cat in a Hat (Crystal's form) and vocalic link from valid phrasings. I did not fix all links so far, naturally; I'm working bit by bit. I had "manual typing" in my copy but it's just not back right now.

Finally, assuming a risk of conflict soon is no difficulty now. It can follow my paradigm just said. Anything can work out harmoniously. JJB 22:36, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Moving portion to Talk:Gadsby (book)#Unofficial count. JJB 10:33, 20 Oct 2008 (UTC)

It appears to me that the lipogrammatic back-and-forth has been going on for several years. As "cool" as it is to have a lipogrammatic version of the article, I don't think Wikpedia's mainspace is the appropriate venue for it. It unquestionably does make the article harder to read, which ought to be enough of an argument to avoid such verbal gymnastics. Perhaps seeking a wider opinion would be the best course of action? People who haven't edited the article (as most readers would be unlikely to do) would probably have the clearest idea of what is best for the encyclopedia on this one. -Phoenixrod (talk) 17:47, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Rod, what particularly do you find still hard to grasp in this composition, s'il vous plait? Naturally I grant that old drafts had significant flaws, but do you know of any ongoing difficulty? You will want to list it at talk first, thank you. JJB 18:32, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Erm, I thought I was listing it at talk.... I think that the difficulty is self-evident. In all seriousness, I don't see any advantage to the lipogram. Circumlocution is simply that ... talking around something that could be said more simply, and more effectively. Your response is a perfect example; while I appreciate the effort you take in avoiding the letter e, you could have made your point much more succinctly. The same goes for this article. -Phoenixrod (talk) 18:48, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Um, again, particularly what is insuccinct or difficult to grasp? Truly, what circumlocution? If I'm looking at a 4,000-word list of words found in Gadsby, what's so wrong with saying simply (and in good monosyllabic Anglo-Saxon) that it skips from d to f? Inform us, thanks. JJB 20:09, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Sigh. Is it the end of the world either way? No. But "what circumlocution?" Really? Okay, how about this: the lipogram forces the reader do the work of figuring out what we mean. It takes longer to process the meaning of "it skips from d to f" than the meaning of the phrase "it does not use e". Good writing tells the reader the information directly. As such, we should fill in the gaps for Wikipedia's readers, who frequently skim articles or want a quick read. We are writing for our readers, not for ourselves. As for the wikilinks, some readers print out Wikipedia pages, so we should have links that refer directly to the target whenever possible. That makes links like Cat in a Hat and faRO problematic.

I don't mean this to be in any way a comment on any particular editor, but in general it strikes me as rather WP:POINTy to force a lipogram where there is no encyclopedic reason for one. Is it in good fun? Sure. But does it help? I don't see how, and it's more than a bit disruptive to the natural flow of English. -Phoenixrod (talk) 20:32, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

OK, thanks! But I don't think so. I (and Wright) hold that virtually anything I can say without a lipogram, I can say with it also, and (I add) without any "gaps" to fill in or loss of information. Now you put down only two particular points: first, you think that my phrasing is difficult and yours scans quickly. But I don't think that's valid with "skips from d to f", in that talking about a word list with a gap in it is (arguably) not as hard as talking about a book that omits a singular symbol throughout, without fault (that's why I laid that subtopic out that way, with its "Ostrogoths" illustration also for clarity). But if this is arguably so, why fuss? And in fact, if I should grant your point (which I don't), it is still no harm to adopt a slightly difficult phrasing; contributors do that daily on analytical and historical topics, if saying it rightly is also saying it a bit murkily (such as with mid front IMhO). So this is a highly minor point.

As to links, look at WP:R2D if you don't mind. No policy says a link must go straight to its topic. David Crystal took up that phrasing "Cat in a Hat" in his own book, so that's what I put it in too; it occurs plausibly and is worthy of wikilinking. "FaRO", as a nom of its author, is not unprintworthy, and is that author's primary alias in wordplay publications; but you can always switch it to "Onomastics" too. No, in fact, I'll do that now.

In short, I think that you lay out no convincing grounds for your phrasing improving this topic. But I'm always on hand for discussion. JJB 14:07, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

In short, and I mean this with all due respect, the fact that your responses are all in lipograms is running afoul of WP:POINT: I cannot easily understand you, and if you can't believe me, that is not my problem anymore. I see you like puzzles and wordplay, and that's great, but our readers should not have to figure out the puzzle of what we mean in an encyclopedia article. That's a basic law of good communication, not a "highly minor point". As for the WP:R2D policy you mention, I quote (with my italics for emphasis): "In many cases where it might seem appropriate to make this change [removing a redirect to point directly at the target page], such as those involving unprintworthy redirects, the better option is to edit the visible text rather than change where the link is pointing. If the linked term is printworthy and presents no other problems to the prose, there is no reason not to just link the term as is." Since the linked terms I mentioned (The Cat in the Hat and FaRO's real name) are printworthy, there is no reason not to just link the target page as is. I am simply suggesting that we edit the visible text ... to make it reflect the linked article without obfuscation, according to policy.

Please see WP:EGG, the Manual of Style for links. Again, I quote: "Keep piped links as intuitive as possible. Do not use piped links to create 'easter egg links', that require the reader to follow them before understanding what's going on. Also remember that there are people who print the articles." Clearly, a link to FaRO is misleading without context. We do not link to Boz and expect readers to know that Boz is a nom de plume for a famous writer; instead we link directly to Dickens. I think the "compromise" you introduced into the article (by deleting the author completely from the citation instead of changing it to Eckler) is not helpful, as it makes for incomplete information.

Similar to the FaRO/Eckler example is your mid front link above: I had to follow the link to get a context when the article's real title, close-mid front unrounded vowel (or even simpler the letter e), would have sufficed. In fact, it is misleading to equate as you do a letter with only one particular vowel sound, since it can be pronounced differently in different phonemes.

Finally, this debate is not new. In fact, the first edit to this very talk page was to complain about the lipogram, and editors have done so repeatedly since then. While an article on the novel surely attracts a particular type of reader who may be more interested in wordplay, it must adhere to Wikipedia's policies. I still don't see how a lipogrammatical Wikipedia article doesn't violate multiple policies in pursuit of an in-joke. -Phoenixrod (talk) 17:52, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

(As if this forum forbids in-joking.) Rod, without going into your points too much right now, your "basic law of good communication" is okay, but your claims of multiplying policy violations do not list any particular phrasings you would add that might fix any flaws (you only hint at a bit of link touchup). You favor misquoting our sourcing, David Crystal (who said "Cat in a Hat" originally), and you do it only to put in a singular solitary word, and it's that most insignificant of all words! Point-making cuts both ways. I was just thinking this morning or last night that this discussion could possibly rapidly spiral downward into a hot disputation about just that word, but I didn't think anybody would truly campaign for that word in actuality so soon. You mistook my words in additional ways also (I was saying that analytical discussion of mid front vocalization in that composition is murky, just as many topics in history or art; I was not saying that any lipogram is murky). Anyway, I will hold off for now so that all may cool down and discuss this calmly. I am asking Mindspill for input, and I'll happily look at R2D again, it might contain an ambiguity that brought on confusion on my part; sorry if so. But if you don't mind, could you and I think about this individually, and both look for an approach that works for both minority and majority? JJB 19:09, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely, JJB. I don't want this discussion to be anything other than amicable. I suggested outside input a little while ago (maybe in the top section on this page?), and I think it's entirely appropriate. It's probable that I missed your shades of meaning; while I might attribute that to your lipogrammatical writing (hint, hint), it's beside the point of what we should be doing: namely, figuring out what is best for the encyclopedia.

I had a feeling you were going to attack my number of examples, and I suppose that is fair. It's just that I don't really want to bother picking out every example when I feel that almost the entire article is written in a roundabout way, simply for the writer-based exercise of avoiding e. As a result, I pulled examples from above discussion by Soap and you. I grant that I based my Cat in a Hat objection on Soap's comments rather than on the article's context. But I find it disturbing that Gadsby is famous for not using the letter e, and the article makes no mention of e, letter, or vowel. Or, for that matter, that it is a novel. Surely there is a notability problem inherent in that lack.

Would you mind terribly calling me by my full user name? I don't identify as "Rod", and it sounds rather to me ears as if I called you "Ulten" or somesuch. I realize you don't want to because my user name contains an e, but perhaps there is a way around it. You have displayed impressive linguistic skill already.

Anyway, I am content to wait for Mindspill (not sure who that is) or someone else to jump in. Please note that I have not edited the article itself; I am trying to resolve the issue on talk first. -Phoenixrod (talk) 20:05, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Mindspill is probably Mindspillage, one of the early editors of this page. Also, just for the record, the 74.something person is not me; I don't edit Wikipedia from IP except occasionally by accident. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 21:07, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Samuel Johnson had jokes in his dictionary.

One of my college textbooks contained an intentional joke in its index; it was a psychology text and the entry for "eidetic imagery" was "see children, memory in;" for "children, memory in" it was see "unexplained phenomena;" and for "unexplained phenomena" it was "see eidetic imagery."

The distinguished biologist Edwin Ray Lankester gave the official scientific name Golfingia to a sipunculid worm he found while golfing. Another one named some crustacean genera Cirolana, Conilera, Nerocila, which were anagrams of his wife's name. A biologist name Kirkaldy created the names Ochisme, Marichisme, Peggichisme, Polychisme, which read as "O kiss me," etc. There's an insect named Chrysops balzaphire ("balls of fire"). Mind you, these are all the official scientific names, under the Code of Zoological Nomenclature, and are used for these animals in official scientific writing to this day.

There is intentional humor in the Holy Bible.

The article on Beethoven in the Encyclopedia Britannica from the 11th edition, up through, I think, the last editions before the Britannica 3, says "any outbreak of vulgarity or sentimentality can with impunity claim descent from Beethoven, though its ancestry may be no higher than Meyerbeer." Not exactly a thigh-slapper, but not the sort of Gradgrind-facts-facts-facts style some people seem to think Wikipedia should be restricted to.

The lipogrammatic writing in this article is almost as flowing and felicitous as that of Gadsby itself. With respect to factual information, it is at least as good, as clear, and as communicative as the average Wikipedia article. In addition, it conveys something about lipograms and the quirky fun of lipograms. Removing this makes about as much sense as removing the portrait of Mozart from the Mozart article on the grounds that it conveys no important factual information about the man or his music.

There's nothing wrong with this article. The people who don't like its being lipogrammatic should not make changes just for the sake of being non-lipogrammatic; that's as silly as edit-warring over BC versus BCE, etc.

The editors who fail to see the humor in it ought to just accept that the fact that this one article, of the hundreds of thousands in Wikipedia, happens to have a style they dislike, but which is sanctioned for this article by tradition and consensus. So far, they have not adduced any arguments much stronger than WP:IDONTLIKEIT

I don't see any danger at all of anyone trying to impose this style on any other Wikipedia articles. It's not a slippery slope. Lighten up. Dpbsmith (talk) 00:56, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

That sounds an awful lot like WP:ILIKEIT. :) -Phoenixrod (talk) 08:59, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Thank you so much Dpbsmith! Might I add Strigiphilus garylarsoni? Nobody should fight from grounds of liking it or not liking it. As I said, partial lipograms look most ugly of all options. JJB 14:15, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

As long as we're talking about funny names for creatures, I can mention that there's now a whole website dedicated to them: [1]. And that I don't think most of those of us opposing the lipogram are doing so because we think there's no place for humor in science. In fact I'm not even opposed to there being a lipogram on Wikipedia, in principle. What I object to is that it makes the article hard to read. Looking over the history, I think the early lipogram versions of the article weren't that bad; at least they had the author's name right. But the way the article is now, it relies on very obscure wording and a bunch of redirects that had to be created specifically for this article alone. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 14:36, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Soap. I think it's stretching things rather too far to say we have no sense of humor. (And thanks for all the lovely louse links et al.) For me, it's a matter of readability. And since I have taught composition, I've read some obfuscatory verbiage in my time. Please realize that what I just said wasn't a dig at the Gadsby article as "bad" prose; my point is that roundabout writing truly does take more work for a reader to understand. On another note, it's also rather more difficult to edit an article when the "table of contents" and "edit section" buttons are hidden. I think hiding useful functions is taking the lipogram too far. -Phoenixrod (talk) 16:26, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

OK, so how about this? Why don't you (both) put in all your own wordings, all that you think is important to cut out any "obfuscatory" or "roundabout writing", so that (as I'd said) a point-by-point discussion can follow? Right now this composition is laid out fully according to my standards (but for a nitpick with your inclusion of a taxonomy box). Why not work on it until all is satisfactory to you, and start an additional discussion back at talk, toward compromising? Thanks Phoínixrod! (Pardon my colloquializing, I do it to all sorts of folks.) JJB 17:10, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Phoínixrod works. Well done! I was expecting something more mundane like PR. :)

Before going to the effort of re-writing the article myself, I'd like to know if there is a point to doing so. If I take the time to do a re-write, say on a user sub-page, aren't we going to have the same disagreement as before? One camp will say it is more readable, and another camp (forgive the warlike metaphor) will say it's not a significant enough change to merit losing the lipogram. This previously-anticipated conundrum is exactly why I tried to make my opinion known up front without editing the article, when I said I didn't care to debate the issue much (and now, alas, I've been sucked into just that vortex). Pray, what do you mean by "a nitpick with [my] inclusion of a taxonomy box"? I didn't think I had mentioned the infobox on the right, but it too has oddities: lack of the author's full, recognized name; "classification" as "fiction" rather than something more meaningful such as genre; and links that ought to point directly to the target page, per WP:EGG. Additionally, isn't there a standard novel infobox that would be apropos (or even à propos) here?

So, to summarize: I am reluctant but willing to work on a re-write on a sub-page, but only if I get some assurance that there is a realistic chance that doing so will help the article. I won't be online much the rest of today, but I'll check back when I can. -Phoenixrod (talk) 17:41, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I was thinking of a solution such as (1) Phoínixrod says "X" is too circuitous and propounds nonlipogram "Y"; (2) John bounds back with lipogram "Z" or similar compromising; (3) harmony springs up from continuing such a dialog. I still don't know particularly what you find so tortuous that you want to hang your hat on claiming it actually hurts this writing. But if you want to start a sub, that works, I'll just go through it bit by bit with you. At any points that you think my phrasing hurts this composition, if you sway my thinking or if not, I'll happily work toward compromising with you.

Such as this: (1) you think "fiction" is too fuzzy; (2a) I look up fiction and find that its only particularization in that link is by wordcount, which is not only said too much now, but also right on a cusp amidst two subcats of fiction (thus indicating against your wording, with or without "-la"); (2b) I accordingly propound "popular fiction" (phrasing at that topic works favorably IMhO against such options as "historical fiction", and "biographical fiction" with two links); (3) you inform us if that is a working solution to what you had said, or not.

I just want it said upfront that (as I thought I'd shown) if it's significant, a lipogram can talk about it, fully absorbably, and without circumlocution. But it's up to you if you think this topic is still too roundabout to satisfy you (against Smith, Qaqaq, and many alii). Thank you also for maintaining paradigmatic civility!

(P.S. My nitpicking was about this topic's bottom taxonomy box (linking to C:LIP), not its top classification box. Sorry if you mistook it, but that is no fault of my using lipograms; similar miscommunications would occur in ordinary writing also anyway.) JJB 19:56, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Continuing discussion

Sorry for my delay. Unfortunately, I don't have much time for Wikipedia at the moment because of that pesky "real life" business. Let me just make a couple of points: 1) I hope I have remained civil, as that is a primary goal of this or any discussion. 2) I don't think that using a different lipogram is really much of a "compromise" when the problem is the extensive lipogram. You have claimed that a mishmash of lipogram and ordinary writing would be worse than one of the extremes. It strikes me that the only logical continuation from that is to strike the lipogram. 3) JJB, you aren't following my points about "fiction": this article has no call to avoid using the word novel, since that is what Gadsby is. Calling it "popular fiction" is not the same, and it's misleading. I don't see any logical way to avoid using "novel" in the infobox and in the lead. An article's lead must establish why its subject is notable, and the lipogram prevents fully doing that. It isn't enough to say that Gadsby is an ambitious lipogram without explaining that it avoids the letter e. The author's full name, too, should be written correctly. This "Vin" Wright business smells fishy; no one seems to call Ernest Vincent Wright that anywhere. 4) Regarding your postscript, your stubborn refusal to use the word "category" because of its e did lead to confusion, and your claims to the contrary are rather absurd. "Taxonomy box" is not in the same league. Pick your cliché: call a spade a spade, call a novel a novel, call a category a category ... but please don't call it a "taxonomy box". 5) On a related point, please stop using lipograms on the talk page. It is disruptive to understanding and surely violates WP:POINT. If that isn't self-evident by now to any objective reader looking at this page, then nothing is. 6) We cannot hide the "edit section" buttons or categories in good conscience. 7) I strongly suggest some plain English here to avoid confusing readers. That's why we're here ... or at least why we should be. Phoenixrod (talk) 04:41, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I'll wait; and I'm always thankful for your civility (and particularity). I'm all for plain, Strunkian writing. But if you think that my simply avoiding a short list of words, in my own talk, is actually confusion and disruption, laid out only to push a point of wiki law (although I'm in good company with about six contributors who did similar talk lipograms), I'll just publish that list of taboo words (following) so that no disruption of communication occurs. (Wright can wall off his own nonlipogrammatic thoughts into an introduction, right?) This list accounts for any point at which you or Soap might possibly wind up thinking that this topic cannot do without a particular word. (I would also ask you, if you don't mind, to back off from charging too many policy violations too much, as I think I'm accommodating you any way I can.) Anway, in that light, only your 3 and 6 list particulars about this topic's wording; and Soap is still only lurking.

3a: You say this topic hasn't "any logical way to avoid using" word [11] (and, in fact "has no call to avoid using [it,] that is what Gadsby is"). But, possibly I am not following, in that your point is a minor logical fallacy too: Gadsby is both [11], and also book, story, narration, yarn, work of popular fiction, fifty thousand words, forty-odd parts, imaginary biography, fantasy municipal history, lipogram, catharsis, political drama, homily on alcohol, and so on, but I can avoid using most such classifications and pick only a handful. So [11] is provably not our first or only option, and avoiding it is not harmful. You imply that "popular fiction" (my trying for compromising) is poor by comparison, and/or distracting; if so, how?

3b: You want words [10] and [3], and that up in front too; but notability is not about which glyph is lacking, it's that a glyph is lacking at all. If Wright told a 50K story scrupulously avoiding "a" or "m" or "n" or "z", or all four, it would count as just as significant as Gadsby is in its actual omissions. It is important to start things gradually, and that's why I put a big graf on what lipograms actually do, to bring folks in slowly who don't know about this topic. Compromising by promoting "A lipogram is a composition which" to graf 1 is a thought, but such an add looks a bit off-path (and Wikilinks do that job for us now without additional prompting). So talking about [10] and [3] in "Lipogrammatic quality" subgrafs looks right. Again, I can think of many ways of talking about [10] and [3]; I said that "glyph" avoids intrinsic bias against, say, kanji lipograms, although I could think about backing off on not naming [3], assuming continuing tit-for-tat discussion.

3c: Long form of author such as [6], or short form Vin Wright: short form is an optional valid way to say it, among (again) many options. I admit I am not choosing his most common form (which is ...?); but naming policy is actually about topic naming (and that is fully compliant), not about what I link to. Introducing nonlipogrammaticity is actually a writing difficulty, such as would point away from using a long-form link (that is, any variation on [6]). If you find "Vin Wright" fishy on any count, it's still also obviously fully in WP:IAR spirit.

6: You want [5] and [1] to show up in this window. Again, I could think about "boxing out" such words, with a box not counting as part of any lipogram. But in talking about that, I'd want to know (and I did ask) that you'd brought forth all your wording complaints into talk, so that compromising can occur fairly and finally, shutting out any risk of a complaint arising again. As I said, I'll wait, with optimistic anticipation of such a list. JJB 17:54, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Wordlist

[1] categories
[2] contents
[3] e
[4] Eckler
[5] edit
[6] E. V. Wright
[7] fire
[8] genre
[9] hide
[10] letter
[11] novel
[12] Phoenixrod
[13] the
[14] typewriter
[15] vowel

So I came to this article...

...because I was looking for the name of that-book-without-the-letter-e-in-it, and I thought it was called Gadsby. I skimmed this article to see if I was right, but I saw nothing about it not having the letter E in it. Then I went to google and realized it was, so why didn't Wikipedia say that? So I went back to the article and read it carefully, and saw something like "it skips from d to f". As you can see, making this article a lipogram is clever/amusing, but annoying to anyone who wants to skim for the important facts that that person needs quickly. I just wanted to post my story as proof of the article's impracticality. Connör ^(talk) 23:51, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

See, JB? We feel perplexed whenever we see these E-less sentences. We revere the letter E; we detest perverse letter schemes. Deleted letters repress the mere free speech we rebels need. We prefer free verse, where sense redeems senselessness. Ye rebels, beseech me; let September be E's revenge! (I would have written more but http://www.chbooks.com/archives/online_books/eunoia/e.html seems to be mostly about Greek mythology after the first three pages.) Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 00:51, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

(Brilliant univocalic. You unconsciously show that you actually favor lipograms and writing constraints, in particular individual situations. As for your ability to say what you wish, that's what a lipogram on this topic is all about, isn't it? As if a nonlipogram is antiauthoritarian, and a lipogram isn't?) Anyway, though a majority of contributors favors this lipogram, I can hold that Connor's difficulty is a bit valid. Connor thinks that that word (word 3 in prior list) is such an "important fact" that it should go in our first graf automatically. I did say, prior, that "50,000-word lipogram" is what's important for notability, and what Gadsby omits is not so important, and I would stand on that point; and also on majority handling of this topic, which has no finding of such impracticality. Plus, if Connor actually wants that-book-without-and-so-on, Wiki should point him to lipogram; that book is possibly La Disparition, or A Void, McB'th, or Unhooking a DD-Cup Bra without Fumbling, or four-fifths of Christian Bok (Soap's link), all of which show up at that topic, not this. Wiki's organization is right for this situation as is (but I'll go and add a link to lipogram anyway, which was missing at bottom). JJB 09-09-08

I still think maintaining the article as a lipogram is silly, but since no one else seems to be bothered about it staying this way, neither am I. If the conflict ever gears back up again then I might come back, but I'm not going to let my esthetic preference take precedence over the esthetic preferences of others. So that's why I've gone silent. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 22:54, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I've gone silent for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that JJB is still violating WP:POINT by posting cryptically in lipograms on the talk page after I asked him to stop. A table of "forbidden" words containing e that I must look up each time is ... also silly, and it's not worth my time to press the issue further. Rest assured that I still think it's silly to maintain this article as a lipogram. Cool in a way, yes; but encyclopedic, emphatically no. But a lipogrammatical talk page? Beyond ridiculous. -Phoenixrod (talk) 06:01, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Agreed it's not very encyclopedic but it's very cool nonetheless! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.68.123.166 (talk) 23:52, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

It's asinine to write the article as a lipogram. If I wanted to know what a lipogram is, then there's a link. I don't need to spend 12 minutes parsing out bad grammar and style, because someone thinks it's cool, and I think such "artistic license" is antithesis to the spirit of Wikipedia. Yngvarr (t) (c) 11:34, 19 Sep 2008 (UTC)

Wow I was reading this article and then at some point I realized that the letter E isn't used. Very clever and creative guys!  Xeysz  ☼  19:04, 20 Sep 2008 (UTC)

Wow, I didnt know that the article was a lipogram too, wow, I also didnt know there were that manny words in the English language that didnt have the letter "e" in it...Ô.ô wow ô.ô (talk) 23:41, 23 Sep. 2008 (UTC)

It says that glyph isn't in Gadsby, you just didn't find it. Avoiding all fifth orthographic glyphs is a good kind of wordplay. I am also in favor of it staying a liopgram, as Gadsby is. --zzo38(✉) 18:31, 3 Oct. 2008 (UTC)

Shalom zzo38, and thanks so much for joining in this worthy task! Although it might hurt to say it, my first thought is that you might want to work on your writing a bit, mayhap (m-w.com is good for that); I don't know offhand what a "built-in" is or what particularly you want cut out or put in. You can point to my list prior; in it, four taboo words ([1], [2], [5], [9]) still show up in this topic, although I favor pulling all four, but didn't try to do it again so far. What's your opinion? (Also, kindly don't modify contributors' talk as you did with X's. You may wish to undo.) JJB 19:21, 3 Oct 2008 (UTC)

We need to change this article back to normal.

I agree with Soap, just because the book is a lipogram doesn't mean the article has to be, in fact I think it's rather stupid and unencyclopedic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by CrashGordon94 (talk • contribs) 7 October 2008

Hi CrashGordon94! Um, it is normal now. Kindly discuss what you think is stupid, point by point (I ask this of all nonlipogrammatic contributors). Also, you might sign in, and you can try your sandbox for practicing your talk contributions. JJB 13:44, 7 Oct 2008 (UTC)

I ask non-lipogrammatic talk page discussions of all contributors, but look where that has gotten us.... I agree that "normal" is a relative term, but in the broad context of Wikipedia, CrashGordon94 is, of course, right. -Phoenixrod (talk) 19:31, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

It's NOT normal, it's still a lipogram. It's stupid because you don't have to use a lipogram to talk about one, wikipedia isn't meant for this silliness and it makes the article harder to read (for example it beats around the bush about not having the letter "e", when a normal article could say something like "The book is known for being a lipogram that skips the letter "e"). I think those are good enough points. —Preceding unsigned comment added by CrashGordon94 (talk • contribs) 07:45, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Crash. Look at point 3b, backing up a handful of paragraphs, for this point. "Skip"ping a glyph is not good wording; actually, it is Wright's vocabulary list that skips words (which is what it says). Nobody had to put in a lipogram, but nobody had to put in a nonlipogram now that you point it out. Finally, this is a minority opinion, for many many moons. Also, do not talk WP down in your providing valid criticism, s'il vous plait. JJB 13:44, 8 Oct 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, there is no call to attack Wikipedia at large. There is similarly no call to nitpick the letter of Crash's words and ignore their spirit. JJB, instead of cryptically pointing Crash to "3b", it might be more productive to simply say what you mean here. As for a "minority opinion", I agree that the majority of users who have commented here on the talk page have supported a lipogram (though I will certainly not concede that a majority of readers would support an article sans e). In any case, of possibly paramount importance, I don't see a policy-based reason for a lipogrammatic article other than ignoring all rules, while I have pointed out several times a few relevant policy-based reasons to remove the all-lipogram form. See, for example, WP:POINT, WP:EGG, WP:LEAD, WP:N, WP:Plain English, and the fact that Wikipedia is not a democracy. Why don't we just take this issue to Wikipedia:Requests for comment and be done with it? -Phoenixrod (talk) 02:22, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

See! You just admitted that most readers wouldn't support the stupid lipogram thing! I think that's a good enough reason to change it back to normal. CrashGordon94 (talk) 07:40, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Crash, perhaps you are mistaking me for JJB? For several months, I have held the position that you are putting forward; of course I believe that Wikipedia's readers (most of whom do not edit) wouldn't support a lipogram. It's JJB who is the primary force arguing for the lipogram. Let's wait for him to weigh in again, shall we? I am still baffled how there is a policy-based reason for the lipogram that outweighs the policies and essay I cited above. -Phoenixrod (talk) 19:28, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Oops! Sorry about that. Thanks for the support. I see that the article now has a sentence saying that the book has no "e"s; that's great! :D CrashGordon94 (talk) 08:44, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Oh, great! Some moron removed the disclaimer! Do you creeps get pleasure from bewildering our readers?! CrashGordon94 (talk) 08:54, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

My good man, you ask that I say particular words of your choosing which I do not wish to say on this talk. I only ask that contributors who claim flaws in this topic list such flaws, according to policy. World of diff. JJB 20:00, 7 Oct 2008 (UTC)

I would support this listing staying as it is. It is obviously unusual but fitting. (Do not put in my Wiki alias. It ruins my straight run of avoiding symbol following "d".) —This contribution was from Orv (talk • contribs) 05:27, 14 Oct 2008 (UTC)

It's fine to enjoy the article (many editors have said it is "cool" even if not appropriate for Wikipedia), but do you have a policy-based reason for maintaining it in light of the policies that indicate that a lipogrammatical article is a bad idea? -Phoenixrod (talk) 22:29, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

This topic has long had lipogrammaticity as its norm. Dpbsmith (talk) 22:25, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, and it has long been disputed. Furthermore, consensus can change. -Phoenixrod (talk) 22:29, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

I think that: I don't mind that Gadsby's listing is as a lipogram, but that such strict authority for this topic might go too far in light of this book's topic. But I also ask, "Why not allow for an "e" or two to avoid awkward phrasing?" As long as it is just a "definite article" or similar word, then it wouldn't hurt so bad.Synchronism (talk) 02:41, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

OK try now

I am proposing a compromising position in my summary to my adds today. I trust all will look at it assuming good faith. FYI (for your information), this is my construction of that AP story, from combining about six corrupt sourcing mirrors of it (which you can find googling; or, for links, look at my adds):

50,110 Words Minus [By Walt Burton]

Author Wright is a kindly, vivacious chap in Company D at National Military Barracks in this city. A World war musician, Wright's hobby always was to do unusual things. Alumnus of a famous Boston campus class in 1889, Wright's classical foundation is thorough.

DIFFICULT AT FIRST

Publication of a composition without a common fifth symbol and acclaim of it as most odd got him to thinking. And so Wright got to it writing [...] unusual fiction composition. It was difficult at first. Most nouns would not do. "Just try it," Wright said, grinning and pulling at gray hairs of his trim, triangular growth on his chin. Four months and 30 days it took to do it all. It is amazingly smooth. No halting parts. A continuity of plot and almost classic clarity obtains.

Try a shot at his script at random, say a fourth down, about [...] words from his Introduction, and find this as typical: Now I think that you should know this charming Gadsby family; So first I will bring forth Lady [Gadsby,] known as such through Mayor's inauguration; a most popular [lady,] taking part in many a city activity such as clubs and social also; a loyal church woman with vocal ability for choir work; and, good capability on piano or organ, no woman could "fill in" in so many ways; No woman was so willing, and quick to do so.

MAYOR CONSULTS YOUTH

Wright calls his book--"Gadsby--Champion of Youth." It is about a mayor who consults youth in his administration. On and on it flows. No short cuts of words or phrasing is found, which in full would contain taboo symbols. First "Bob" was Wright's romantic swain, but a kibitzing companion said Bob was short for a word containing a taboo symbol, so it is "Frank" now, not Bob.

Writing this way is a good thing for an insomnia victim to try.

Now that it's down to that point at which authors say "finis," Wright ought to win on it.

JJB 20:01, 17 Oct 2008 (UTC)

I am certainly trying to assume good faith. But I don't understand what you are saying about corrupt mirrors and constructed stories. Do you or don't you have a citation for the above text?

Anyway, no one has yet answered my simple question: What policies support a lipogrammatic article in spite of the policies I have cited against the lipogram? (In other words, why should our own writers' desires trump our readers' needs, in violation of the spirit of Wikipedia?)

And why is my question about WP:RFC repeatedly ignored? Are the lipogram-favorers reluctant to involve outside viewpoints? I'm rather frustrated with this dead-end. So why not seek independent eyes? -Phoenixrod (talk) 17:33, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

My good man, if you must know all this, I will try to lay it all out for you again, in plain Anglo-Saxon:

1. As you could find out from my adds, portions of this AP story ran in Indy and in Oshkosh Daily; in history, you can find a link to a Wisconsin Journal copy; and I saw about four additional publications containing similar copy, which I don't wish to find links for again at this hour. Not counting Indy (and CS Monitor, a pay copy), all this copy is corrupt archival scans. To obtain a good draft of what AP said originally, I did lots of googling, bit by bit. That is, basically, look for "vivacious chap in Company D" at this link, and you obtain a quick-gloss which says "vivacious chap in Company D at and pulling ..."; look for "Company D at and pulling" and you obtain "at and pulling at grays hairs of hfs trim triangular growth on his chin ..."; and apply again circularly until worn out. All I did was to put all such jigsaw bits as I could find into a matrix of what probably was AP's original script, fixing all column mismatchings and scanning typos and such. This is all ordinary, basic construction from corrupt sourcing, such as any form critic could do with old torn manuscripts. Obviously "[...]" is a sign for a word or words that did not show up in any mirror. But, so as to avoid boring anybody, I just put my own build of what AP said in a quick go, and I did not say "I put 'his' for 'hfs'" on all occasions. In short, this copy is basically what Oshkosh Daily originally ran, but only with as much accuracy as anybody can supply.
2. You did not go for my compromising. I thought I could allow you your glyph in that first paragraph if you could allow omission of tag words. No policy puts us in such a box that TOC and tag words turn mandatory on us; but you say, "no way you can" do this. I can, I just did, I can again. But I was compromising: waiving a point as invitation for your waiving a point. If you don't wish to join in on this, I'll back up and think again again. But I must ask again why you imply that a TOC and tag words, with such an insignificant boon to anybody, would count as so important to you that you can't find any halfway point for compromising at.
3. I didn't talk to your policy citations or RFC proposal, as I didn't want to say that your citations do not go against a lipogram, but cut both ways. But now I must say it.
   1. I'm not disrupting for illustration of a point. I'll admit I'm limiting my own idiom, as many do on this talk, but I'm saying just what I want to say, so I'm doing nothing to disrupt. Is my idiom irritating to you? If so, um, is that my fault?
   2. Do you actually think that I'm hiding "what's going on" from anybody? On WP it is wrong to say, "This paragraph is a lipogram" (WP:SRTA); WP says it as, "Following is a lipogram: a-df-z", or similarly (in fact, look at lipogram). So I'm in-joking, as WP did by putting Ima Hogg as FA for April Fools' Day with a fishy-sounding but valid blurb graf. Doing this kind of writing right is fitting and has majority approval.
   3. My capitulation on our first graf should cut out your WP:LS point; but you didn't say anything about it.
   4. What's notability got to do with it?
   5. What's not plain about my writing?
   6. If you want discussion and not voting, what is your discussion point? What's wrong with this topic? You say that you don't want to say.
   7. Why do you want my approval on your going to RFC? ("Why not" go to RFC, you ask: right, why not?) But what would it talk about, anyway? But that's "what's wrong with my writing" again.
4. You ask what policy supports a lipogram. I said WP:CON many ways, naturally. This is also a good application of WP:IAR (I know many bad applications crop up too). Also WP:5P, in that WP has almanac roots, has no bar against in-joking and brilliancy, and may thus, with impunity, talk subtly as long as it also talks plainly. But what's actually going on is that (you look as if) you want a nonlipogram, but you don't want to list any major flaws with my writing, which is contrary to WP:DR#Discuss IMhO. I grant that our old copy on this topic had obvious flaws, such as "typing contraption". But that's old history now. I claim that with a lipogram I can say all that anybody would want to say on this topic, and that that point is in fact so valid that I can also go so far as to throw in your glyph in an apt singular location on top of all this. And that point, WP's ability to say anything in lipogram that anybody might wish, is what you still do not talk against. My phrasing "popular fiction" is as good as your options; no wording is so significant or mandatory as to start us fighting with any passion.
5. You imply that in violation of WP spirit I am ignoring an implicit duty to that onlooking crowd that I don't want to fulfill. What particular duty? It's not my duty to say particular words at your claim that I must; it's not my duty to strip WP of all humor; nor to submit to a minority only qua minority; nor to work hard at divining what is plain monosyllabic Anglo-Saxon to you if it's AOK in my book; nor to go to RFC for you. But if I am guilty, indict away! JJB 10:02, 20 Oct 2008 (UTC)

---

All I want to add is that I'm not sure that all of the "thumbs up" votes would necessarily approve of this extreme version of the lipogram that lacks even the edit links. Writing a 2500-word Wikipedia article as a lipogram is respectably clever; it's longer than [2]. But tricks like hiding section headers and typing Unicode E-like symbols instead of E don't really add anything to the show. In my opinion, anyway. And yes, I still think it should be reverted, although I'm too busy right now to commit myself to the task of taking the last known nonlipogram version and touching it up to reflect the recent additions you've made. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 21:32, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

---

JJB, thank you for finally answering my questions, somewhat. But really ... really ... if you refuse to write in plain English that includes the letter e even on the talk page when I have asked you not to, and furthermore you claim that it is my problem that your non-standard choices are hard to follow, that is refusal to get the point by definition. You seem to think that writing in a lipogram proves that lipograms make for easy comprehension; I strongly disagree, and have told you so repeatedly. Claiming "I'm not disrupting for illustration of a point" is, seemingly, a refusal to get the point.

I (and I am not the only one, certainly) have told you that your writing in lipograms and circumlocutions obscures your meaning and makes it hard to understand your points. If you say that's not your problem, you are again refusing to get the point.

I didn't go in for your "compromise" because it wasn't clear what you thought the compromise was. I thought that you meant including "E" in the lead—which, by the way, was my point about WP:N and WP:LEAD: the lead should explain why a subject is notable or worth having an article about (in this cause because Gadsby does not contain the letter e). The relevant text in WP:LEAD is this: "The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview of the article. It should establish context, explain why the subject is interesting or notable, and summarize the most important points". As such, failing to mention that Gadsby is notable for its avoidance of e defeats the purpose of having the article in the first place.

I do think you are hiding "what's going on" from readers (although I'm not sure what you're quoting). In particular, readers who aren't familiar with Gadsby and readers who print out Wikipedia pages will be confused by a citation claiming an author as "Al Ross, Jr." when the real author, A. Ross Eckler, Jr., has apparently never gone by your name for him in print. Or even on as simple a point as the author of the book: you would have us believe that his name is Vin Wright instead of Ernest Vincent Wright. That is disruptive because it is not the author's name.

Apparently you are disturbed that I didn't comment on your insertion of an E into the lead. I applaud the concept, but like Soap, I don't see the point in redirecting to the letter from a symbol. It's silly.

What's not plain about your writing? Come on. It's hard to parse; that's a big reason why lipograms are not wildly (or even remotely) popular. I'm pretty sure you know this, and I am dangerously close to concluding that you are simply enjoying playing a game (something Wikipedia is not.)

What is my discussion point? My point is that the lipogram is silly for a serious Wikipedia article, "cool" though it may be, and we have no business writing a serious article in such a protracted and difficult style. Because you have demonstrated little compromising in your position that the article should be a lipogram (inserting other lipgrams in their stead is hardly much of a compromise), I feel that any substantive change I make should have a concensus first. That's why I'm discussing on the talk page. That's why I want to see outside input from something like RFC. I've never filed anything with RFC, so I was hoping that someone familiar with the process could do it.

Re: your point #4. Okay, so you claim a concensus for ignoring the rules. Thanks for clarifying. As far as I can see, however, what you call a consensus is simply a series of random votes without much basis in policy. It's simply a straw poll, and the relevant guideline is that polling is not a substitute for discussion. I could just as easily claim that the only voices in favor of the lipogram who are contributing to real discussion are JJB and, to a limited degree, Dpbsmith—while I and Soap, and maybe CrashGordon94, are opposing the lipogram to various degrees. In other words, any claim to consensus is flawed, at best. (Note further that "Asserting a consensus where none exists" is a form of gaming the system, a violation of WP:POINT, and really ought to be avoided.) So it comes down to IAR, which states, "If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it." I don't see how the rules I've cited prevent us from improving Wikipedia, especially in the realm of clarity, so IAR isn't really a strong argument for a lipogrammatic article. What would be lacking if we did not have a lipogram? Would the reader get any less information?

Re: your point #5. Do you honestly think that Wikipedia isn't written for its readers? We editors have a duty to write clearly and concisely; circumlocution to avoid the letter e is seldom clear and even more rarely concise.

You claim that "But what's actually going on is that (you look as if) you want a nonlipogram, but you don't want to list any major flaws with my writing". I do indeed want a non-lipogrammatic article. Have I not listed major flaws with the writing already? The most major is that it is difficult to understand what you mean at times. Other flaws I listed at Talk:Gadsby_(book)#Continuing_discussion.

Are you asking for a point-by-point listing of every last problem that the lipogram causes? As I said before, I would consider taking the time for that endeavor if I were assured that it wasn't a complete waste of time. But, JJB, your incessant lipograms on the talk page lead me to believe that you are unlikely to address those concerns if you are not even willing to speak in plain English here. -Phoenixrod (talk) 00:34, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for staying tough with such twists and turns as this dialog has thrown at us! Did you look at that Ima Hogg link? Did Raul654 fail policy by supplying implausibly circuitous trivia for this FA's blurb, although policy would limit him to simply quoting and summarizing his topic's first paragraphs? Is innovation so forbidding that you would not chip in at all on improving its wording, so as to withstand scrutiny of growing proportions? Look, I found this topic in poor condition, with partial and full lipograms immixt, and sad wording throughout; it now says (virtually) all anybody would wish it to say, and aptly links to fulfill any surplus wants.

But you may still think it omits unforgivably. OK, and yup, I am "asking for a point-by-point listing", as I do on any topic conflict. I can truly say, (again,) that it is what any contributor would do who wants such a conflict to wrap up amicably. (Again, I point you to my wordlist.) I was compromising by allowing word [3] on that list, and asking you to forgo [2]-[5]-[9] in combination. You put [2]-[5]-[9] back in. I thought you'd try RFC, so I cut all four words; you put [2]-[5]-[9] back in again, forgoing [3]. Now that is also a try at compromising, for your part, which I did not fight (and which I might allow for good, if you and I shook hands on it finally). But you don't know, nor do I, what you might still want as bargaining chips to fight about, and until you can put that list down, that final shaking of hands will wait.

So your first point is that you think I "can't" omit [2]-[5]-[9], as if WP is forcing all topics to contain such words. Actually, WP:GFDL was my inspiration in this omission, which admins maintain with high standards of purity. But, point two, you don't truly want to forgo [3], as if saying [3], and that upfront, is a "most important" point. (As I said,) Gadsby's notability is its lipogrammaticity, not which glyph it was built upon; this point was always valid in history of lipograms too. Linköping lipograms omit forms of a and o; Carroll Bombaugh has only o; Christian Bök omits all vocalics in turn; McB'th omits two. And as far as I know, many old lipograms (which I just had not got around to putting into lipogram) do not try for "most common glyph" status, but work mostly randomly. I think I was told of a historic lipogram in which its first "book" lost all alphas, its third book all gammas, and so on (or was it in Arabic?). I know of an author who, for many many moons, put no r in his writing or daily dialog (though it was highly irritating for a lot of folks); and that's his notability. (If this conflict wraps up soon, WP may soon find out about him.) I do say that Gadsby skips from d to f; if you only want this up in our first graf, it can go in without saying [3].

Third point, you say again that my pal Ross should go by that ordinary form as it shows up in print, including word [4]. (Rabbit trail into old puns-and-anagrams humor: Crossword author M. Taub says that Al Ross is actually short for Al-BAT-Ross. Ha ha.) Anyway, I did put in a form that Ross was using in print for an awful lot of writing, that is, "faRO" (that's what I know him as, too), and that too did not work for all of us. But [4] is not strictly a good word to fight about including; it has many ways that can go around it.

Fourth point, you say this also about [6], as if "Vin Wright" is not in any way a form that Wright could go by. That is a valid form for him; I'm not hiding anything, as my links clarify. If you want to say that this book's topic is invalid without naming its author with a particular stylization, that might work for a slight bit. But you don't say if this is a bargaining chip, or if you cannot do without it.

Stating a compromising position would say what you allow and what you insist upon, on all four points and any additional you wish to bring. So far that's six words you look as if you don't want to do without. If you insist on all six words, and also hold out on finishing your list of additional words, that's hardly a compromising or middling position; and it's just as if I should insist on omitting all six words (which I don't). So what is important to you and what isn't?

I don't think our arguing about policy is accomplishing much. Policy has not much to say, if you strip out all its glorifying of humor and patting us on our backs for smart in-joking. I might submit that your position is that which cuts against WP cultural norms. You and I can talk minority, majority, voting, and unanimity all day, but that's playing statistics. What you want is clarity and concision. So "improving WP" is listing what is poor and fixing it. But if I ask you, you put down only a small amount of quibbling points. I still await your full list. (Now I could, assuming good faith, add back your prior list, which had [11], [10], and [1]; and you had past complaints about [8], [13], and [15]; but that's all I know of, and you didn't say anything to my points at "Continuing discussion", so I said nothing too.)

To Soap, you'll want to know that I did that hard work, that is, I did look at all drafts of this topic from start to finish, and put in all points in any draft that had any validity. So you may look for nonlipogram drafts but I don't think you'll find much to add. That vanity publishing firm's ID, mayhap; but why insist on that?

Finally, my good sirs, on talk, I may and I do say just what I want to (within normal limits as fitting for usual two-way dialoguing, naturally). It is not my job to guaranty your ability to follow all that I say, nor is it your right to obtain any particular idiomatic inclusion (say, vocalic or consonantal) from my WP account at any instant. My job is only to pick words with as much clarity as I can, and yours to try to follow along, with both of us just muddling through if it fails to work at any point. That is all simply such an ordinary two-way communication standard that I don't think I wish to harp on it again, it is so basic. If I avoid lipograms totally, it still occurs on and off that, although I may think I got my point across just right, I didn't do it at all in actuality. My bad! Try, try again! But your WikiLaw application of WP topic policy to how I wish to talk is hardly fitting to this Gadsby talk column, anyway; it's actually most apt at: JJB 01:50, 22 Oct 2008 (UTC)

I am aware of the Ima Hogg April Fool's Day blurb. Note that the blurb was not in the article; rather, it was the short section written for the main page. Thus, your Ima Hogg link is not at all analogous to this article: while the Hogg article was a one-day blurb for April Fool's Day, the Gadsby article is in its misleading and confusing lipogrammatic state every day. By making the comparison, you are implying that we should pull an April Fool's joke on our readers with this article, yes? How can you justify that position?! And your accusing me of WikiLawyering is simply laughable; of course WP:POINT applies to talk pages.

You claim that "It is not my job to guaranty [sic] your ability to follow all that I say". Actually, it is, JJB—at least as far as not intentionally and actively putting obstacles in the path of comprehension. If you refuse to speak comprehensibly and non-lipogrammatically after I have repeatedly asked you to lose the lipogram for the purposes of discussion, then you are going out of your way to guarantee that I cannot follow all that you say. I am not going to waste my time trying to parse your words any longer in light of your clear WP:POINT violations. Let me quote the nutshell of that policy: "If you think you have a valid point, causing disruption is probably the least effective way of presenting that point". I have told you that your lipogrammatic talk page comments are disruptive and hard to understand. Do not refer me to a grid of words you are not willing to write simply because you are making a disruptive point.

I am willing to compile a list of specific problems with this article when I have a chance, but I'm not going to engage any longer in this game of monkeys throwing faeces at each other. -Phoenixrod (talk) 19:04, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Our story so far

• Phoínixrod and I both find that this topic, as it stands today, fails our standards. I would trim 3 tag words (also known as [2]-[5]-[9] at Talk:Gadsby (book)#Wordlist); Phoínixrod would add 9 words or so, and has not said what, if anything, is on his list additionally.
• If a contributor finds anything confusing, that party should particularly say so and all can discuss it. But our discussion about all 12 words has not found actual middling ground so far.
• Phoínixrod, I put no bar in your way. Just as anybody would, I think of all my options for wording, and I pick that which I think has most clarity. If a nonlipogram is truly fitting, I can do that (as I did with that wordlist).
• 10 or 11 contributors so far talk in lipogram; I just do it most. So is it all of us disrupting to win points? (81.134.54.129, JIP, Robin Johnson, Zuiram, Dpbsmith, Thu, zzo38, Orv, Synchronism; and Soap in univocalic, which is also lipogram!)
• Still waiting for that list of confusions and how you would go for improving such.
• No scatological simians that I know of, sorry. JJB 02:52, 26 Oct 2008 (UTC)

JJB, thank you for your version of events. My previous comments stand from here.

As for your point about other contributors who have commented in lipograms, note that they did not do so in long and arcane paragraphs after being asked not to.

Still with the list of "e" words you refuse to say? I'm disappointed. I thought you actually wanted this discussion to improve the article. -Phoenixrod (talk) 06:02, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

I did a quick run-through, improving what I could to Wikipedia's normal standards, but it is still confusing for someone who hadn't read the story...and that's not what this article is for. I'm going to tag the plot summary with an {{inuniverse}} tag, there's a requested move in, and we'll see what happens. Feel free to userfy your lipogram version, but it can not stay as a Wikipedia article. My apologies and cheers, —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 16:41, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

hahaha well done

Glad to see wikipedia still has a sense of humour. I was beginning to worry about this place. --86.135.177.237 (talk) 13:03, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it's pretty cool. I'm not telling the net-nannies on you.TCO (talk) 11:31, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Seeking input from WikiProject Novels

Because the top of the talk page says that this article falls under the WikiProject Novels, I have started a thread at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Novels/GeneralForum#Gadsby seeking outside input into how lipogrammatical this article should be. -Phoenixrod (talk) 06:42, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Bad idea...run silent, run deep...with things like this.TCO (talk) 11:32, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Why...? —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 16:35, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Because we raise the ire of people with no love for the article, but who just like being rule-followers.TCO (talk) 18:34, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

TCO, the discussion lingered for months without getting anywhere. What would you have me do other than seek further input? Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution#Ask_about_the_subject is rather clear on the matter. Are you suggesting that it's a bad idea to resolve disputes? -Phoenixrod (talk) 18:52, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

[Note that I was responding to this version of TCO's comment. TCO, please don't change your comments once people have responded to them; wording is sometimes significant. You can always strike through them if you want to change them, but don't re-write them after the fact. -Phoenixrod (talk) 19:22, 26 October 2008 (UTC)]

Naw...that's cool.TCO (talk) 19:11, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

As I noted there, writing this article as a lipogram (at least, if it can be done well...) is fine by me. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 08:45, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

It is unfortunate, but the immediately preceding caveat is impossible without the use of the integral English definite article. To grammatically describe any superlative in a sentence almost always requires "the"'s use. Really, this article needs to consider readers' needs first and to that end it needs to be consistent with the rest of the project. That means in the future restricting intentional lipograms to the text of the article, and even then, only if it makes sense. The tacit (not overwhelming) use of lipograms will still be appreciated by privy readers. Let's document the fully 'lipogrammatic' version at WP:humour or somewhere around there.

That said, I respect the current lipogram convention while this discussion procedes. That said, I rewrote the lead (in response to the list of concerns with the lead by Phoenixrod) so that it fit "proper" syntax, and it remained a lipogram while providing essential context (subtly wikiling the hated letter as highly typicial glyph for example). TCO reverted it but without any meaningful explanation stating that "the ongoing discussion is ongoing" (my parsing). And he reverted it to a version predating my edit by thirty-six minutes that's why I'm going to revert TCO's reversion, find something specific and delete it for a rational reason, TCO. Let the discussion continue.Synchronism (talk) 02:00, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was move to Gadsby: Champion of Youth. JPG-GR (talk) 16:47, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Gadsby (book) → Gadsby (novel) — per WP naming conventions. (This is not a non-fiction book.) — —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 15:47, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Survey

Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this section with *'''Support''' or *'''Oppose''', then sign your comment with ~~~~. Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's naming conventions.

• Support per my nom so that this article, like all of the other article here, follows the naming conventions. —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 16:12, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose. It messes up the lipogramatic quality. Wiki can survive having this article as a lipogram. It survives April 1st. A lot of heart went into the current article.TCO (talk) 18:53, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• Support because Gadsby is a novel, and that designation is more precise than "book". Similarly, we have an article for Milton Bradley (baseball), not Milton Bradley (sports player). I quote in italics from Wikipedia:Naming_conventions#Books_-_literary_works: To disambiguate, add the type of literary work in parentheses, such as "(novel)", "(novella)", "(short story)", etc. You may use "(book)" to disambiguate a non-fiction book. This seems quite clear. -Phoenixrod (talk) 18:58, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• Support, but I think the debate over the title is secondary to the larger argument over the article itself, and I think we should all come to an agreement on that before we go about moving the page or editing the text in it. I, at least, will not edit anything until that happens. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 19:05, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• Strong oppose. Lighten up, everyone, this is excellent, and far more informative as is than if it's messed up. Oh, and see Lipogram for those who don't get it. Andrewa (talk) 19:30, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
  • However, support move to any title which would preserve the lipogram and can gain consensus - one suggested by others below, and perhaps there are other possibilities. Andrewa (talk) 14:07, 31 October 2008 (UTC)
• Support: This article should be encyclopedic, not a clumsy homage for the sake of an April Fools joke. I hope that this renaming process will be the first step in restoring a professional standard to such an important article. Funny or not, it's inappropriate. María (habla conmigo) 19:33, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• Support, because Gadsby is a novel :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 13:56, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose We could have Gadsby (lipogram), Gadsby (story) or Gadsby (fiction) but novel would be wrong, it would look as if we hadn't got the point of it. ϢereSpielChequers 16:08, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
• Support — As cool/neat/awesome as this article may have been, lipogrammatic writing is not appropriate. Gadsby is a novel. The naming convention for fiction says that, for disambiguation, "add the type of literary work in parentheses." Thus, the article should be at Gadsby (novel). This shouldn't even be up for discussion. Mr. Absurd (talk) 22:55, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
• Oppose. There is nothing inaccurate or problematic about the title "Gadsby (book)." --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 08:46, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
• Support. To place what are admittedly arbitrary restrictions on an encyclopedic article is uncalled for and unnecessary. Padillah (talk) 19:06, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Discussion

Any additional comments:

• I'll hold off until you finish. My opinion is obvious. JJB 16:20, 26 Oct 2008 (UTC)
  • JJ, if you would, please see WP:SIG#Links...thanks. =/ —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 16:29, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• I think the central debate here is whether this article can be allowed to be an exception to the normal rules of Wikipedia because of its amusement value. I think that it should not be, because a lipogram version can always be moved somewhere else and the normal one be left as the first article. But, I admit my argument is probably among the weakest of all the arguments on both sides, and so I have to say that I really no longer have strong feelings either way. I will let other people decide for me. I do think it's silly to extend the lipogram to things such as the article title and the edit links on the page, though, because any fool can say "book" instead of "novel" and it doesn't really add to the cleverness, in my opinion. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 19:10, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• For the record, the article has undergone several moves, historically. I hope I'm not missing any, but this is what I glean from the history: 1) The article was originally at Gadsby, which is now a disambig page. 2) Then it was moved to Gadsby (novel) in 2005, where it remained for almost three years. 3) It was moved on 3 July 2008 to Gadsby: Champion of Youth. 4) It was moved on 25 July 2008 back to Gadsby (novel). 5) It was moved on 18 August 2008 to the current Gadsby (book) around the time of the flare-up of discussion of the lipogram, which has continued since then. There was little or no discussion of these moves. Make of these facts what you will, but I would stress that the current title, Gadsby (book), doesn't exactly have a lot of support historically or in policy. -Phoenixrod (talk) 19:49, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• I reverted this edit, as I believe that it was not justified...if I was wrong in doing so, will a third party revert me? Thanks, —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 20:14, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
  • Alright, Soap. :) —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 20:51, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
• Compromise: Call it Gadsby: Champion of Youth. This is consistent with Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books) (which recommends subtitles in place of a disambiguation as long as it is short - I think we can consider 3 words short) and it keeps the lipogram. Everybody ok with this? -maclean 23:48, 26 October 2008 (UTC)
  • First: yes, that is an okay title. However, some of us have a problem with the article being a lipogram in the first place... (Phoenix, Maria and I so far...) —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 23:57, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

I could go with this title - but the article style has to change (from lipogram that is) it reads so badly and compromises on material content have been made already. :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 13:59, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I think this is right. Strong support (with gratuitous bolding!) for Gadsby: Champion of Youth. --JayHank 05:40, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

• Support for Gadsby: Champion of Youth, in accordance with Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books), whether or not the article is a lipogram. Sssoul (talk) 08:41, 31 October 2008 (UTC)
• Support for Gadsby: Champion of Youth, good suggestion, and appropriate whether or not the lipogrammatic article is itself preserved. Or are there better titles we haven't thought of? Another possibility IMO is Gadsby, currently used for the DAB page that could move to Gadsby (disambiguation) which is currently not even a redirect. I'd think this was arguably the primary meaning. As noted above this article was originally at the undisambiguated name, but was moved, perhaps without discussion (surprisingly perhaps, or perhaps I've missed it... the DAB doesn't have a discussion page at all, and I can't see any discussion here). Andrewa (talk) 14:30, 31 October 2008 (UTC)
• Support --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 19:58, 31 October 2008 (UTC)
• Comment I think including the subtitle is a reasonable compromise, and I would be okay with it. It's certainly a more precise choice than the current (book) designation. At the same time, however, I believe the proposed move to (novel) is better. -Phoenixrod (talk) 03:48, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

• What do you think is wrong with WP:NC-BK#SUB? It distinctly says to put in short subtitlings--to avoid disambiguations. Gadsby: Champion of Youth--four words total--is obviously short. This is a good approach, in my opinion. And fully compliant with WP:NC. Can't all of us happily follow this? -- JayHank 16:09, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

• As I said, Champion of Youth is a reasonable compromise, so please don't imply that I would not accept it. My point is that there is a gray area here. Without question, Wikipedia:NAME#Books_-_literary_works suggests Gadsby (novel) as the title we should use. I acknowledge that Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(books)#Subtitles tries to be more specific, but I don't think it clearly says what you claim (further, it appears to be somewhat poorly written). It starts, "Usually, a Wikipedia article on a book does not include its subtitle in the Wikipedia page name. The only exception to that is short titles, for disambiguation purposes". What does "short" mean? You assume it means a word count. I believe, from the examples given, that it is a character count. "Champion of Youth" is longer than " (novel)" for this Gadsby article. Therefore, I believe that Gadsby (novel) is better under both policies. -Phoenixrod (talk) 16:50, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

• You think the intent of the subtitle guideline is that we should use subtitles when the title is shorter than "(novel)". "Character count" is an absurd interpretation. So it was for all those books and novels with 4 letter subtitles? That's not a reasonable interpretation, especially since it's directly contradicted by the very first example. Orlando: A Biography is longer than Orlando (novel). --JayHenry (talk) 17:28, 2 November 2008 (UTC)
• Also, please read Wikipedia:NAME#Books_-_literary_works again. What's the last sentence? "Rationale, specifics and exceptions: see: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books)". Contrary to your assertion, both guidelines are actually quite clear. NAME says to refer to NC-BK for exceptions. NC-BK says to use subtitles. Your interpretation of character count is obviously not what was intended. --JayHenry (talk) 17:35, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

JayHenry, I have read both policies several times, and I am quite aware that one policy points to the other for specifics and exceptions. That is exactly why I focused on your link to NC-BK in my comment. Please don't willfully misunderstand me; as I said, we are not so far apart in that "Champion of Youth" is a reasonable title, and better than the current one.

I think it would be bad form for me to attack all of the "absurd" arguments above in the Survey section, but you insist on arguing over what amounts to a really, really minor point in the whole discussion. Let me repeat again that Champion of Youth is a reasonable compromise. I'm not sure why you are pushing against that statement.

I don't know where you are getting "all those books and novels with 4 letter subtitles"—did I mention such a list? Look, I did not mean a strict character count as in "Orlando: A Biography has X characters. Orlando (novel) has Y. X > Y, so we must prefer Y." That is why I said "gray area". I would call those similiar lengths, namely short, so of course the subtitle is preferable per the guideline. Sure, "character count" was probably a poor choice of words—perhaps you'd prefer if I said something like "visual length"?

But please read again the last two examples at Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(books)#Subtitles. One says to prefer "Social Contract (Rousseau), not The Social Contract, Or Principles of Political Right". Why not include the subtitle there? Because it's signficantly longer than the disambiguating version. The last example says to prefer "On the Origin of Species, not ... On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection". Again, the second version is not a huge number of extra words, but it makes the title no longer qualify as short.

So, to reiterate my earlier point, it comes down to how we define "short". It is a judgment call, so calling it absurd when I disagree, in however minor a degree, is crossing the line. It's fine if you disagree with my interpretation of when a title goes from "short" to "long" or when the length becomes a greater concern than avoiding a disambiguation, but how then do you define the difference? (Since apparently you are able to divine the intent of the guideline and I am not.)

Finally, it is simply not true that "NC-BK says to use subtitles." Rather, it claims the opposite except in rare circumstances: "Usually, a Wikipedia article on a book does not include its subtitle in the Wikipedia page name." In other words, the onus is on editors to prove an exception rather than to claim that the subtitle is a rule. Furthermore, "The only exception to that is short titles, for disambiguation purposes." Clearly, the "purpose" behind the move to Champion of Youth is to maintain a lipogram, not to disambiguate. -Phoenixrod (talk) 18:48, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I do think that "Champion of Youth" is clearly a short subtitle. I could just as easily claim that the "purpose" of your desire to move to "(novel)" is motivated by your fervent desire to undo the lipogram. Instead let's talk about the guideline. The Rousseau book with subtitle is 53 characters. Gadsby is 25. It's less than half the size and yet you refuse to acknowledge this is smaller! The Darwin example is about whether to include the subtitle when there's no issue about disambiguation. --JayHenry (talk) 19:12, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Ed...you might even be right...that this should not be a lipogram:

Who knows. All of us have acknowledged that point. But consensus was to leave it. Heck, there is an April Fool's joke and Brittinaca doesn't have that. So who says that for sure, we can't have something like this. Especially if well done. But who knows, you might be right.

But...just storming in here...with NO DISCUSSION and by fiat messing the thing up is uncool. Make your case in discussion, first.TCO (talk) 18:42, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

This consensus was a total vote tallied over 3 years...as I noted above, "2005 on Wikipedia was a lot different than 2008 on Wikipedia."

The discussion is ongoing at this second, and the changes I made to the article are fully within WP policies... —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 20:07, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

I believe the general practice is to leave the main page alone until a consensus has been reached on the talk page. I will revert it back to the lipogrammed version now so that it doesnt look like we are ignoring the rules. I appreciate the work you did and it can always be used as a starting point in the future. If you want to copy the whole page to a subpage of your userspace and edit it there, you can do that. It can be called User:the_ed17/Gadsby for example. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 20:47, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Note: by consensus, I dont mean an informal survey of users, but rather the whole Wikipedia:DR dispute resolution process. Soap ^Talk/_{Contributions} 20:50, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

What I've seen is WP:BRD; Be Bold, Revert, Discuss. If you want to, make a change, if it gets reverted then go to the talk page. I must admit, I've not really been in a discussion where the entirety of the article is the contentious edit. Padillah (talk) 19:12, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

This lipogram stuff has got to go.

I saw this on the WikiProject/Novels page and came to have a look. The biggest problem I have is there is nothing that notes the article as a lipogram. As such it's just a messy read. I made a few edits and was reverted so I came to the talk page to participate in the discussion, but I can't find any. There are several editors that disagree the article should be written in this way, there's even a poll about the name, but there's no discussion regarding whether the article should be maintained as a lipograph or not. How can I violate talk page consensus when there's no discussion going on? I've reverted the edits since there is no talk page discussion and would like to start with suggesting this entire format is one big WP:IDONTLIKEIT. Being in lipogram format adds nothing to the article and should stop. Padillah (talk) 19:20, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Um, essentially this entire talk page is devoted to the discussion as to the format this article should be in. I'm sorry you don't like it, but you were drawn here by a note that asked you to contribute to the consensus; which you've summarily ignored. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 20:52, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

You'l forgive me for not wanting to wade through that morass of indecipherable prose o determine what that guy was on about. I have an aversion to getting into discussions with people that are being intentionally obtuse so that they don't have to listen to others. It annoys me when my three year old does it and it annoys me when JJB and others do it. Padillah (talk) 22:32, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia! ;) --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 23:42, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, most of the whole talk page is one long discussion about the lipogram. I'd encourage jbmurray not to throw around the word "consensus", though, in edits like this one; there's hardly a clear decision yet. I think the only agreement right now is that we won't try to force through major changes without discussion—such as completely undoing the lipogram. I'd also encourage Padillah not to use WP:IDONTLIKEIT in the discussion; as I understand matters, that is a deletion argument. I'm working on a list of specific problems with the lipogrammatic version of the article which I hope will spark more specific discussion, but I'm sure it won't be a complete list. -Phoenixrod (talk) 01:32, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Heh. I'm not sure about "throwing around." But there does seem to be a consensus, albeit a fairly precarious one that is currently (and not for the first time) coming under fire. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 04:14, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Wait: to go on a quick vote count, there are 7 supports and 4 opposes. (With the first oppose having the weird reason of "It messes up the lipogramatic quality." HUH?) Doesn't that point to a (albeit precarious) consensus of support? —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 04:19, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what exactly you're counting. But above, another editor counts "48 favoring [writing the article as a lipogram], 33 (including vandals; plus four probably socks) against. A goodly majority of all chiming in favor a lipogram." --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 23:16, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it's rather clear that the_ed17 was counting votes on the proposed move to Gadsby (novel), and probably extrapolating that as support for a "normal" (i.e., unlipogrammatic) article. The count you cite by JJB above is extremely flawed for a number of reasons that should be clear from old discussion and from the article's history. In any case, I think that the conflicting ways of counting "votes" itself shows that there's no clear consensus numerically—although the policy arguments are weighted heavily against the lipogram. -Phoenixrod (talk) 03:40, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Two things: 1) I meant WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT, but you already brought that up (several times from what I can see). Thanks for the poke-in-the-ribs. 2) I never agreed to this Not making edits that mess up the lipogram. And I don't see why anyone that doesn't support the style could agree to support it. The requirements of Wikipedia are counter to the lipogrammic style, <ref> tags have already been brought up, not to mention the refs themselves. This page has no citations and as such would fail an AfD in a relativly short amount of time. Applying arbitrary restrictions on article content is not conducive to being lucid. Padillah (talk) 12:16, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

It's simply not true that the article has no citations, or that it would fail AfD. In fact, if anything it has too many citations; this is one of its weaknesses. Also too many of its references are poor ones. The number of citations and the number of references should both be cut. Meanwhile, I think you're confusing one particular format for citations ("ref" tags) with citations per se. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 23:14, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

It is tricky but I would say go for the lipogram. Martin Hogbin (talk) 23:07, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Okay, but why? How about some reasoning instead of what amounts to a pure vote? -Phoenixrod (talk) 03:40, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Fun, interest, ignore all the rules, occasional exception, why not? As I will make clear elsewhere, I think the lipogram should be restricted to the main text with footnotes added to remove what I consider the be abusive use, such as modification of proper nouns.Martin Hogbin (talk) 10:42, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

List of specific complaints about the lipogram

Okay, I'm compiling specific problems with the lipogram. This list is incomplete (on the first go-around, I'm not going to attempt dealing with the body of the article yet). Taken together, I think they make a compelling argument for why the article should not be a lipogram.

Novels Infobox:

1. Author should be the full name, not Vin Wright. The author is Ernest Vincent Wright, not Vin Wright. We should not make up a nickname for him. As evidence, I'll point out that Googling "ernest vincent wright" and gadsby leads to 6310 hits, while "vin wright" and gadsby yields literally five hits.
2. I'm glad we are calling the book a novel now, since that's what it is. "Novel" is a genre studied in literature; "popular fiction" is a much looser term that is so broad as to be almost meaningless. And really, was Gadsby ever popular or widely read once the lipogrammatic shock factor wore off?

References/Citations/Attribution to works (or whatever the section is called today):

1. Walt Abish should be Walter Abish. Let's use real names instead of making up redirects that are used once.
2. Al Ross, Jr. should be A. Ross Eckler, Jr.. Removing his last name or piping a link to FaRO is silly. Wikipedia uses last names to refer to authors. Let's do that here.
3. Douglas Richard should be Douglas Hofstadter. Again, use his actual name, including the e. He is not D.R.H.; we need to use his last name. This clearly playful piece aside, he is Hofstadter in academic publications. See WP:EGG, which advises, "Do not use piped links to create "easter egg links", that require the reader to follow them before understanding what's going on."
4. Oxford Dictionary is likely an incomplete reference, since there are many Oxford dictionaries.
5. Various other citations that aren't linked (for example, Indy staff when the newspaper's name is The Evening Independent). I'm sure there are others. All of these problems with references stem from avoiding the letter E. Is the point of citation to show off how smart we are—or to help readers find more information? The article is currently privileging the show-off route. Bad idea.

See also/Similar topics section:

1. "See also" is the standard name. "Similar topics" loses the distinction of whether the link is internal (within Wikipedia) or external.
2. "Taxonomic list of lipograms" is redundant with Category:Lipograms on the bottom of the page. I hope I don't have to explain why we shouldn't hide the categories.
3. "Lipogrammatic discussion of Gadsby" links back to this page. Maybe that's a way of avoiding direct self-reference (for example, saying "This article is a lipogram"), but it's certainly in the spirit of self-reference. Either way, I don't see the point of the link. Let's remove it.

External links/Auxiliary links:

1. "External links" is the standard section title. No need to vary. In fact, "external" has the added benefit of indicating that the links are outside of Wikipedia, in contrast to a standard "See also" section. "Auxiliary" loses the distinction.
2. Do we need a link to a copy of the novel? I'm not sure on this one, but isn't there a Wikisource template that would be clearer?
3. We don't need two links to the full book. Let's cut the spinelessbooks.com link.
4. Why do we need a WorldCat link? It isn't Wikipedia's job to find all the world's copies.
5. The link called "Facts" has incomplete citation information. Critically, it was published in the magazine Time but doesn't say so. Come on ... Readers shouldn't have to click on links before they know what they are looking at. See Wikipedia:Self-references_to_avoid#Think_about_print; some readers will print articles or view them on other websites/mirrors, so we should not obscure information.
6. In the "About Words" link, what is "alphagrammatic rarity"? Let's say what we mean here. Clarity does not mean dumbing down.

Introduction:

1. "Intrawar" should be "interwar": intra is a prefix meaning "within", whereas we should say "between the wars". The redirect was created by JJB on July 3, and this is the only use of intrawar on Wikipedia. It's not accurate.
2. "Intrawar account" is vague. What sort of account? Is it fictional? Is it a newspaper profile? The sentence goes on to say that Branton Hills is a fictional city, but that still doesn't address the form/genre of the "account". A better, clearer phrasing would be something like "1939 novel".
3. Author's name should be accurate. I addressed this with the infobox above.
4. Why are there no footnotes for claims? We should be using <ref>.
5. Gadsby is "possibly most famous" and "probably most ambitious" of a set of lipograms, but the introduction fails to mention why. This leads into the next point.
6. The novel is notable because it does not use the letter E. Let's say so in plain English. Otherwise, we fail WP:LEAD and possibly fail to establish the article's notability in the introduction.

-Phoenixrod (talk) 03:31, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate the time you've taken to draw up specific issues. But I do think that the discussion has to be a general one: Obviously, if you set out to write with such a restriction, you are forced to come up with some rather odd formulations. That's no great surprise.

The question is whether or not the article can be written well, or well enough, in lipogrammatic style.

And what does "written well" mean? Well, I think it's quite the opposite of the "show off" posturing that you claim. Ideally, a well-written lipogram should not be immediately obvious. The reader should note that something is off, but without being entirely sure what.

Of course, once the restriction is pointed out, it's obvious. But I don't think that it's a problem that it's not immediately clear what's going on in this article: again, that's the point. And it's quite different from showing off.

Could this article be written better, in lipogrammatic style? Undoubtedly. Could it be written like any other article and still be a lipogram: obviously not; that's the point. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 04:20, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

These "odd formulations" are what we are complaining about.

Still though: what is so wrong with using <ref> when that is hidden to the reader?

References have to be complete; citing complete and accurate sources is a fundamental cornerstone of Wikipedia that cannot be changed just because the article is written in lipogrammatic style. How can readers look up sources for themselves if the source's name is not complete? Regardless of what happens in this RfC, the sources and in-line citation [roblems have to be fixed. —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 04:28, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) If the reader senses that something is "off", then it's not really an encyclopedic tone and style, is it? To my mind, the logical conclusion of your reasoning, jbmurray, is that the lipogram shouldn't be on Wikipedia. *shrug*

We've had a couple months of general wrangling. Before that, over several years, the issue came up repeatedly, again generally. In reply to JJB's request for specific problems above, I compiled this starter list of problems. Whether the lipogram stays or goes, the points above must be addressed.

I'm starting with an assumption that the needs of an encyclopedia's readers come first. Does having the Gadsby article as a lipogram help readers? I don't see how, since you admit that "you are forced to come up with some rather odd formulations." -Phoenixrod (talk) 04:34, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

(this is mostly a reply to jbmurray) Let's say that I know nothing about Gadsby, or lipograms for that matter. I come to this article, read the lead section in its current state. What do I learn? It's an "account", a long "story", and a "lipogram" (?). Then there's this befuddling sentence: "it is possibly most famous of all Anglic-group lipograms, and probably most ambitious also." What does that even mean? I honestly don't think I would have noticed that the article itself were a lipogram, mirroring the style of the novel itself; how could I, when the article doesn't even say that the novel was written without the letter "e"? I would have read that last sentence and thought "wow, this article was written by someone who doesn't speak fluent English. I should copy-edit." Truthfully, the rest of the article isn't much better. Unless there is someone out there who is able and willing to write a lipogrammatical article that also fulfills Wikipedia's preference for professional prose, then this problem will be ongoing. The benefit of an accurate, well written and verifiable article far outweighs what is essentially a cutesy homage. María (habla conmigo) 12:27, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Of the inordinate amount of issues already raised by Phoenixrod I think the overriding problems would be the restrictions on the citations. To write the article itself in lipogrammic style is an exercise in self-flagellation, but the unnecessary obfuscation of citations and author names is down right misleading and the use of pseudonyms, self-published nick-names, and just plain leaving off full names is wrong and nothing should allow us to represent incorrect information.

If the lipogrammic style is going to be used it should not be the basis for putting in incorrect information "Intrawar" means "within the war" not "between the wars", that statement is blatantly wrong. JJB's intention aside, they do not get to redefine the English language (no matter how many redirects they use). NOTHING should allow us to represent incorrect information. That will change as soon s I finish this post. Padillah (talk) 12:36, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with this. False or misleading information should not be presented. Have a bit of fun with a lipogrammatic article but use full-fat footnotes etc.Martin Hogbin (talk) 10:47, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

@Jbmurray, Please understand, there is NO amount of discussion that will make incorrect information acceptable. If you can post a citation that "intrawar" means "between wars" than it can be included (for what it's worth, you might wat to start here, or here). Just because some of you guys want to be "cutsie" with the article doesn't mean it gets to be wrong. You want the "E" out of there? Try harder. This is what JJB was touting as the big challenge of lipograms, your vocabulary is limited. You don't just get to make up new vocabulary because you can't come up with a non-e word. Bogus redirects are just as unacceptable. This is a big reason not to continue with the lipogrammatic style for the article: it relies on tricks and gimmicks to accomplish the task. As an encyclopedic article we shouldn't have to rely on gimmicks to inform people. Padillah (talk) 20:15, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

There's nothing here about being "cutsie," whatever that's supposed to mean. If you think this article is a "gimmick," then you presumably also think that the novel itself is a gimmick. Which is fine and fair enough. But why not then go off and edit on something that interests you, and work to improve those articles rather than indulging in tedious wikilawyering here. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 20:31, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I think that "cutsey" means that this article is not up to Wikipedia's normal standards...articles here are supposed to have (to quote Maria) "professional prose". This article does not have that, and therefore it should be edited to reflect these standards. If this article could incorporate "professional prose" with a (mostly) lipogrammatic style, I'm all for that. However, basic cornerstones of Wikipedia should not, and can not be sacrificed to achieve this goal...i.e. in-line citations with <ref> tags should be added (can't even see the tags anyway unless you hit [edit]); book titles have to be corrected to their proper names, correct synonyms must be used and something as basic as the author's name must be correct. —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 00:27, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

If the point is that the article is not good enough, then say so: say that the article is bad, rather than it's "cutsie" or even "cutsey." Given that this article's critics are consistently arguing for a simpler and clearer approach, I'm rather surprised that they beat around the bush.

So let's improve the prose. The question is whether it's possible to do so and retain the lipogram.

Those who say it isn't, of course, are similar to those who say it is not possible to write a novel that eschews the letter e.

One way forward might be to define the limits of lipogramicity. I would personally have no problem in saying that the Infobox and the "References" section could contain the letter. (Note however, that <ref> tags are not required by the MOS; though personally, again, I have no problem with the letter e being used in mark-up that is invisible to the casual reader.

All this seems suitably in line with the practice of Gadsby itself, in which the letter "e" figures on the front cover, for instance.

But once more, those people who are stamping their feet and saying that somehow by definition it would be impossible to write a Wikipedia article without the letter "e" are hardly helping improve the article itself.

This is far from being the only bad article on Wikipedia; in fact it's better than many, better even perhaps than the large majority, and it has been written with deliberate self-restrictions. The question is whether it can be still better and retain those restrictions. I see no reason in principle why not. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 02:09, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Note that I did not say anything about killing the lipogram to "reflect [the] standards" of Wikipedia. :) I have no problem with retaining the lipogram in the article proper if the following happen:

• The infobox is corrected using "e".
• The references are corrected using "e".
  • Yes, <ref> tags are not required, but their use would preserve the article's lipogram while allowing sources (authors) that have an "e" in their name. I.e. instead of "lorm ipsum (Ed, 1009)." we see "lorm ipsum[1]" where the [1] goes down to the References. Does that make sense?
• Sources are corrected using "e".
• Basically, as long as the lipogram is confined to being below the introduction and above the references, then (IMHO, at least) it can stay--as long as...
• the most important part of all this: the lipogram must have—if not totally professional—very good prose. Considering that readers who have not read the novel will not even be aware of the missing letter, the prose has to be of a quality where it is noticeable that something is different, but everything is still understandable. If this does not/can not happen, then I believe that the lipogram has to go.
• Last thing: I believe that the intro should not be bound by the lipogram so that it can explain in plain, normal English, that the letter "e" is not used, among other things. (And hey—the book's intro used "e", so why not us? :D) —Ed 17 for President _{Vote for Ed} 02:33, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

That seems fair to me. Perhaps the lead could still be a lipogram that specifically mentions e? There's nothing wrong with an article's prose reflecting the prose of its topic- it's to be expected.Synchronism (talk) 03:20, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I would also broadly support this proposal, though I'm less convinced by the introduction using the letter e. In fact, I'll put this proposal in a separate section so it doesn't get lost... --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 05:38, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Most of the above complaints do not seem to strongly connected to the fact that the article is a lipogram and those that are seem relatively minor. Martin Hogbin (talk) 23:17, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Can you perhaps be a little more specific? When compiling the list, I aimed for problems that are caused by the lipogram. I wouldn't classify them as "minor" by any stretch of the imagination. -Phoenixrod (talk) 03:32, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps you could give me an example from above of something that you consider a major concern and caused by the article being a lipogram. Martin Hogbin (talk) 10:14, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

For starters, how about everything in the list at Talk:Gadsby_(book)#List_of_specific_complaints_about_the_lipogram? Even you have acknowledged that references and "intrawar" are problems. I'm baffled how you can recognize that those are significant problems elsewhere in the discussion and yet forget that in this section. -Phoenixrod (talk) 16:56, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

I have read the above list and the points seem to be about issues unrelated to the article being a lipogram or minor. Perhaps you could tell me what you consider to be the three most important points in the above list.Martin Hogbin (talk) 18:38, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

I admit I'm baffled; I don't know how to reply to that request. I consider them all important, and most deal in part with the lipogram. I think "reducing" a set of specific complaints would gut them and reduce their impact. If I must make a set of principles off the cuff, I would say this:

1. The article must say clearly, for a general reader, why the book is notable. That is probably impossible without mentioning that the novel doesn't use E.
2. References must be complete. Redirects and WP:EGG-violating links like Ross, Jr, Al are inappropriate.
3. You cannot have an encyclopedic article about a book without calling its author by his real name. Vin Wright does not exist except in this article and its mirrors.

If you consider those points minor, then I really don't think we can discuss productively. -Phoenixrod (talk) 18:59, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

1. I see no logic in that statement. If it is possible to write a novel without using the letter E then I am sure that it is also possible to provide a good explanation of almost anything using the same lipogram.Martin Hogbin (talk) 21:34, 2 November 2008 (UTC)
2. I agree, we should use non-lipogram footnotes.Martin Hogbin (talk) 21:34, 2 November 2008 (UTC)
3. I thing the link to the full name is acceptable. It is easy enough to see the real name.Martin Hogbin (talk) 21:34, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

There may be a better way of naming the author though.Martin Hogbin (talk) 19:00, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, Martin but I'm forced to ask - Are you being obtuse on purpose? The ability to plainly describe the lipogrammic style of the novel is seriously jeopardized by the exclusion of the very letter we are asked to distinguish. Yes, it can be described in lipogrammic style, but not as plainly, smoothly, or bluntly as simply stating "The novel does not use words that contain the letter "e" ". 11 words (well, 10 and the letter) If you can come up with a sentence that's as plain and uses 11 or fewer words I'll be impressed. And I don't think Phoenixrod was referring to a link to the authors name, I think he wants to state the authors full name. What is wrong with paying the author the respect of using his given name when referring to him? What "better way" would there be of referring to an author than by his given name? The one he used in the publication of the novel, no less. Padillah (talk) 19:25, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes: for me, including the author's full name is on the level with having full, clear citations. I highly doubt an article could reach FA status without mentioning its author's real name. WP:EGG seems pretty clear about that, as well as what I might daringly call common sense. -Phoenixrod (talk) 20:49, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Edit Break

@Jbmurray: "Cutsie" refers to the self-imposed arbitrary rules that some editors think it would be cute to enforce. That's exactly the kind of self-flagellation that is driving the editing of this article. All edits should be with the goal of improving the article, how does maintaining the lipogrammic style in the face of obfuscation and inaccuracy improve the article? The correction you made is fine with me, and I'm sure no one here has a problem with edits that improve the article. What is being objected to is that the article is suffering from this self-imposed restriction. You suggest that I may find the original work a "gimmick" as well, well it is. Wright admits that it's a gimmick, The Blah Story is a gimmick too. Gimmicks are used all the time in novels, no one's debating their use in that medium. I'm not even objecting to this article - I'm objecting to the self-imposition at the expense of clarity and accuracy. To create redirects for the sole purpose of obscuring the use of an "E"-word is not in the best interests of the article. To include blatantly incorrect information and hope links will clean it up is down-right under-handed. And with all the respect this article format is trying to pay the author, why would it be acceptable to not mention him by name? After reading the comments above I think you and Ed have a point; I couldn't care less if the article is in lipogrammatic style or not, so long as it's not inaccurate or obfuscated for the sake of that style. The article should come first, not the style. Padillah (talk) 12:09, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

party poopers

I think there are some people at wiki who either got beat up a lot in school...or should have.TCO (talk) 09:45, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Were there any personal attacks you had in mind or were you just generally attacking all other editors? Padillah (talk) 12:09, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Everyone: to quote a cartoon rabbit, "if you can't say something nice [or constructive], don't say nothing at all". Let's be civil. María (habla conmigo) 12:30, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I am familiar with this work, and saw this discussion just looking through random logs. I find such an idiosyncratic approach to writing about this topic particularly fitting. My thoughts: Wikiformatting such as for ¹ tags would not ruin it. But, broadly, I think mimicry of this work's particular idiosyncracy is okay. Anybody can intuit that most writing, syntax, and phrasing in discussion of this book (and not just our own) is faintly unnatural. And that's crucial. Our mimicry of this unnatural aura is an aid for anybody who is trying to grasp this work's most basic quirk. Omission of that glyph (most common glyph of all, is it not?) is intriguing and also a bit jarring. But it's okay, in my opinion, for us to try an unusual approach for such an unusual topic. As I said, a bit jarring, but worth living with. Avoid that glyph! On uncommon occasion I think it's a worthy goal to WP:IAR and do it with jazz and gusto! This is such an opportunity. --JayHank 05:16, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Similarly.Martin Hogbin (talk) 23:20, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

I lubz you guys! TCO (talk) 11:24, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

When referring to WP:IAR, please remember the key part of the rule: "If a rule prevents you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore it." This lipogram is PREVENTING us from improving the article. Therefore the lipogram should be ignored.--Aervanath lives in the Orphanage 04:16, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

A bit of clarification... This lipogram is not a policy of our Wiki. WP:IAR is about ignoring our own maxims and axioms and such. I admit that using this lipogram is a constraint of sorts. But I do not think that it stops us from improving or maintaining anything. It is primarily a constraint on writing. But for anybody looking up Gadsby, using this lipogram throughout, actually aids in grasping what is so significant about this work (for what it's worth, I do support limits: no lipogram in wikimarkup, infobox, citations, and so on). So I'm saying WP:IAR: it's not that this lipogram is policy--it's that this lipogram allows us to accomplish our goal of imparting important information about this topic with utmost quality (and not too narrowly assuming what words can do that). --JayHank 05:06, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

I cannot express how strongly I disagree that "for anybody looking up Gadsby, using this lipogram throughout, actually aids in grasping what is so significant about this work". Should we run off and write Le Train de Nulle Part without verbs? That's virtually the same argument, taken to an even further extreme. -Phoenixrod (talk) 17:01, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Done it. Martin Hogbin (talk) 19:08, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

It was not just to make a point Phoenixrod, you will see that it hand been done before. You could have left it for the regular editors of that page to decide whether they liked it or not. Martin Hogbin (talk) 21:24, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that page has "regular" editors, since it had been edited all of once in the last year. But your edit introduced ungrammatical prose and left a sentence hanging unfinished. If jbmurrary wants to say I'm violating WP:POINT by reverting that, I just don't get it. You will see disagreement on the talk page there as well, so that's the kind of change that (even if done well) ought to be discussed before changing the current state of the article. -Phoenixrod (talk) 15:26, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I can not understand you, party poop. Omit glyph, por favor! TCO (talk) 18:03, 2 November 2008 (UTC)