Talk:John Osborne

message: As of 25.06.2006 it is interesting that Osborne´s disowning of his daughter Nolan, presumably because she was non-intellectual, has been airbrushed out: see earlier versions. Why the hagiography? The same problem occurs, after all, in the life of Ingmar Bergman: questionable personal behaviour as against Great Art.
: I've restored the 'Women' section, including his unspeakable treatment of Nolan. I don't usually go in for revert wars but unless 216.175.113.47 wants to post some justification for deleting it I'm going to insist on it. Please sign contributions to talk pages. Thanks. El Ingles 14:33, 25 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  What happened to Nolan? 

message: Was his "serious liver crisis" the result of alcohol?Lestrade (talk) 16:32, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes -- his preferred poison was champagne. Heilpern pp 428-9 provides the medical details. --El Ingles (talk) 16:38, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Drink?

message: Apart from Nolan, mentioned in the article, did J. Osborne have any other child? --80.36.68.39 (talk) 07:48, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: No. His wife Mary Ure gave birth to a son and named him Colin Murray Osborne, but the father was Robert Shaw, with whom she was appearing in The Changeling at the time. She married Shaw on 13th April 1963 and as a married couple they legally adopted Colin who then became Colin Murray Shaw. --El Ingles (talk) 17:13, 19 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Children

message: User:NorthLondoner are you proposing to add a screen's worth of quotations for each of Osborne's wives? If so, I'd find that excessive -- the Ure material is of interest but highly selective. If you aren't proposing to add more wives to this compilation, could you possibly explain here why you single out Mary Ure for this treatment? --El Ingles (talk) 19:30, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the clarification. I very much fear that this effort will unbalance the article. But go ahead — perhaps when you've done your extractions all editors of this article can opine. How about Osborne's many mistresses? He wrote of them too. --El Ingles (talk) 21:46, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Way too much about Ure. This is about Osborne and very little of what has been added adds value. If this was a more high profile biography this would have been removed PDQ. I'll wait a while but I will be removing it, pretty much wholesale, unless inclusion is justified. Leaky Caldron 21:53, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  Cool cool, appreciate both of your feedback.  On the basis that it's all source material therefore the worst case scenario is temporary 'over-information', could you give me a couple of weeks to make my extractions and an assessment can then be made of what is pure deletion, what is perhaps for migration (in this case, to Ure's entry) and what shall be retained and in what format.  
I'll be focusing on wives but also adding in relevant mistresses.  Given the amount of polemic on the subject there is justification for expansion on biographical grounds and because much of what Osborne wrote on the subject is very quotable, but only in context, therefore adds to character portrait.  
Anyhow, enough to be getting on with for now. NorthLondoner (talk) 22:10, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: It would be preferable if you familiarised yourself with relevent policy and guidelines on aricle content, balance and weight before adding further superfluous material. Leaky Caldron 22:18, 28 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:   Thank you, will do. NorthLondoner (talk) 22:23, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

text: By word count about 1/3rd is now taken up with the ex-wives content. Even accepting his prolific marriage record I am sure that there is way too much content in this section and I urged NL to consider policy and guidelines last week in order to prevent just what you are suggesting. It requires a major cull to make it more concise. Leaky Caldron 15:16, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you both for your feedback.  I would suggest that seeking to revert the entire exercise does not seem to be a progressive approach given that all of the content is fact-checked, sourced and relevant to Osborne's life.  Osborne's life and work puts him in a different category to all of the playwrights El Ingles mentions.  And in each segment of information about his wives, there is valid biographical information about Osborne himself.  I have already culled the Mary Ure section and would kindly ask that instead of looking to revert what is essentially an expanding exercise, that editors focus instead on expanding the article on Osborne in general.  NorthLondoner (talk) 17:46, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  Additionally El Ingles, I may be comparatively new to wikipedia but you do seem to be using rather proprietal and emotional language which should be flagged up as it would suggest that your motivation may be influenced by ownership of data and inappropriate emotions:  *'As the editor who wrote the original brief' *'I'm not delighted', *'Just as I feared'.  Surely best that we keep ego out of this and strive to achieve an excellent article? NorthLondoner (talk) 17:46, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Considering that I am requesting consensus rather than summarily deleting this extravagant exercise in quoting from a single work, I do not think an accusation of self-declared ownership of this article is justified. --El Ingles (talk) 20:16, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  Perhaps, but you felt it necessary to point out you were the 'editor who wrote the original brief' - something which is not relevant.  My understanding of wikipedia is that once something has been submitted there is no direct 'ownership' of it, rather it is in the public domain and up to interested members of the public to collaborate and edit in order to make it into the best article possible.  I am simply putting information up there and defending the case for expanding what previously was a good article but with scope for expansion.  Having read the policy and guidelines Leaky Caldron pointed me in the direction of, it would be surely be the best approach for the future of the article to allow me to make the planned final few amendments and then it can be edited from there.  Your talk of 'reverting the entire exercise' shows an alarming willingness to indiscriminately delete relevant, appropriate and factual information.  However, I trust we can now conclude the 'personal' part of this discourse and focus exclusively on improving this article. NorthLondoner (talk) 21:52, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

text: Thank you vultureofbook.  Am pretty much done with the wives now however I agree with you, there is definitely scope for expanding the information on Nellie Beatrice and this is something I'm happy to be involved in, would also be good to have other editors involved.  Additionally, some information on significant mistresses would be good.  Expanding the wives section has provided additional biographical information on Osborne plus selected, contextual examples of his prose.NorthLondoner (talk) 11:16, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  On a re-reading, I agreed somewhat with El Ingles's point that this was an 'exercise in quoting from a single work' so have aimed to provide all quotations with a context and background and have, during the course of this exercise, removed what seemed to be superfluous quotations and encompassed both of Osborne's autobiographical volumes. Thank you for the time afforded me by other editors. NorthLondoner (talk) 13:58, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Space given to wives 

message: We are told that Osborne was the "first" to oppose "monarchy". I thought that there was something against monarchy in the 17th century in Britain. This included a Civil War. I want less spamming for Osborne.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.98.54.79 (talk) 15:42, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Monarchy 

message: Substituted at 20:19, 29 April 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Assessment comment

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Greetings, fellow Wikipedians! I can see that much effort has been expended on writing (and debating the content in) this article. For that I salute you. It's well-written. But it seems to me that it contains too many unsourced statements. For example:
* "His personal life was extravagant and iconoclastic."
* "Look Back in Anger was largely autobiographical..."
* "...she cuckolded him with a local dentist." (This particularly bothers me. Who says he was cuckolded?  How do we know whether this is true?)
* "...he possessed a native intelligence." 
* "Osborne played the role of Shropshire squire with great pleasure and a heavy dose of irony."
* "Osborne's work transformed British theatre."
Perhaps all of this is factual, well-known or accepted by current literary thinking on Osborne. But it does not belong in Wikipedia unless it can be attributed to reliable, authoritative sources. It is inconsistent with Wikipedia's "neutral point of view" requirement, which states "All articles must strive for verifiable accuracy, citing reliable, authoritative sources...Editors' personal experiences, interpretations, or opinions do not belong." See Wikipedia:Five Pillars. 
I am happy to leave these statements in the article if someone will provide citations ( e.g. statements by published authors, newspaper articles, academic journals, etc.) to support them. If that doesn't happen within one week from today, I propose to delete them. Cordially, BuzzWeiser196 (talk) 13:11, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: I know this is 3 years later than your initial comment, but I wanted to inform you that I also noticed the heavily subjective/biased language used in this article and attempted to remove as much as possible. In many cases I reworded the statements to be more neutral, but in some other cases I just had to delete the statement. A. E. Katz (talk) 02:59, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

text: Sorry to be replying 3-4 years late - a lot of the article in its current state is very indebted to Michael Ratcliffe's entry on Osborne in the Oxford DNB. This includes flamboyant non-Wikipedia-like moments ("Through the 1980s Osborne played the role of Shropshire squire with great pleasure and a heavy slosh of irony"), unsourced quotations ("a radical who hates change"), and unverified statements (he joined CND in 1959), etc. I feel we need to carry on the work User:A._E._Katz has done. Per$1$tenceofv1$1on (talk) 23:29, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

text: Thank you, Stu, for volunteering to address my comments. If I wanted to slash and burn, I would have already deleted those statements. But I prefer a collegial approach. So, if you need more time, by all means take it. As a fellow Wikipedia editor, you deserve to be treated with respect and civility... another of the Five Pillars of Wikipedia. Cordially, BuzzWeiser196 (talk) 19:26, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Issues are resolved. BuzzWeiser196 (talk) 10:17, 14 June 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Too many unsourced statements 

message: The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:
* 
Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 01:07, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion 

message: I would say around half of the sources used in this article all link to John Heilpern's 2006 biography of John Osborne. This gives me some concern. Firstly, relying so much on one source is generally not ideal, but secondly, there are many claims in this article (some of which I removed) that seem highly subjective and I am not sure that this book can be relied on to give factual and unbiased pieces of information. 
Providing more alternative sources would be helpful, if someone is willing to do so. 
Thanks. A. E. Katz (talk) 03:10, 2 October 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: I've been looking for something to back up the anecdote about Olivier, Arthur Miller and The Entertainer, and have come across several online articles, all written by... John Heilpern. Is there a decent biography of Miller that covers this? Per$1$tenceofv1$1on (talk) 23:00, 21 March 2023 (UTC)

text: It's less than a seventh of the citations now, FWIW. Per$1$tenceofv1$1on (talk) 12:49, 28 May 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Overuse of John Heilpern 2006 book 

message: I've just been reading the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography entry on Osborne, and there are plenty of places where this article (in its current state) seems to lift whole phrases and sentences verbatim, e.g.  this passage on his later life: "Through the 1980s Osborne played the role of Shropshire squire with great pleasure and a heavy slosh of irony. He wrote a diary for The Spectator. He opened his garden to raise money for the church roof, from which he threatened to withdraw covenant-funding unless the vicar restored the Book of Common Prayer." I think a thorough edit of this article would only be fair to Michael Ratcliffe, the author, as he isn't credited anywhere. Per$1$tenceofv1$1on (talk) 22:21, 15 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Plagiarism? 

message: The Osborne quote about Max Miller currently occupies a slightly disproportionate place in a section about his heroes/role models (being the only one), and I would have thought a few theatre professionals (George Devine) and playwrights (Strindberg?) would make more sense.Per$1$tenceofv1$1on (talk) 15:49, 10 April 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Idols 

message: The lead section of this article says, accurately, that Osborne became notorious for the violence of his language not only in relation to politics but also against members of his family. The Wikipedia manual, no less than common sense, consequently requires the article to outline his political views in more depth than the one sentence in the section "Critical Responses, Idols and Effect" that outlined them in the article as it stood at the beginning of March 2023, so I have expanded this sentence into two paragraphs and made it a separate section. Because Wikipedia guidelines also say, reasonably, that the better an article is the more structure it will have, I've made it part of the "Personal Life" section, going ahead of the space devoted to Osborne's five marriages (I think this is the structure suggested by the lead section, and also by Osborne's life and career itself). Per$1$tenceofv1$1on (talk) 15:09, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Politics 

message: First of all I'd like to apologise to another contributor for reverting a change they've made, but I think the line in the lead section about Osborne being notorious for the violence of his language should be allowed to stand. The violence of his language against ex-wives and his mother is illustrated in several places in the article (particularly 'Personal Life'); the violence of his language re: politics I believe can be backed up by expanding the 'Politics' section, which I think should be done by citing, briefly, his contribution to Tom Maschler's 1957 Declaration anthology and the 1961 'Letter to My Fellow Countrymen'. I'm hoping to make these changes to the 'Politics' section quite soon, within a week or so, and would ask them for patience in the meantime. Per$1$tenceofv1$1on (talk) 21:50, 19 April 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Violent Language