Talk:The Quiet American

message: It seems incorrect to call it one of his "later" novels when he published it in 1955, and his last was published in 1990.  Approximately 12 published before this one, and ten published afterwards.  According to his Wikibibliography, anyhow.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.226.171.6 (talk) 02:30, 18 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Error 

message: I noticed that there as an article split notice at the top of the page, but I see no rationale for that on this talk page. I think it would be best as one article until it gets too big. So I'm removing the notice. LittleDantalk 01:10, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I hadn't looked at this for a while, & now I see that User:Jazk34 did in fact split the article (into 3 - one for each film version) back on July 17. I mention it here just to clarify the article history, since the edit summaries provided no clue. Editors, please remember to use edit summaries and talk pages when doing that kind of thing... ←Hob 22:35, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article split 

message: The article at one point says: "As Smith asserts in her foreword to the 2002 Vintage edition..." There is no other mention of this 'Smith' anywhere in the article. This needs to be fixed by whoever knows anything about such matters. Tm19 23:01, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's Zadie Smith; that edition is  if you want to find it. I'll fix the name just to make the article less confusing, but I don't think the Smith quote really adds much, and the Themes section needs trimming in general - lots of redundancy and occasional POV. ←Hob 22:22, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Smith unidentified 

message: This was just a long and vague collection of thoughts and interpretation and was highly subjective.  More specifically it is in clear breach of WP:OR. Wikipedia is not an essay forum for lengthy and half-baked analysis of books, films etc, it's an encyclopedia - anyone who wants this section to remain in needs to justify why it should be here. Plus whoever put it back reinserted typos.  Thanks --Nickhh 17:33, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the section resembled certain study guides (eg this one) and might therefore be a copyright violation. Sciurinæ 17:39, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thanks - I also thought that might have been the case, at least when it was originally added (which of course only adds to the problems with having it here).  And people have added their own occasional thoughts to it as well over time I think, which in turn compounds the OR problem. --Nickhh 08:22, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

text:  Pssst... when i publish my PhD, i'm coming back with it and reinserting my discussion. That alright? DaveofDundee (talk) 01:24, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I would certainly say that the description of Fowler is half-baked. Firstly, if Greene had chosen Fowler's surname as a metaphor, he is at least as likely to have used this as a hunter of birds (snaring Phuong and Pyle in different ways) than by sounding like 'foul'. In any case, Fowler is a very complicated character. Some 'non-foul' attributes to be found include his being the most conscientious of his circle of journalists, his knowing murder when he sees it and his willingness to intervene. There are also subtleties which this review comes nowhere near. For example, there are the half-chances which Fowler gives, including those which allow God to intervene, when Fowler is of course an atheist. As well as his hypocrisy, there are also contrasts. He is personally irresponsible, while Pyle is painfully responsible at that level (his desire to protect and plan for Phuong) while being the facilitator of the ambushes of civilians. The religious and existential themes are also interwined with political considerations.  Quite what ought to be written is another question, but certainly the current issue is worse than a paperback blurb. Cole Davis writer (talk) 16:58, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lengthy "themes" section 

message: The book does convey an anti-war message, but does that really belong in the first line of the article? I don't see that as a defining feature of the novel. But I may be wrong. DrJimothyCatface (talk) 10:04, 8 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Anti-war novel" 

message: is it relevant to anything that pyle dances badly??????  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.101.54.95 (talk) 20:10, 11 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: another question: must you have the rather jejune, sophomoric parsing of the charcters?  reads like a bad effort from a rent-an-essay company.50.101.54.95 (talk) 20:12, 11 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Question 

message: The statement in the article "The book was the initial reason for Graham Greene being under constant surveillance by US intelligence agencies from the 1950s until his death in 1991, according to documents obtained in 2002 by The Guardian under the US Freedom of Information Act.[2][3]" is NOT supported by either reference 2 or reference 3.   Reference 2 refers to PERIODIC inquiries about Greene by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and states that Greene's mail was opened by FBI.  No reference to "constant surveillance" is to be found in Reference 2 or Reference 3.  
It's important to note as well that Reference 3 is to be found on booksie.com as a self-published paper.  This makes it unacceptable under WP:SOURCE:"Sources that are usually not reliable."  The author of the work cited in Reference 3, Michael Wynn, describes himself as a former English teacher (in his booksie.com profile) and offers no other qualifications as an expert on Graham Greene.  He also does not substantiate the allegation made in this WP article about "constant surveillance by US intelligence agencies."  It should be noted here that FBI is a law enforcement agency, not an intelligence agency, and that even so, no support for a claim of constant surveillance by FBI exists in either of the references cited at all - not just to the degree required in WP:SOURCE, but at all.
I am deleting the sentence in question from the article because the references cited do not support it. Reference 3 is an unacceptable source under WP:SOURCE:"Sources that are usually not reliable" section and References 2 and 3 fail under WP:SOURCE: "All quotations, and any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged, must include an inline citation that directly supports the material." loupgarous (talk) 08:00, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  "The book was the initial reason for Graham Greene being under constant surveillance by US intelligence agencies... " 

message: The statement "Assuming Greene himself was a professional assassin for British Intelligence during WWII, our hero (assuming we are dealing with political journalism dressed up as fiction and the reporter is non other than Greene) is anything but a "middle-class English snob". - rather, he is a professional who believes that 100% collateral damage is politically incorrect." was made by another editor - with no citation at all.  
Where to begin?  Well, let's start with WP:SOURCE, since the editor who inserted this bit of nonsense didn't supply one.  That's cause to delete the statement in itself.
In reality, Graham Greene was a minor functionary with MI5 (the British Security Service, which handles counterintelligence activity) during World War II.  He worked at a desk there.  Any suggestion that Graham Greene ever killed anything other than a pint at the local pub is risible.  This is the sort of thing that we should be vigilant to clean up from Wikipedia.  Of course, if the editor responsible cares to supply references that meet the criteria in WP:PROVEIT, I'll gladly reconsider my language and the deletion.  The WP article Graham Greene doesn't even mention rumors of Mr. Greene ever having murdered anyone, either professionally or as an amateur.
I'm deleting that entire paragraph, as directed in WP:SOURCE.loupgarous (talk) 07:58, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unsourced statement: "Assuming Greene himself was a professional assassin for British Intelligence during WWII"