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Requested move Nineteen Eighty-Four → 1984

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (non-admin closure) JudgeRM (talk to me) 03:03, 30 January 2017 (UTC)

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Nineteen Eighty-Four → 1984 – According to WP:Article titles, WP:Primary topic, and common sense, this article should be moved to 1984 and the article about the year 1984 should move to 1984 (year). A less than ideal alternative would be to move this page to 1984 (novel), which currently redirects here.

1984 is unambiguously the common name by WP's definition as virtually all of the reliable sources cited in this article refer to it as "1984" and not a single one spells it out. This is also very clearly the primary topic. This article is much more popular than than the article on the year 1984, with a daily average of 8,216 vs 687 pageviews. According to google trends, since 2004, hardly anyone has searched for the term "nineteen eight-four" and many people have searched for "1984". Googling "1984" alone with no other search times, will first bring up websites referencing the novel, then adaptations of the novel, before any other uses of 1984.

There are a number of past discussions on this in the archives (I'll add links to relevant threads later tonight), but I haven't read a single argument in favor of the current naming system that is supported by current policies and guidelines. A lot of the discussions were 10+ years ago, so things might have been different then. The most common reasons seem to have been that it was spelled out as Nineteen eighty-four in the first edition of the book, which is antithetical to WP:Common name, and that it would be too confusing to move the article on the year 1984 to 1984 (year) since every other year article can easily be wikilinked with double brackets, which not only contradicts the DAB guidelines for primary topics, but linking years is discouraged in the MOS anyway, so this shouldn't be happening.

TL;DR: The vast majority of reliable sources only use the number 1984 to refer to the title of Orwell's novel. There are hardly any sources that primarily refer to the book with the spelled-out title or mention that it was spelled out in the original edition. No one google searches "Nineteen eighty-four"; many people google "1984" and the majority of those searches are for the novel, followed by its adaptations. Way more people are interested in reading the WP article about the book than the year, so readers of this article should be our primary concern. —PermStrump(talk) 01:42, 23 January 2017 (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 policy on article titles.

• Support anything that makes year indicate they are years, since bare numbers are obviously numbers in the default case (this page not being the default case, therefore being a special case) -- 65.94.168.229 (talk) 08:13, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose The novel was originally published as Nineteen Eighty-Four. This title unambiguously refers to the novel; a numerical title is ambiguous. Andrei.smolnikov (talk) 08:58, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
  • This reasoning is specifically discouraged in the policy WP:Common name: "Although official, scientific, birth, original, or trademarked names are often used for article titles, the term or name most typically used in reliable sources is generally preferred." —PermStrump(talk) 16:39, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - the book is not called "1984", but "Nineteen Eighty-Four". The article title is not referring to a number, but to the title of a book - ergo the article title should (as it currently does) match the book title - dash and all. I see that the 1984 article has a hatnote to the novel, and I think that's good enough. Chaheel Riens (talk) 09:03, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
  • This argument is not based on a WP policy. The policy WP:Common name does give guidance in this type of scenario: It says we should name the article based on what the majority of reliable sources use. WP considers the most reliable sources on any topic to be third party analysis in secondary or tertiary sources published by sources of authority or with a reputation for accuracy and fact checking. A picture of the original title is the primary source, so (1) it's not the highest quality source we have on this topic as far as how the book has commonly been referred to since it was first published. The first edition of the book is also only one source, so it's outweighed against the vast majority that write the title in the numerical format. —PermStrump(talk) 16:39, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
    • Commonname doesn't offer guidance here because it makes no mention or guidance of the difference between expressing a numerical book title as either numerals or words. It's particularly confusing because the term is pronounced in exactly the same way, so we only have the written word to distinguish the phrase. Google is not much help in this instance because running a search for "1984" returns - as the very first result the Wikipedia article for Nineteen Eighty-Four. Therefore it must be assumed that search results for "1984" are being tainted by "Nineteen Eighty-Four" - just as "Nineteen Eighty-Four" includes results for "1984". This shows that at the very least there is enough usage of the term "Nineteen Eighty-Four" - even when searching for 1984 that "Nineteen Eighty-Four" is the primary topic when referring to the novel. I'm also not convinced of your assumption that the first edition cover is not a valid source. You're correct that it is not an example of how the novel is referred to, but it is an excellent example of the novels name, and how it should be referred to. In this case being a primary source is not detrimental.
    • As a final comment I'll point out that while going against other opinions, you haven't actually made an argument to support "1984" as being the primary topic, or at least if you have you've diluted it over several different places - it would help if you placed a (presumably) Support statement with your arguments here as well. Chaheel Riens (talk) 19:10, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. There is no way on Earth the book is the primary topic for 1984, and the current title seems fine for DAB purposes. Nohomersryan (talk) 09:51, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
  • Did you notice that I linked to a graph that shows the pageviews and also google trends? I'm not just guessing this one is the common name. —PermStrump(talk) 16:39, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
    • If you capitalize your Google search term it comes up with a different result. Not every search is for the book, far from it, so this capitalized result shows the continued interest in the book. Randy Kryn 17:01, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
      • @Randy Kryn: That's a topic search, not an exact phrase search. Notice how it says "Novel by George Orwell" in a small font right below the term? Topic searches are linked to the relevant WP page, so it's just a reflection of how we've named this article. I made a new graph with all 3 parameters: "1984" (search term), "Nineteen Eighty-Four" (Novel by George Orwell), "Nineteen Eighty-Four" (search term). Virtually no one who is searching for the book is writing the number out. —PermStrump(talk) 02:46, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
        • I'm not a wikilawyer, but it seems, like an editor says above, commonsense and "if it ain't broke..." should come into consideration here. It certainly is not broke, as google searches come right to this page, and commonsense seems to fall on the side of "iconic name" plus "encyclopedia" equals accuracy. Randy Kryn 02:59, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
          • It is broke. Editors meaning to wikilink this page have been linking [[1984]] assuming this it leads here. Probably around 200 readers per day that are trying to read about the novel are first misdirected to the year article from a backlink in another wikipedia articles related to Orwell's novel and then have to figure out how to get here. Non-editors don't automatically know to look for hatnotes. Most probably see it eventually, but this is the whole point of common name, so readers can intuitively navigate between articles without ending up on random pages. I have no idea what you mean by "iconic name" but virtually all of the sources cited in this article write the title as 1984 using the numbers. No one who opposes the move has linked to a single reliable, secondary source that spells it out. —PermStrump(talk) 03:30, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose The book was published with the full title. Both '1984 book' and '1984 novel' already redirect here, and there is a hatnote on '1984'. All five bases covered. Randy Kryn 15:09, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
  • This is not based on a WP policy or guideline. Users looking for this article are much more likely to be misdirected to the year article than the reverse and that's frustrating for readers. Since this article is so much more popular, we will frustrate less readers by changing this page to the most recognizable name. —PermStrump(talk) 16:39, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
    • Just created redirects for book 1984 and novel 1984, which might get more readers directly to the book. Not as popular per the capitalized google version, I haven't looked at n-grams. This seems like one of those iconic cases where the real name of an iconic work is good enough. Wikipedia should look professional, and making such a major change to an iconic work's encyclopedic title, which reflects on the accuracy of the site, just doesn't have enough reasons. Thanks for putting editor's attention on this, it's a good page to create redirects to and to edit and polish the page itself. Randy Kryn 20:13, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose per Randy Kryn. This proposal is pretty far-fetched and even if policy were to suggests 1984 should be used, it's a situation where invocation of WP:COMMONSENSE and Wikipedia:If it ain't broke, don't fix it warrants serious consideration. Jason Quinn (talk) 19:56, 23 January 2017 (UTC)
• Support per WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. First, the article about the book gets far more page views[1]. Second, the term 1984 is very commonly used in reliable sources to refer to this book, probably more commonly than the original official title (spelled out). In any case 1984 should at least redirect to the article about the book, but I support moving the article here. --В²C ☎ 00:03, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
  • Redirecting '1984' to here sounds good. The name should stay the formal full name, let's not go hog wild and change the name of an iconic book, but yes, the redirect from '1984' could be something to explore. Randy Kryn 00:13, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
    • The fact that it is officially known and sold today as 1984[2] overrides what it was known as in the past with respect to choosing the article title on WP. Current usage in reliable sources is what is most relevant to WP article title selection. --В²C ☎ 02:06, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
      • Yeah, but it's also still officially known and sold today as Nineteen Eighty-Four[3] - from the same seller. Chaheel Riens (talk) 10:39, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Support in this unique case, where WP:COMMONNAME has been violated for many years. --Orange Mike | Talk 00:14, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. The book should remain at Nineteen Eighty-Four, which is the original title; usual bibliographic practice is to make the first edition the main title unless later editions overwhelmingly favour a later title. See here for a (probably quite incomplete) list of editions; it is clearly still published under the original title as well as under 1984; in fact the great majority of the 1984 titles are from a single publisher. If academic sources had switched to using the 1984 title I might be persuaded it should change, but a look in JSTOR doesn't support that -- I can't be sure which title is the most commmon because of the difficulty of avoiding the year in searches for Orwell, but the spelled-out title is clearly still in frequent use. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 04:02, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

  Searching for "1984 orwell" on amazon.co.uk brings up three editions; two have "Nineteen Eighty-Four" in the Amazon product description as well, and the other is revealed by the "Look Inside" function to have Nineteen Eighty-Four on the title page, not 1984. On amazon.com, the same search leads to four editions, two of which have Nineteen Eighty-Four on the title page. Searching for "nineteen eighty-four orwell" on both sites finds additional editions. Overall this means that most current editions of the book use the spelled-out title; and I'm not counting out of print editions, which would skew the results further in that direction. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:12, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose for a couple reasons. First, "Nineteen Eighty-Four" is the original title of the book, and it is still regularly used in releases today. In the Amazon reference above, the copyright page states the title as "Ninteen eighty-four", and I suspect this is the case for most (if not all) releases. Secondly, per ISFDB, the use of "Nineteen Eighty-Four" or "1984" is pretty evenly split (about 60 to 80, if I counted correctly). To know for sure which title is used, we'd have to look at the title page of each of those editions, as the marketing departements at publishers sometimes use a different title on the cover. The title page is the definitive title for any particular edition. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 04:09, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
  • Can you link to a few of those that are reliable sources? ISFDB is a user-generated wiki (with an awesome c. 1998 themed webdesign), but it WP doesn't consider user-generated websites WP:Reliable sources for contentious claims. Since the title ISFDB uses conflicts with countless scholarly articles published in peer-reviewed journals, it only makes sense to go with the highest quality sources. Luckily, there's no shortage of top-quality sources on this topic. —PermStrump(talk) 04:23, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
    • Very little of ISFDB is a wiki. The vast majority of the site (including what I linked to, above) is curated material which requires verification to the source of the information. Every entry is reviewed by a small group of moderators to determine if it can be approved or should be declined. The database (which, again, is the largest section of the site by far) is absolutely a reliable source. And I seriously doubt the scholarly articles are "countless". Here's a quick search for "nineteen eighty-four" on Google Scholar and JSTOR. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 04:30, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
      • ISFDB's disclaimer makes it sound like the whole thing is user-generated. Even assuming there are sections that aren't, it's still a self-published source that explicitly states in the disclaimer "ISFDB cannot guarantee the validity of the information found here", so it really doesn't make sense consider it in this discussion where there are so many solid sources that fit WP's criteria. Here's a comparison of of the results in different search terms:

Google Scholar		JSTOR
1984 orwell	52,000	"nineteen eighty-four" orwell	13,400
((1984) AND (orwell))	6,335	((orwell) AND (nineteen eighty-four))	3,025

—PermStrump(talk) 06:36, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

That's just a legal disclaimer so someone doesn't try to sue them for something if it turns out to be inaccurate. Even news sites have disclaimers like that. Also, as someone else pointed out, the hit results are not necessarily valid as most articles using "Nineteen Eighty-Four" will also use "1984" somewhere in them. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 20:46, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose. The rules invoked in support of this change (like WP:COMMONNAME) are supposed to make access to articles more predictable, but my feeling is that this case the change would more likely just make things more confusing. The spelled out title is always recognizable as the book title.--Arxiloxos (talk) 06:28, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Strong oppose. The common name for the novel may or may not be "1984", but the primary topic for 1984 is clearly the year itself. I would not ,however, be opposed to 1984 (novel).  ONR  (talk)  07:20, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
  • On what basis are you claiming the year article is the primary topic when this page has an average of 8,216 daily pageviews and the year article only has 687 (see links to those pageview stats in my original rationale)? When you google "1984" alone, the first several pages are about the book or adaptations of the book. —PermStrump(talk) 07:59, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. As per ONR. I haven't seen enough compelling evidence that 1984 is so significantly more commonly used than the books originally published title to justify a 1984 primary article. However, 1984 (novel) is good for me too. Scribolt (talk) 07:50, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
  • These are some examples of search results for 1984 orwell vs nineteen eighty-four orwell:

    Google scholar: 52,000 vs 13,400

    JSTOR: 6,335 vs 3025

  That's not "compelling" enough for you? —PermStrump(talk) 07:59, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

  • No, it's not (I did read those figures btw). One has a 80/20 split, the other 66/33. If we didn't have year articles with their current naming convention (which is a separate argument), then yes, looking at those figures it would make sense to change the book title to 1984. However, that's not the situation, so the standard for me therefore becomes, 'is the title so unrepresentative and inaccurate that it's going to confuse or mislead people?'. And imo, that isn't supported by that evidence. For what it's worth, I don't like the year articles very much and I would be quite happy for them to be 1984 AD or 1984 (year) or whatever. But we shouldn't do it on a one to one basis because having consistency is more important. Scribolt (talk) 08:56, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
    • On the one hand, moving the year article to 1984 AD wouldn't be WP:consistent with the other year articles. On the other hand, 1984 is the book's wp:common name and the the book is the wp:primary topic. So the policies are in conflict, but IMO, considering the lack of interest in the year article relative to this one (8,216 vs 687 average daily pageviews), we should be asking ourselves what's going to be confusing or misleading from their perspective instead. —PermStrump(talk) 10:38, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - I see this as being one of those situations where two reasonable guidelines are being weighed against one another. People generally tend not to spell out numbers nowadays (I learned at school to spell out all numbers up to "twelve", and continue to do so, and have noticed that I am frequently one of the only people in off-wiki discussions amongst people around me to do so). On the other hand, "1984" is taken as primarily being the year, rather than the book, so it would potentially be inconsistent for a sequence of articles to be year, year, book, year. To be honest, though, I think Scribolt makes a good point that the year articles themselves are ambiguous by virtue of having no suffix. While more recent years are much more likely to be the CE page, older years (closer to 0 CE) will have less weighting towards recency. I think naming of the year articles is a point that is more importantly addressed, after which point moving the book to 1984 would be more likely to gain consensus. — Sasuke Sarutobi (talk) 15:21, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Comment If this is moved, the year should be moved to AD 1984 instead, per consensus on Talk:AD 1. Pppery 21:20, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. The original title cover spells out the year. It should remain that way. As for 1984 (Novel), it should remain as a redirect to this article. KyuuA4 (Talk:キュウ) 22:09, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose per others, especially Mike Christie and Nihonjoe. While a lot of folks might use "1984" as a shorthand, I do not see the current title as truly violating the spirit of COMMONNAME. Vanamonde (talk) 03:38, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose. The common name for the novel may be "1984", but the primary topic for 1984 is the actual year. While not the point of this discussion, I would support this article being renamed to 1984 (novel).--Frmorrison (talk) 16:26, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose The primary topic for 1984 is the actual year and so the original title seems best. Andrew D. (talk) 19:24, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose ridiculous. In ictu oculi (talk) 21:30, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose current title appropriately uses WP:NATURAL disambiguation. feminist 11:32, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose Per WP:Article Titles, specifically requirement for consistency. Primary article for "1984" should be the AD year, consistent with other years. Furthermore, the claim that "virtually all of the reliable sources cited in this article refer to it as "1984" and not a single one spells it out" is clearly inaccurate: if you inspect the sources, you will see that a significant number refer to the novel as "Nineteen Eighty-Four". Note that some links to newpspare articles contain "1984" in the title (for brevity/space, presumably) but "Nineteen Eighty-Four" in the text of the article. Style guides (e.g. https://www.theguardian.com/guardian-observer-style-guide-n) favour "Nineteen Eighty-Four".JayZed (talk) 14:08, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

Discussion

• Comment the various year templates/parameters that expect a 1984 to be an AD year will need adjustment. Though, it would be better if all years were moved to indicate they are years AD or CE (ie. 1984 CE or A.D. 1984, etc) instead of assuming something is a year if its a number (definitively not true for numbers 1000 and less, but the way Wikipedia currently does it) -- 65.94.168.229 (talk) 08:13, 23 January 2017 (UTC)

So far the 4 "Opposes" have

completed their sentences? Chaheel Riens (talk) 16:55, 23 January 2017 (UTC)

• Comment FYI I posted an alert on the relevant project talkpages asking for more opinions. —PermStrump(talk) 04:11, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Orangemike re: "in this unique case, where WP:COMMONNAME has been violated for many years". I was afraid I was going crazy. I feel like I'm in the twilight zone. What's going on here? I've never seen it written out and every time I see it spelled out, it still takes a second to click that it's referencing the novel 1984. —PermStrump(talk) 04:28, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
  • You've seriously never seen it written out? I find that very hard to believe. Seeing "1984" as opposed to "Nineteen Eighty-Four" is actually more ambiguous since no one ever refers to the year as the latter. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 04:34, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
    • I'm serious! The surprising thing is that this surprises you so much since the print editions of the novel have used the number title for years and the majority of sources writing about it also use the number form.

Google Scholar		JSTOR
1984 orwell	52,000	"nineteen eighty-four" orwell	13,400
((1984) AND (orwell))	6,335	((orwell) AND (nineteen eighty-four))	3,025

I don't think it's ambiguous since it's the common name and no one is visiting the year article. Apparently the sources don't think it's ambiguous either or they'd spell it out. —PermStrump(talk) 07:01, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

The results above don't take into account that many (probably most) scholarly articles that use Nineteen Eighty-Four as the title will also include "1984", either in discussing the year, or as the date of publication of a cited source. I don't see how to avoid this, so I think the numbers you give are not useful. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 13:46, 24 January 2017 (UTC)

• Comment if this is successful, we should examine 2001 next, since it is also ab obvious case for the Stanley Kubrick film to be the base article -- 65.94.168.229 (talk) 05:41, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
  • I was thinking of 2001 too and also 1776, 1776 (book), and 1776 (film). I bet there are a bunch of links to 1776 the year that are supposed to go to the book or movie. I can't think of any books or movies with only a year as the title, but I could be wrong. —PermStrump(talk) 06:34, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
    • Yes, nothing happened in 2001 or 1776 to make them noteworthy. And 1941, which was a yawner, can be moved to that John Belushi film. Or maybe all of them, including '84, can be left as is for awhile. All of this raises interesting quandaries though, about common name versus real name, relative values of topics, etc. Randy Kryn 12:54, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
      • Even though there were hugely noteworthy events on 2001 and 1776, readers have very little interest in those year articles (and year articles in general). —PermStrump(talk) 22:32, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
        • A random page like 1924, one you wouldn't think of as popular, has a good viewer count of over 100 to 150 or more a day. Year pages have their fans, readers, and editors. Would be interesting if an editor or a high school student would make a chart of views-per-article for all of the 'year' pages, with graphs and trends clearly shown. I'd like to see it, not going to do it. That would be a good project for someone. Randy Kryn 04:33, 25 January 2017 (UTC)
• Comment I feel I should just point out that I don't believe "1984" to be an incorrect title, and acknowledge that it is also printed with that title - in many numbers apparently, only that it is not the most appropriate title for the Wikipedia article regarding the novel. Chaheel Riens (talk) 20:02, 24 January 2017 (UTC)
• Close requested this obviously isn't going to pass. Let the nom resubmit for 1984 (novel). And doesn't look like that would pass either. In ictu oculi (talk) 21:30, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

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

"Alternative facts"

I've removed the latest iteration of "Alternative facts" from the article - again. Just because the hipster community has seen fit to trend the term across the internet does not mean that it is suddenly a requirement for this article. Please justify its inclusion here, before we end up having to protect the article - which would indeed be ironic. Chaheel Riens (talk) 20:26, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

I agree with the removal; we'd need more than a brief burst of news to make these worth including. The article on alternative facts may want to link here but I don't think there's any need to link there from here. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:44, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

FWIW - Seems the following edit is relevant, worthy and very well sourced - and should be mentioned in the article - including the lede:

Copied from "Nineteen Eighty-Four article (version 21:39, 26 January 2017)":

More recently, in January 2017, the novel has again become a best seller book, seemingly in response to apparent attempts by members of the White House staff to present possible misinformation, according to news articles.

References

Hope this helps in some way - Comments Welcome from other editors of course - in any case - Enjoy! :) Drbogdan (talk) 15:03, 26 January 2017 (UTC)

Another editor added mentions in the lede about sales jumping in response to Snowden and the 2013 mass surveillance leaks, and about Buzzfeed's recent activities. I revised this to remove the reference to Buzzfeed, since the sources say nothing about any connection between Buzzfeed and sales of Nineteen Eighty-four, but I've left a brief mention about the 2013 sales surge, since this is mentioned in the sources about the current sales jump. The 2013 surge is also mentioned later in the article, so whether it should be kept in the lede is open for discussion. --Arxiloxos (talk) 20:26, 26 January 2017 (UTC)

I don't think it belongs in the lead; our coverage should take the long view of what's inherently notable about the novel, and in a few years this will be a minor footnote at best (if no more happens than has happened already). I don't think it belongs in the body either, for the same reason, but I see very little justification for it being in the lead. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:38, 26 January 2017 (UTC)

I do think that the fact that an almost 70-year-old book keeps popping back to the best seller lists and getting substantial new printings is significant information that ought to be included; I agree, though, that detailed data about those sales wouldn't necessarily be material for the lead section. --Arxiloxos (talk) 22:38, 26 January 2017 (UTC)

A few things spring to mind now - I agree that there is now some decent sourcing and references so that it may well have legitimate place in the article. The next question is - where? I don't think that it's worthy of the lede, as per WP:RECENT, but see no reason for it not to stay in the Cultural Impact section, where it is also mentioned. Chaheel Riens (talk) 12:29, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

The general consensus here is that while the "alternative facts" are now suitable for the article itself, they're not for the lede. The alternative facts commentary is based on a single event, which falls under WP:RECENT. An important aspect is that this article is about the entire novel - not just a single aspect of it, which is the doublethink/alternative facts point being made. Given that alternative facts are only a small part of the novel in general - and therefore the article in general, it's not lede-worthy. Chaheel Riens (talk) 13:23, 30 January 2017 (UTC)

Hi. Just wanted to say that I didn't see this discussion. I removed some 'alternative fact' related stuff from the 'In other media' section because it wasn't really about other media and it was already mentioned beneath. Apologies for jumping the gun, feel free to re-introduce it if necessary (after some copy editing please). FWIW, completely agree with it not going anywhere near the lede. Scribolt (talk) 13:44, 30 January 2017 (UTC)

It still has a presence under "Cultural Impact", and I feel that that's good enough - both for coverage, and for the location of the coverage. I was initially against coverage, but that was before it was reasonably sourced. I still think it's a bit recenty and zeitgeisty, but at least it has references and sources now. Chaheel Riens (talk) 15:59, 30 January 2017 (UTC)

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Overall Mistake.

Wikipedia being mentioned as number two search result is 1984 itself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.230.17.215 (talk) 23:37, 24 May 2017 (UTC)

Could the name "Newspeak" used by Orwell have been a passing comment on the United States' magazine "Newsweek"? Is this farfetched? Obvious? Neither?

There is nothing of value in this section. It is not about improving this article, but instead about satisfying some sort of curiosity by Alfred Nemours. Nothing here can be used to improve the article. Please take your forum discussions off Wikipedia. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 04:47, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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I have a question about the novel, and given that I know next-to-nothing about either the novel or Orwell (only having read this novel, Animal Farm, and a few essays written by Orwell), I wanted to pose it in case someone could speak with authority on the topic. If the question can be answered with certainty, such an answer even passingly referred to or footnoted in the body of main article would represent a substantive improvement to the article itself.

Could the name "Newspeak" used by Orwell have been a passing comment on the United States' magazine "Newsweek"?

Orwell is known for his criticism of media censorship not only in Russia, but also in England.

The sinister fact about literary censorship in England is that it is largely voluntary.

Unpopular ideas can be silenced, and inconvenient facts kept dark, without the need for any official ban. Anyone who has lived long in a foreign country will know of instances of sensational items of news — things which on their own merits would get the big headlines-being kept right out of the British press, not because the Government intervened but because of a general tacit agreement that ‘it wouldn’t do’ to mention that particular fact. So far as the daily newspapers go, this is easy to understand. The British press is extremely centralised, and most of it is owned by wealthy men who have every motive to be dishonest on certain important topics. But the same kind of veiled censorship also operates in books and periodicals, as well as in plays, films and radio. ("freedom of the Press," Preface to Animal Farm)

The above comment came four years before the publication of 1984. And Newsweek had been in circulation for sixteen years at the time of 1984's publication, and met the criteria mentioned above in the [period] (wealthy ownership, having been owned by stockholders that included the Cheney silk family and the son of Andrew Mellon, and centralisation, having already been subject to at least one widely-publicized merger before the publication of 1984).

"Politics and the English language" also concerns criticism of explicitly Anglophone political language from the relevant period--from which Orwell samples "jackboot, Achilles' heel, hotbed, melting pot, acid test, veritable inferno" among examples of "verbal refuse" that are "designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind..."--when Newsweek was a widely-known and large-scale political publication presumably reporting on some of the events that Orwell recalls.

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of the political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenceless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements. Such phraseology is needed if one wants to name things without calling up mental pictures of them.

Is it possible that the name given to Oceania's language in 1984, "Newspeak," was among other things a passing comment from Orwell on a specific English political magazine of his time?

(Is there anything in the Orwell canon (interviews, essays, diaries, published accounts of friends, etc., including those attributed to Eric Arthur Blair and any other known names) to either confirm or refute his the likelihood of this possibility? Or even to confirm or refute his familiarity with American press? Were the early activities of Newsweek's London bureau limited to information gathering, or was there also large-scale publication (if not readership) of Newsweek in either London or elsewhere that would have been seen by Orwell or his readers? The WP entry for one of the appendices to Homage to Catalonia cites Orwell's discussion of a Daily Worker account, indicates a familiarity with another New York publication.)

Perhaps the suggestion is far-fetched. Perhaps I've never seen the suggestion because it is so obvious and explicit that it never need restating. Perhaps neither. I simply have no idea, and I'm asking in case someone with some familiarity with the topic might be able to say something with authority about it. Again, to repeat, this question is not posed with discussion of the book or its content in mind. It is posed since if it can be answered with certainty, passing mention or footnote of such an answer in the main article would represent a substantive improvement to the article itself. Alfred Nemours (talk) 00:08, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Unless it's been discussed in reliable, third-party sources, then no, it can't be added here, regardless of how "obvious" or "explicit" it appears to you. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 23:37, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

Obviously. That's why the matter was raised in the form of a question, rather than in the form of an answer. Incidentally, as far as my own view is concerned (though this is obviously irrelevant except to correct the insinuation and loading of the question by the comment directly above)--to those who read before simply disappearing blocks of text, I maintained that I was unclear whether the possibility is "far-fetched" or so "obvious" that it does not require mention, or neither. Thank you for your many generous and careful contributions to WP elsewhere, particularly in the area of your Japan-related tourism. All this best, and take care Alfred Nemours (talk) 00:08, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

In the future, I recommend doing research ahead of time to find out the answers to your questions about whether something should be included in an article. If you find multiple reliable sources discussing whatever it is, then feel free to either add it to the article yourself or bring it up on the talk page. I recommend, however, that you try to keep your comments as succinct and clear as possible. Waxing philosophical is good for a philiosophy paper, but is not helpful here as it only serves to obfuscate the real purpose behind your comments. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 00:16, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Not being an Orwell scholar or specialist (and with all due respect to the bloke, without an interest in becoming either), I had neither a good answer nor prospects of finding one. The question was posed in WP talk in hopes of drawing on the intelligence of the wider community. And attached to a couple of sentences putting down the (near-negligible) bit I knew. I don't know what anyone else reading this thinks, but I think the weakest aspect of WP is empty guesswork posing as fact that comprises the bulk of way too many articles where the writing reflects an obvious cluelessness to anyone with the least familiarity with the topic at hand. And I think it really detracts from the reputation of WP, which contains a lot of valuable entries that do nothing of the kind. (One of the things I like about your entries on Japan-related travels is the clear familiarity with what is being discussed--even if, at worst, for the sake of a guide that aids tourists or other travelers. But that's real information and added-value.) Thanks again for writing; All the best, and take care, Alfred Nemours (talk) 02:10, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

• Newspeak= new speak. I think I just solved the mystery. ‡ Єl Cid, Єl Caɱ̩peador ^ᐁT₳LKᐃ 00:57, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Yes! So are the lying euphemisms of New Speak in the novel a passing comment by Eric Arthur Blair on an widely-known English-language public affairs magazine with a rhyming name? I really can't tell if this is unlikely, or too obvious to a contemporary reader to even have to mention. Maybe not much of a mystery, but I don't know. So I ask. Alfred Nemours (talk) 02:10, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

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The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Please try to encourage discussion on improvements (to this article, like others), rather than discourage it.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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At the time of this writing, discussion pursuant to the question of the meaning of a word in the novel has been closed, with an appended note explaining that the discussion contained "nothing of value," and according to the same opinion apparently must have posed no prospect for containing anything of value. There is some irony in having to respond to this in an entry devoted to 1984. Nonetheless, let me say that I respectfully disagree. This was no "forum discussion" as stated. No discussion was taken into the article. "Newspeak" is a term used in the novel that contains its own WP entry. A reliable answer on point (either footnoted or via passing mention, as noted) that adds anything substantive to the article's description of this term would only add to the quality of the article. As explicitly noted, discussion was pursued throughout with such an improvement in mind.

I see no reason for discouraging follow-up on this topic.

Please try to encourage discussion on improvements (to this article, and to others), rather than discourage it. All the best, Alfred Nemours (talk) 10:56, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Alfred, discussions on Wikipedia about improving articles are unlike discussions in other forums; here, a discussion about a topic is essentially useless unless it makes reference to sources that can be used to cite any new material. That's why the discussion has no value here. All editors here get used to the idea that they cannot usefully bring ideas to the talk page; they can only bring sources, and sourced ideas. Nothing else can be used in the article. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:37, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Articles on WP about improving articles are indeed useful to the extent that they can draw on sources to improve articles with new material. This is why the question given in the WP talk discussion topic drew on two sources, "Literary Censorship in England" and "Politics and the English Language," to raise a question about 1984. The help topic was clear, further, that such a question was raised given that even passing mention or footnote of such an answer in the main article could represent a substantive improvement to the main article itself. Please consult the sources and sourced ideas, here and elsewhere, before claiming contrary to fact that they do not exist. Alfred Nemours (talk) 16:42, 12 July 2017 (UTC)

Mike Christie nailed it. None of your discussions (here, or the "attack" questions you posted on two dozen plus talk pages) are directly addressing a real issue with the articles themselves. You seem stuck on some weird interpretation of one word or another, but you have no reliable sources to share that back up your preferred definition. In no case have you actually presented anything which is useful to improving the articles in question. As Mike stated, unless you do so, your discussion is not about improving the articles, but rather an irrelevant discussion. Discussion that has nothing to do with improving the articles is not welcome or encouraged on article talk pages. There are plenty of other places online where you can discuss word meanings and other nuances that seem to be your thing. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 14:40, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Though this issue is about a specific discussion, rather than about me or "[my] discussions," let me take a moment to respond to the empty (and gratuitous) charge posed here. Questions raised elsewhere about entries in which an act of violence are repeatedly and thoughtlessly referred to with the word "attack" are simply commonsensical to anyone with even basic familiarity with international law, the history of propaganda campaigns used to justify organized state-run campaigns of violence, and the wider context at issue, and with any concerns or scruples about taking care not to substitute propagandistic justifications for state-violence for careful documentation about a given event; or to any sharing concerns about the WP commitment to disinterestedness (often called neutrality) or WP value of (guarding against) recentism. Moving from your gratuitous, hyperbolic charges against me to your hyperbolic charges against this WP talk discussion topic (let me add in passing that it's not often that I hear of charges leveled against raising topics or questions anywhere, let alone on 1984), two sources were presented and quoted in detail that gave rise to the question concerned. "Literary censorship in England" and, in particular, "Politics and the English Language" are direct statements by Orwell/Blair indicating that Stalinist Russia was not his only concern when it came to propaganda and that there are specifically Anglophone targets he had in mind, even if he nowhere named them. This is why I linked the WP article on Newsweek to mention that that publication existed for sixteen years at the time of Orwell's writing, and fit two specific criteria for censorship that Orwell mentioned (wealthy ownership and centralisation). Newsweek apparently had a London office even by the early 1940s, though it remains unknown to me at the present time whether this office was maintained only for information gathering or also for publication (the relevant point being Newsweek's London sales, whether or not an Orwell/Blair writing 1984 in the 1940s would have routinely seen Newsweek on local newsstands or would otherwise have been familiar with the magazine). However uninteresting this topic may be to you (it is not more than of passing interest to me), its brief pursuit has always been guided by documentation and fact, and its further pursuit can only be given by documentation and fact. Let me suggest that your time would be better spent making contributions to WP entries and topics that interest you, rather than trolling either this topic (repeatedly asking whether it has the right to be raised, pretending that the documentation that animates the question either does not exist or has not been cited) or my other interests at large. All the best, Alfred Nemours (talk) 16:42, 12 July 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Trump comment relevance?

Speaking to this in the Brave New World comparisons section:

However, that assessment was reconsidered in 2017 with the presidency of Donald Trump and the associated burst in popularity of Orwell's novel.

Do we have any evidence of a correlation to this besides the link to Trump's presidency article, like someone saying what the perceived correlation is (i.e what the comparison is between Donald Trump's presidency and 1984's government?) If not, I think this should be removed. (Not that the burst in popularity of 1984 during the campaign wasn't notable, but it should say a reason why or provide a source as to why). 73.104.111.23 (talk) 00:00, 12 November 2017 (UTC)

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Works set in one period but commenting on another

Is there a collective noun or literary category which covers works like Miller's The Crucible and Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-four which are set in one historical period but clearly or are generally understood to provide a commentary or challenge to another historical period, especially the writer's contemporary period? - BobKilcoyne (talk) 03:17, 7 June 2017 (UTC)

No responses yet - I'm thinking perhaps such works have never been put into a category together? - BobKilcoyne (talk) 22:51, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

Social novel includes them, and also some other types.PopSci (talk) 04:07, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, PopSci, for that, although neither writer/work is referred to there and "social novel" does not capture the cross-reference from one period of time to another which I am asking about. - BobKilcoyne (talk) 06:08, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

Most Historical novels have some of this aspect. Either holding up the past as a good example for the present Ivanhoe or as a warning Tale of Two Cities, to give a couple of examples.PopSci (talk) 12:35, 22 January 2018 (UTC)