Talk:Stendhal

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Religion?[edit]

Why is there no mention of Stendhal's views on religion? Practically the first thing you find when you google Stendhal is quotations like: “God's only excuse is that he does not exist” “All religions are founded on the fear of the many and the cleverness of the few.” “The shepherd always tries to persuade the sheep that their interests and his own are the same.”

Stendhal was also an inspiration to Nietzsche: "I had put into practice one of Stendhal's maxims: he advises men to make their entry into society with a duel." ("Ecce Homo" - 'The Untimely Ones' section 2) (There are also claims that Nietzsche's "revaluation of all values" was based on Stendhal)

So where is all the information on this? Why is there no mention of religion or atheism on this page?

17th February 2009 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.73.235.108 (talk) 16:13, 17 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Head count of 20?[edit]

Confusing language. 206.72.76.5 13:26, 27 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Right, I have no idea what that means, either. --Andersonblog 20:13, 25 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

And eighteen months later it's still there, with no explanation. I took it out. Cheers, LindsayHi 15:08, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Help improving the article on Stendhal[edit]

I am not an academic and any major amending is beyond me, but this entry on Stendhal is really awful. The article in britannica.com gives an accurate account, not only of Stendhal's life but, indirectly, his unique personality which, like his writing style, could be described as genially ironic. Just for example, the Wikipedia piece says that "Stendhal was a dandy" and that he was "an inveterate womaniser. . .obsessed with his sexual conquests." In the milieu of Paris under the Bourbon restoration, Stendhal could hardly be called a dandy - a dandy manqué, perhaps - and, unlike the "womanisers" who proliferated in that age of marital liberation (for want of a better term), Stendhal's not so numerous affairs were always wrecked on the shoals of his sentiments. If anything, he was obsessed with his sexual failures, not his sexual conquests. Recently, some critics have begun to wonder whether we are losing our sense of irony. This article on Stendhal would seem to be a good example of that failing. Rev. H. Carlton Earwiggherd (talk) 20:50, 2 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

To whoever maintains the "Stendhal" article:

A few months ago I had occasion to compile a long (4,500 words) chronology of the life of this author. It draws on materials found elsewhere on the internet and offline (but never word-for-word) and is, I believe, more complete than anything that can be found in one place online, in some cases going month by month. Though only a chronology, I think it also gives some sense of Beyle's character. The only major lack is that I did not include citations.

Anyhow, I think it'd be a shame if it's not put to use, so I'd like integrate it into this article, except: (a) there might be too much detail, (b) the style might be too terse or culturally-allusive, and (c) I'm wary of rearanging the current biographical section. Would anyone with experience like to have a copy of this chronology with an eye to improving the article? You have my full permission to edit, cut, rearrange or excerpt as you see fit. Please contact me a kmbush40@aol.com for a copy.

Kevin Bush

Hi Kevin. I'd say go ahead and edit/work in your own chronology! It's always good to be bold on Wikipedia. It seems to me that it couldn't hurt the present article, which doesn't have references either (we will want to work in references eventually, though). If you think it's too long, you might see if you can put any of the material into specific articles such as The Red and the Black. Lesgles (talk) 01:47, 23 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]


he had a miserable childhood in stifling provincial France[edit]

Seems quite rude. "miserable" is out of place, since his father was quite wealthy and his early life all but "miserable" literally speaking. "Unhappy childhood" would suit better in my opinion. --Kubrick 908 22:39, 11 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

In somewhat the same vein: Stendhal suffered miserable physical disabilities in his final years.... In this case, it was not the physical disabilities that were "miserable," it was Stendhal himself.
Sca (talk) 20:21, 8 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"Citation Needed" makes article unreadable.[edit]

There are far too many lines tagged with "citation needed." It makes for a horrible article. If someone can provide citations, good. If some lines seem invalid or insupportable, take them out or edit. But peppering the article with far more instances of "citation needed" than the number of citations typically seen in a well written article is ludicrous. zadignose (talk) 05:38, 28 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. This is frankly ridiculous on a page regarding one of the top names in French literature. Now, I have spent a good time studying Stendhal and I'd be happy to help find citations, as well as clean up some of the lacklustre information here. I am quite a newbie in terms of editing on here though so anyone who might have a bit of advice on biographies and general formatting drop me a line or two below. IroningOutThe (talk) 00:08, 25 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]


Mistaken reference to Hazard slights Arbalet?[edit]

Just browsing the Stendhal entry, I note that one of the References appears incorrect. I don't believe that Paul Hazard ever wrote a work entitled Les Plagiats de Stendhal (the work is not mentioned in the link to this reference).

I would suggest that the reference should be to Paul Arbelet and his L'Histoire de la Peinture en Italie et Les Plagiats de Stendhal (Paris, 1913). Unfortunately, there do not seem to be any Wikipedia entries for Arbelet either in English or French, but one can consult the Internet Archive at

http://archive.org/stream/lhistoiredelapei00arbeuoft#page/n5/mode/2up

— Preceding unsigned comment added by GianniBGood (talk • contribs) 17:17, 7 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Plagiarism Detected[edit]

I believe that the basic outline of this article was plagiarized from a chapter in Paul Broca and the Origins of Language in the Brain by Leondard L. LaPointe:https://books.google.com/books?id=H3M0BwAAQBAJ&pg=PA135&lpg=PA135&dq=Stendhal+was+a+dandy+and+wit+about+town+in+Paris,+as+well+as+an+inveterate+womaniser+who+was+obsessed+with+his+sexual+conquests.&source=bl&ots=94rLB4VIlp&sig=JxH-VE4su6xAIrK68ImFmQjN1zU&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCUQ6AEwAWoVChMI69j9t-_qxgIVDEmSCh3ssQF3#v=onepage&q=Stendhal%20was%20a%20dandy%20and%20wit%20about%20town%20in%20Paris%2C%20as%20well%20as%20an%20inveterate%20womaniser%20who%20was%20obsessed%20with%20his%20sexual%20conquests.&f=false BrEdWhite (talk) 23:37, 20 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

This article's history shows that the bulk of the text you mention was in place in 2008, well before the LaPointe book was first published (in 2012). See: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Stendhal&oldid=236211567. So Wikipedia definitely did not plagiarize Lapointe here. LaPointe references Ann Jefferson's Reading Realism in Stendhal (1988) which is included as further reading in our article. I don't have access to the Jefferson text to see how that matches up with wikipedia or Lapointe's section, but either that is the original source of the text, or Lapointe has plagiarized from wikipedia.Dialectric (talk) 01:08, 21 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, I have requested the Jefferson book from the library and should be able to follow up on this in a week or so. BrEdWhite (talk) 18:33, 21 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Google Listing for this Article[edit]

I don't do much in the way of improving Wikipedia, but I did just happen on a rather unusual instance of poor form that might require edit. Half an hour ago I googled Stendhal, and found the Wikipedia article shown given the brief summary: "Stendhal was a dandy and wit about town in Paris, as well as an inveterate womaniser who was obsessed with his sexual conquests."

As it is, not exactly here to argue the case for or against the description's accuracy, but it might be noted that: (1) the Wikipedia article itself seems to differ in its evaluation of Stendhal; (2) regardless if Stendhal was as is written, less overtly negative phrasing might instead be used (For, at the very least, to quote the man himself, "To have a strong character one must have experienced the effect produced by others upon oneself; therefore others are a necessity." Among the first signs of degraded character is the tendency to insult.).

Just some thoughts — Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.56.31.9 (talk) 09:40, 30 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

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