Talk:Edgar Wallace

Expansion?
How would this best be expanded? Seems well fleshed out to me, now. Aaronwinborn 13:19, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

"... to writing crime thrillers at a prolific rate." Once we have stated that, it's ridiculous to have a list of only three (!) novels. Haven't House of Stratus published some of them recently? Would anyone like to have a look at that?  10:35, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Nine days
How do we know that he was exactly nine days old when he was found abandoned in Billingsgate? Was there a note documenting his date of birth? Something needs to be said about this. JackofOz 00:01, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:The mixer.JPG
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Johannesburg docks?
Infuriated, Caldecott did indeed book passage back to England, but was further outraged by the lack of penitently weeping family on the Johannesburg docks. Many years later, Ivy would bear the brunt of his vindictiveness.

Cape Town or Durban docks perhaps - Johannesburg is a long way from the sea! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.224.166.77 (talk) 15:00, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:The mixer.JPG
Image:The mixer.JPG is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot (talk) 02:42, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

King Kong Script
There are several things wrong with this section, which I will annotate in detail later.

First, the treatment Wallace wrote was called The Beast, not Kong.

Second, there is no evidence that Wallace had any substantial hand in creating the storyline. Producer Merian C. Cooper devised the concept, and the various scenarios were crafted by himself and Willis O'Brien, the stop-motion animator of King Kong. All Wallace did was simply transcribe their ideas. He admitted this in private letters, and Cooper agreed in other forums. Cooper, an honorable man, promised Wallace credit when he was alive, and granted it to him after his death. Cooper wanted to use Wallace's name and fame by having him write the novelization of a production that was already taking shape, simply so that Kong could be advertised as "based on the book by Edgar Wallace." Facts supporting these claims can be found in King Kong: The Making Of A Movie Icon by Ray Morton, and in Cooper's biography, Living Dangerously, by Mark Cotta Vaz.

Third, the author of this article claims the treatment was a much better script than what Rose and Creelman came up with. This is clearly a matter of opinion. The native sacrifice scene is no more "far-fetched" than an island of dinosaurs and giant apes in the first place. Kong's story is universally acclaimed by critics and fans alike, and that is due to Rose's script (with an unknown but probably minor contribution from Creelman). She wrote the scenarios based on Cooper and O'Brien's previous ideas; those and her own unique contributions made the film work. It is unknown what shape the story would have taken if Wallace had lived, but dramatically, having Kong shot down by biplanes is much more effective than a random strike of lightning (as in Wallace's treatment). It completes his tragic story arc, that "the little guys licked him" and not the deus ex machina Wallace had written (which in all fairness might have and probably was devised by Cooper/O'Brien). This is but one example. In all ways Rose's final script is more powerful and direct in terms of story.

I am the author of an article examining the deleted spider-pit scene from King Kong, and have studied the different versions of Kong (including the relevant parts of Wallace's draft) and the history of Kong's production, and in my estimation Wallace's contributions overall were minor... but that in no way reflects on his artistry, skill or fame outside this final project.

Tone is not neutral

 * "After a while of enduring Edgar's temper tantrums and hysterical accusations and self-pitying moping, she began to stay longer at her office or on the film set: it is hardly surprising she craved laughs and pleasant conversation with youthful, handsome colleagues instead of being harangued by Edgar."
 * "However, these works never achieved the prominence accorded to such characters as Sherlock Holmes et al., which is a great pity, because if done properly, many of Wallace's best stories, such as the Just Men and Mr J G Reeder would make excellent adventure-thrillers."

There is an awful lot of editorializing thruout the article. It reads as if it were pasted in from a biography, and a rather opinionated one at that. --Tysto (talk) 20:15, 5 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree. The following are just a few of the examples of the unencyclopedic tone to the article.  67.100.127.175 (talk) 23:11, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Seeing a way to demonstrate her gratitude for the warmth and kindness bestowed upon her and her little daughter, Polly actively sought to locate a suitable bride for the languid Richard
 * The following morning Polly was deeply ashamed, but Richard Horatio Edgar was apparently so inebriated he did not even remember the incident.
 * Arriving with the news and a distraught offer to place Richard in a workhouse, Polly found the Freemans fiercely opposed to any such action, doting on the boy. Polly left abruptly, overwhelmed by emotion; she never visited again.
 * Richard had inherited his father's swarthy handsomeness
 * Infuriated, Caldecott did indeed book passage back to England, but was further outraged by the lack of penitently weeping family on the Cape Town docks; the realisation they were gladder to get rid of him than he was to go was an unpalatable epiphany. Many years later, Ivy would bear the brunt of his vindictiveness.
 * Superstitiously, Edgar viewed any "economising" as a sign his luck was about to end, and thus had been living in excess of a £2,000 per annum salary since the first day of his employment.
 * Unfazed, Edgar pressed ahead - his alarmed workmates at the Mail prevailed upon him to lower the prize money to £500: a £250 first prize, £200 second prize and £50 third prize, but were unable to restrain him in the privacy of his home. Edgar had advertisements placed on buses, hoardings, flyers, and so forth, running up an incredible bill of £2,000. Though he knew he needed the book to sell sufficient copies to make £2,500 before he saw any profit, Edgar was confidently aware this would be achieved in the first three months of the book going on sale, hopelessly underestimating the expenses.
 * Harmsworth's irritation simmered as instead of appropriate gratitude and contrition, Edgar recovered his ebullience and confidence, and also seemed not to be in any hurry to repay the loan.
 * At the time there was nothing strange about a series of stories portraying as a positive and likeable protagonist the governor of an (unnamed) British colony in West Africa, who relies upon gun boats cruising along a major African river to enforce British rule and who - while not gratuitously cruel - does not shrink from using brute force on occasion.
 * By the meal's end, du Maurier had accurately realized Edgar's enthusiastic if rather childish personality, and saw that in his own blundering way, Edgar had not been malicious but rather trying to help.
 * There is not any suggestion, however, that Wallace ever resorted to illegal drugs such as cocaine or heroin, and he was known to be a virtual teetotaller. Though he didn't know it, he was also suffering from diabetes and this led to ever more sudden mood swings, bouts of melancholia and, mercifully brief, periods of paranoid suspicion about his family.

I agree. So fix it - delete the editorializing. -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:49, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Plot wheel.
I am not so certain if the Edgar Wallace Plot Wheel is fictitious. At least it's not an invention of Stephen King's.

Michael Crichton mentions the plot wheel in his non-fiction book Electronic Life and even give a BASIC program to perform the same function. Crichton does not state Wallace's name, however. He referred to a "famous mystery writer" but otherwise described the same plot wheel King describes.

I had brought the plot wheel to the attention of the Edgar Wallace Appreciation Society and even his granddaughter had never heard of it.

So the truth of this plot wheel are shrouded in mystery. In either case, given the mention in Crichton's book, I'll remove reference to it being King's invention as it most likely isn't. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.79.228.134 (talk) 22:01, 7 June 2010 (UTC)

Recent edit
I have done a fairly major clean up on the prose of the article. It seemed like it was mostly written by a family relation, drawing from personal anecdote, or from an over-excited reader of a romantic biography of Wallace. Some of what was written clashed in dates and travels with the profile in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, so I have gone with that source. I suspect much of what was added in 2006 is true (in the way that family stories are true) but there was a hopeless amount of unref'd, tangential detail and editorialising comment. For those interested in tales connected to Wallace's life the old version is worth exploring and if anyone wants to try and dig out refs to support relevant deleted detail, they are more than welcome. As a major British writer, my hope is that Wallace can have a decent biography. Span (talk) 13:07, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

To quote the BBC on his output
One of Wallace's publishers said that a quarter of all books read in the early twentieth century England were written by him. As well as journalism, Wallace wrote screenplays, poetry, historical novels, non-fiction, eighteen stage plays, 957 short stories, and over 170 novels. 12 novels in 1929 alone. More than 160 films have been made of his work and the only one remembered today is the screenplay for King Kong. BBC Radio 4 Extra, 20 March 2014. (84.236.152.71 (talk) 19:21, 20 March 2014 (UTC))


 * To my knowledge, this is the first time I have been featured on BBC Radio 4. As it turns out the text is also given on BBC music, though why, I'm not sure. If anyone is wondering about sourcing this was the article version from before Christmas 2013 (see above note of editing changes). You would hope the BBC would do better than reading off verbatim a WP article, but I guess we should take it as an act of faith in our dedicated army of editors. Thanks very much for posting the link. Anna (talk) 23:00, 20 March 2014 (UTC)

Father ?
The article reads - "Wallace's father, Captain Joseph Richards, was also born in Liverpool, though in 1838; he was also from an Irish Catholic family. He and his father John Richards were both Merchant Navy captains, and his mother Catherine Richards came from a mariner family.

When Mary was eight months pregnant, in January 1868, her husband died at sea."

As Wallace was born in 1875, describing Richards as his father seems erroneous, and the article goes on to name his actual father as the actor Richard Horatio Edgar, after whom he was named. RGCorris (talk) 19:27, 5 November 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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Clara (Richardson) Freeman
It is stated that Edgar Wallace bonded with young Clara. Clara Richardson was born in 1836 and Edgar born 39 years later. IE in the 1881 census Edgar is 6 whilst Clara is 45.

Also it stated that Edgar took the surname Wallace from Lew Wallace. This is also wrong. On his church baptism he is named Richard Horatio Edgar Wallace, father Walter (comedian). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.187.234.239 (talk) 07:27, 15 August 2020 (UTC)

Crime novel
The 1923 title Captains of souls also appears as (The) Captain of souls on various web pages (e.g. Amazon), including dust jackets/covers. I assume that the versions differ among publishers in Great Britain and the US, especially. --Hodsha (talk) 18:59, 30 August 2021 (UTC)

Irrelevant link
The link associated with "Wallace was such a prolific writer that one of his publishers claimed that a quarter of all books in England were written by him" does not provide any support for that statement. 203.221.122.109 (talk) 03:59, 3 July 2022 (UTC)