Talk:Robert le diable/Archive 1

Medieval legend?
We have two refs. to the legend - in the intro and in the synopsis. They apparently contradict each other. Which is more accurate? --Kleinzach (talk) 09:19, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Why is this disambiguated?
I'm wondering why this is disambiguated. Robert le diable only disambiguates the opera from Robert the Devil. Wouldn't it be normal to have just the two articles linked by hatnotes, without a disambiguation page? -- Klein zach  09:09, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
 * User:Smerus sensibly has done away with the disambiguation page and made it a REDIRECT – which raises the question, why have a disambiguator at all? I suggest to ask that this article be moved from Robert le diable (opera) to Robert le diable. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 13:28, 24 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I have that this article be moved to Robert le diable. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 09:59, 2 April 2012 (UTC)


 * The first thing one has to do when disputing a non-English language title is look at the article in the Wikipedia of the language of origin. In French Wikipedia, you will find that there are other Robert le Diable titles (all spell diable with a capital 'd' by the way.)Mike Hayes (talk) 23:43, 26 March 2014 (UTC)
 * The second thing is to notice how inconsistent the French usage of capitals in titles can be; this has been discussed several times (here's one) and that's why the WikiProject Opera adopted their WikiProject Opera/Article guidelines. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 04:47, 27 March 2014 (UTC)

Synopsis
I've made some changes to the synopsis - adding more detail and making sure it follows the description given in The New Grove Dictionary of Opera (given as the reference for the synopsis). If any editors would like to check the changes that'd be very welcome. A few other edits I'd like to suggest: removing the line 'The plot of the opera has been often cut or rearranged in various productions' (Robert le diable is rarely performed, so this seems misleading); removing the two scene divisions in Act 3 (they're not included in Grove); removing Scene 2 from Act 5 (also not featured in Grove). Would there be any objections to these changes? Thanks, OperaBalletRose (talk) 11:05, 25 September 2012 (UTC)


 * I would leave the statement 'The plot of the opera has been often cut or rearranged in various productions' as this is historically true, regardless of the rarity of modern productions (which seem to be coming slightly more frequent in fact). Just check carefully about the scene divisions in Act 3 and Act 5 - I am pretty sure they are in the opera, even if in fact they are not explicitly in Grove (I am away from my reference books and can't check myself at present). --Smerus (talk) 20:28, 25 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks - that makes sense to leave in the opening statement. As for the scene divisions, I've looked at the libretto and it in fact has scene divisions in every act (Act 1 has 7 scenes!) Rather than representing all of these here, I'd suggest we go for a consistent approach, along the lines of Grove, and provide a succinct description of each act without any scene divisions. Does that sound OK? OperaBalletRose (talk) 14:20, 26 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Well yes, but we should I think indicate that there are a definite changes of location in Act III (outside a cave/in the ruined convent) and Act V (outside the cathedral/inside). How are ROH going to do it, by the way? Best, --Smerus (talk) 20:24, 26 September 2012 (UTC)


 * I've removed the scene divisions, but retained indications of the changes in location, as suggested. Looking again at the libretto, it's not clear that the opera ends with Isabelle and Robert's marriage so I've removed that line, while keeping the description of their reunion in the cathedral. It's a new production by Laurent Pelly coming up at ROH, so excited to see how it'll be done... so far, we've had an intriguing sneak preview of the backcloth OperaBalletRose (talk) 17:19, 27 September 2012 (UTC)

Modified navigation box
What's the improvement in ? It replaced the standard navbox Meyerbeer operas with something very similar, just with a different image. The drawbacks are that the new construct is not a template, thus provides no central location for editing it, and the parameter name is not functional. If a different picture in the standard template is desired, and I'm not convinced that is a good idea, there have been discussions at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Opera of how that can be done. I believe it only takes a very small change in Meyerbeer operas: add |image= -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:14, 22 August 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for this. My thinking was as follows: Wikipedia is (or should be) a more dynamic construct compared to a printed encyclopaedia. The existing template repeats monotonously a picture which shows the composer at one age of his career - not necessarily (in fact rarely) the age at around which the opera concerned was written. It's not therefore specifically informative about the opera, and doesn't make the most of the opportunities an on-line encyclopaedia can offer. And as the article is about the opera it's more informative to have at the most prominent position on the page a picture (and text) specific to the opera, rather than the composer. The picture of the composer should also be related to the opera (at around the time of its composition, or major revision, or whatever). This seems (to me, anyway) logical and to make a useful contribution to the article's impact and comprehension.

It seems to me that this makes a genuine and useful addition to the article. It also overcomes the spurious argument sometimes used by infobox promoters, that the static nature of the template justifies its replacement by an infobox. In the light of the hissy fits which are gonig on at the present arb case, it seemed to me worthwhile making a constructive proposal which might deal with the deficiencies of a template and prevent any such deficiencies being used as a 'straw man' argument for infobox promotion. I chose do do this on an article for which I was largely responsible to avoid (hopefully!) any slanging matches!

Design is my weak point and I make no claims for the edit as it stands if anyone can make it look nicer. From an aesthetic point of view it might be better, for example, to have a coloured picture in the template. I am not convinced that central editing is essential if the concept I propose is adopted on an article by article basis and is carried out sensibly.

I hope there may be further constructive comments on this trial. I would suggest for convenience comments and suggestions in prose on this talkpage, rather than other specimen templates, as I note these tend to create clutter.

If of course the consensus is against this, I am happy to revert. If consensus is favourable then I hope that something along these lines can be used as a model for the future. Best, --Smerus (talk) 06:57, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
 * I don't agree that having a variety of images in the opera navigation boxes is an improvement, but that's only my opinion and I'm not fanatic about it. As to implementing such a feature, the template Verdi operas shows the way. As I wrote above, I think with a minor addition to the code the same effect can be achieved with Meyerbeer. The beauty of that approach is that the navboxes in the existing Meyerbeer operas will not change at all until somebody uses the parameter image with a suitable image. I have now implemented that code which should allow this article to return to the standard Meyerbeer template while replacing the composer's image with the poster. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 08:11, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Many thanks for this - --Smerus (talk) 09:26, 22 August 2013 (UTC)
 * I still favor using the composer's portrait at the top of the article, since the composer is probably the most important piece of information to be known about most operas. I think the composer's image serves the useful purpose of almost subliminally establishing immediately in whose oeuvre the particular opera belongs. (I should say to those who are already familiar with the composer's appearance.) --Robert.Allen (talk) 04:46, 27 August 2013 (UTC)
 * I also favour the return to the images as shown in . -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 10:45, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

File:Louis Guéymard as Robert le Diable by Gustave Courbet - The Metropolitan Museum of Art 436015 (cropped).jpg to appear as POTD soon
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