Talk:The Birds (story)

Wikipedia articles are not reviews
"The Birds' Alfred Hitchcock movie is what we all think of when we think "The Birds", but the fascinating book by Daphne du Maurier is completley different to the 1963 film starring Tippi Hedren, Rod Taylor and Jessica Tandy:..." -- If that is not POV, nothing is. 1) "We think" Well that might be true for most people, but I don't think that can be justified for all. 2) "fascinating book" should be simply "book". And another thing: the article previously says that it is a "short story". So which is it: book or short story? MichaelSH 01:33, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

It's definitely a short story. That's why it's in quotation marks. Anyway, we read it in Literature class and our teacher calls in a short story. Kickasskat 17:18, 22 October 2006 (UTC)kickasskat
 * No, It's a Novelette by current standards. I can't say for sure how the terms novelette, novella and short story were applied at the time of its initial publication, however.LiPollis 20:18, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Yeah what's up with the "theme" section? Writing about theme is inherently about a particular interpretation of the story. Either this section needs to be removed, or given clarification (i.e., "One interpretation of the story's theme is that...). In any event, the inclusion of such an opinion in the article would require a citation from a reliable source. I am removing this section until such a citation is forthcoming. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.177.13.235 (talk) 18:31, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

The Birds...
This article is a bit of a mess, especially the second paragraph. I'm going to try to fix it up a little, though. If anyone dislikes my changes, feel free to revert it to the way it was.

No structure, bad summary, interpretation missing
That article is a mess. It has no clear structure, a interpretation is missing and the summary sums up unimportant things. I think that summary should be rewritten completly and a interpretation, which follows all directions, should be added. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 217.185.13.224 (talk) 15:37, 25 February 2007 (UTC).

I made some changes as well to a few parts of the article, especially the summary. Feel free to revert if I've done something wrong. LavenderInk (talk) 17:41, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Not well written or accurate
I'll refine it a bit(more details addded). Added basic infobox. -121.6.224.104

I worked a bit on the first two paragraphs, hoping to fix the "not well written" part. If people are okay with my changes I'll do similar things with the rest of the article. Just small changes, but they'll make it more readable. Statusred (talk) 23:28, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

About "Radio Adaptations"
This segment is merely a single section. I believe it should either have more information added to it, or be removed. -70.20.127.71 01:08, 1 November 2007 (UTC) I removed the radio adaptations section, adding the information to the first paragraph, and added a link to the film version within the page. -70.20.127.71 01:18, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Japanes translation needed
The block of Japanese text on the page seems to be a short plot analysis of 'The Birds' but either needs translating or completely scrapped and just to be written in English. It's also in the wrong section —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mizzuru (talk • contribs) 16:55, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

What is the ending?
I've altered the ending of this story in the summary because I think the previous version was wrong, but it might be open to interpretation. I think that Nat smoked his last cigarette and mentioned that he hadn't got more cigarettes at the farm. The previous version said that he realised that he'd left his last cigarette at the farm so couldn't smoke it. It seems an odd thing to do - to leave the cigarette at the farm while he still has the packet. And surely he'd say "I dropped it" rather than "I left it"? The text also says "He reached for it" - 'it' is unspecified, but the cigarette seems the obvious thing.

This might seem squabbling over something trivial, but since it's the last incident, the 'last cigarette' (which previously he said he'd keep for a rainy day) might have some significance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Keith Edkins (talk • contribs) 23:22, 20 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Good call. When I heard this being read, at first I also thought that was what he meant (that for some reason he took and left his last cigarette at the farm). To be fair, it's a little ambiguous, but you can pretty quickly work out that it must mean he left the farmer's cigarettes at the farm, and so the one he has is still his last. -- xensyria T 21:49, 3 May 2013 (UTC)