Talk:The Thirty-Six Dramatic Situations

Many of these examples are original "research" or plain incorrect.
I removed the most egregious examples, but this whole thing seems very flawed. None of it cites a secondary source. Wikipedia is not Tv Tropes, where volunteers are supposed to just make up their own associations! FPTI (talk) 07:01, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

Incorrect info as to date of first English translation
I have a reprint of The Thirty-Six Dramatic Situations. This must have been printed in the last year or two (I bought it new from Amazon: ISBN 1-59462-342-2). It's a straight copy of an original English translation from 1916/17, and this appears to predate the assertion in the main article that the first translation was 1920. The title page of my book reads, "Translated by Lucille Ray, with a Foreword by William R. Kane. Ridgewood, New Jersey. The Editor Company. 1917". The next page says, "Copyright 1916, 1917 the Editor Company. The Station Place Press, The Editor Company, Proprietors, Ridgewood, New Jersey". —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 172.213.76.162 (talk) 09:59, 27 February 2007 (UTC).
 * He's correct I have a 1916 copy published by the Station Place Press, an imprint of the Editor Company of Ridgewood New Jersy, it is the Lucile Ray translation, and clearly shows the copyright year as 1916. The foreword was written by William R. Kane December 1st 1916. --Xero (talk) 21:31, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Which number is Faust?
Some say that all good stories have one of those 36 situations as a central plot device. Can somebody tell me then, which one of those 36 is the central situation of Faust / "Deal with the devil"? It can't be "Ambition", because there is no adversary, right? Peter S. 00:42, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

How about #2: Deliverance: an Unfortunate; a Threatener; a Rescuer where the devil is the rescuer and probably also the thretener. --Lbeaumont 00:37, 23 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Since there are several versions of the Faust legend, there are several possibilities depending on whether the particular version is for example, tragedy or redemption. I would argue for conflict with a god, for the common supernatural element. MMetro (talk) 14:47, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Wikisource copy
At wikisource:Index:The thirty-six dramatic situations (1921).djvu, I've started the slow process of proofreading the full version of the book. 14 pages done, 166 to go. The work is primarily checking the OCR'd text for mis-transcribed characters/words, fixing linebreaks, and adding the wikisource templates. There are some notes at wikisource:User:Quiddity, and it's easy to use the already-verified pages as examples to work from. If anyone would like to assist, t'would be appreciated. :) -- Quiddity (talk) 20:20, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Totally Inaccurate Portrayal
Does anyone else find this article to be an extremely poor and totally inaccurate portrayal of the book? I have the book in my hands right now and this article makes it seem like Polti bangs out 36 clean and clear situations, but the book is nothing like that. For example, in the Third Situation "Crime pursued by vengeance" there is not one situation at all; there are 16 situations clustered under various sub-headings. The Twenty-Fourth Situation "Rivalry of superior and inferior" has 26 different sub-categories!

Furthermore, the examples listed here on Wikipedia are not the examples from Polti's book. And finally, the formatting is inconsistent as some have examples, there is some capitalization and some not. This article is mostly a waste of space. Andersole (talk) 22:29, 26 September 2014 (UTC)

Why isn't there a original french language name of the book? It should be at the very beginning of the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.112.199.15 (talk) 10:18, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

I completely agree, this entire thing needs a heavy rewrite. FPTI (talk) 06:59, 12 February 2024 (UTC)

Civic education
Different types of situations 105.112.227.213 (talk) 14:00, 11 October 2022 (UTC)