Talk:Tom Stoppard

Henry Carr
In the section on Travesties, Carr is mentioned solely as the plays narrator. He was in fact real and also appears very briefly in Joyce's Ulysses.

Outrapo query
What's the evidence for 'co-opted into Outrapo', whatever that is? DJ Clayworth 21:39, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your interest.
 * Outrapo


 * But what does it mean? Is he an active member, a patron, just somebody who the members of the Outrapo group look up to, or what? &mdash;Paul A 02:53, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)


 * He's an official member... like Marcel Duchamp for the Oulipo, by example, or Patrick Hughes for the Oupeinpo... etc. etc.&mdash;212.198.0.93


 * That doesn't explan very much. What does he do as a member? Indeed, for the benefit of those of us without much French, what does Outrapo do? DJ Clayworth 13:30, 22 Oct 2003 (UTC)


 * See the talk:Outrapo page, please.

OK. I get it. For encyclopaedic purposes it would be nice to know whether Tom Stoppard knows that he is a member of Outrapo. DJ Clayworth 14:36, 27 Oct 2003 (UTC)


 * I see that Tom Stoppard participated actively in the public presentation of Outrapo one year ago in the Bibliothèque nationale de France: he wrote the text of introduction of the evening and collaborated in the last demonstration based on his Hamlet's own summary.: http://www.bnf.fr/fr/evenements_et_culture/anx_conferences_2011/a.c_110519_oulipo.html 85.171.205.123 (talk) 09:48, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Nationality
I know there's a good reason that Stoppard is considered British. (I don't know what it is, but) oughtn't it be mentioned? Omphaloscope » talk 23:21, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

From the article he was British by residence and adoption from an early age. Singapore would have been British when he arrived there at age 2, and when his mother married he would presumably become British. What else would you suggest, given that he left his birth country age two? DJ Clayworth 01:54, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Sheer pedantry
Sheer pedantry I know but hey ho:  Around the time of Doggs Hamlet was also somthing called Doggs Our Pet.... a short play written for the Doggs Troupe company (of which it is an anagram)

The early bbc radio writing included a lot of work on the world service on a series based around the events in a young arab mans life and experiences in london....the series was primarily aimed at people trying to learn English.


 * If you have the details this is totally the place for them: we're an encyclopedia, not a resume!
 * Dybryd 17:07, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

List(s) of available performances?
Does anyone know of a good link for available performances? Woefully few of his early plays are available on DVD, and a quick search didn't turn up any radio plays available on CD. But I may be missing something; searching for DVD's under his name at both Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk missed a lot, and both are even worse at searching for spoken word CD's. The best I've been able to find is an Amazon list of DVD's.

FlashSheridan 05:06, 15 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Almost all of Stoppard's radio plays were broadcast by the BBC. I've never heard of any being released, but you could ask them. I have a friend (a friend, you understand!) who has cassette tapes of some. DJ Clayworth (talk) 14:18, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Golden Compass screenplay draft
Anyone have any idea about locating this?Anthony Krupp (talk) 15:54, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Getting a copy of an unused draft of a movie script? Wouldn't that be very hard short of espionage? DJ Clayworth (talk) 14:14, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Squaring the Cirlce missing
Squaring the Circle, a teleplay written by Stoppard in the 80's, is missing from the list of works. Concerned with the Polish Solidarity Movement (Polish: Solidarność), Squaring the Circle is an inventive treatment of history through the differing perspectives of multiple participants. While I've written an undergraduate paper on the subject, I am not qualified to edit the article on this work. I's like to request it's addition by someone more qualified. Panzerama (talk) 22:55, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * If you're writing an undergraduate paper you are probably well qualified to edit this article. see Be bold in editing. DJ Clayworth (talk) 16:20, 14 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Fair enough. I'll get on that. Panzerama (talk) 02:27, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Wrong link
The link to Dolphin School point on new (founded in 1970) and small school in Berkshire, obviously not the school Stoppard attended in 1946 which is in Nottinghamshire. Avihu (talk) 20:21, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Works: Theatre cut the descriptions of each play
I think the potted descriptions of the plays don't fit with the article. They seem like original and POV synopsis. Without exception each play has its own article. Let's cut. Would you agree? Spanglej (talk) 01:30, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

I've cut the extensive prose descriptions of the works and added translation detail. Most are wikilinked. Spanglej (talk) 03:55, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

"Ennobled"
A recent edit admits Stoppard to the ranks of the "ennobled". Isn't Baron the minimum entitlement to qualify as a noble, rather than the "knighthood" he actually holds? Proposing RV. --Old Moonraker (talk) 22:07, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Old Mookraker - which sentence are you looking at? Btw, do you agree with cutting out all the prose description of Stoppard's works? Spanglej (talk) 22:26, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry: it's this one; top at the time of writing, but I should have been specific. And: yes, because most of them are wikilinked. --Old Moonraker (talk) 22:38, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Ennoblement removed from article. --Old Moonraker (talk) 07:18, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

Nationality
The Encyclopaedia Britannica states that Stoppard is "| a Czech-born British playwright". In interview he identifies as British; he left Czechoslovakia when he was two. Time and Britannica are strong sources. So, if anything, his nationality should be entered as British. Info boxes most often do not get these subtleties across, which is why they are often not encouraged for BLPs. I am removing the 'nationality' line in the box. His early history is well explored in the lead and body of the article. If there is disagreement, please discuss here. Span (talk) 23:04, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Copyright problem
This article has been reverted by a bot to as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. (See the investigation subpage) This has been done to remove User:Accotink2's contributions as they have a history of extensive copyright violation and so it is assumed that all of their major contributions are copyright violations. Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. VWBot (talk) 14:48, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

Could not have been saved by Tomáš Baťa
The article says, "Just before the German occupation of Czechoslovakia, the town's patron, Tomáš Baťa, helped re-post his Jewish employees, mostly physicians, to various branches of his firm all over the world."

That was in 1939.

But the page on Tomáš Baťa says he died in 1931, and therefore could not have saved Jews in 1939.


 * Well spotted. It's the link that's wrong: Tomáš Baťa's son was also Tomas Bata (confusingly, Tomas Bata Snr) and it was he who was in charge of the company when it dispersed its Jewish doctors. Bata Snr himself went to Canada. Many references, if required, for the company's action. --Old Moonraker (talk) 17:19, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Fixed: Thomas J. Bata. Sorry for the delay! --Old Moonraker (talk) 13:59, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

"Shakespeare In Love" stageplay adaptation
It's just been announced that Tom Stoppard will be writing a stageplay adaptation for Disney, to premiere in London. Since there were four copyright infringement suits against the movie, how can Stoppard write a play without infringing copyright? The movie was derived primarily from three sources: "The Dark Lady", "As You Might Like It" and "No Bed for Bacon". "As You Might Like It" was an original stageplay in itself. 66.122.183.251 (talk) 13:19, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Can you give sources for these "four copyright infringement suits". Even though this is a talk page, WP:BLP still applies and without references your post is liable for speedy deletion. --Old Moonraker (talk) 13:36, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

A Separate Peace
This is listed in the section on radio plays, but it goes on to say it was first performed on British television. Which is it?
 * Now fixed, with acknowledgement to you. Re your mainspace edit: please don't forget the edit summary—it was a long broadcast to search through! --Old Moonraker (talk) 15:32, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

Themes
There was a reference to Stoppard's being inspired by seeing Trevor Nunn's production of Gorki's Summerfolk to write more openly emotional drama, which then lists The Real Thing (1982), Arcadia (1993) and The Invention of Love (1997). Nunn's production of Summerfolk was 1999. I have removed the error. Stoppard was presumably inspired to write his Russian trilogy by that production. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.102.245.243 (talk) 14:07, 12 July 2012 (UTC)
 * And the OP has restored it. It's in the reference: start at 35’ 20”. --Old Moonraker (talk) 22:27, 12 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I have just seen this comment. Stoppard certainly seems to say that seeing Nunn's staging of Summerfolk (1999) inspired The Real Thing (1982) and his change of heart dated from this time. This is a transcript of the interview (the audio is linked). The salient piece is about three quarters of the way in. Tulsa begins "Looking at, at the whole of your, your career, most common thing said about you is that there are two clear phases." I guess it's easy to misremember the details of what we saw when. The citation seems to support Stoppard's view, even if the chronology is off in actuality. Span (talk) 22:57, 12 July 2012 (UTC)

But how can Stoppard have been inspired to write something in 1982, 1993 and 1997 by a production which happened in 1999? It's a nonsense. What Stoppard is talking about in that section of the interview is his being inspired by the Nunn Summerfolk to write his Russian trilogy which was presented at the National in 2002. 77.102.245.243


 * They start off talking about the first trilogy, but, yes, it would make sense, datewise, if he is talking about the second trilogy: The Coast of Utopia. Span (talk) 14:06, 13 July 2012 (UTC)

Racism of Sir Tom
Tom Stoppard doesn't believe that all British people are equal under our flag, but he believes that monarchs selected by the Christian God (not other God even we Brits believe or not in many versions of Her) are of pure Aryan blood, and that fact is eternal. If you believe that some people are superior for some metamagical neo-Hebrew religion we call Christianity, then you are a Sir, and Sir means liked by the unaware masses like Hitler, for Racist Aryans are loved for their style when they deceive. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:587:410E:5800:C5DB:BD26:452E:CB3 (talk) 01:20, 30 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Okay... maybe?  Source please? Jimw338 (talk) 14:22, 6 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Ah yeah right, Hitler. This is the same Stoppard whose father Eugen was a doctor for the Bata shoe manufacturers in Zlin, a Moravian town in Czechoslovakia, and whose the family "fled after the Nazi invasion of 1939, with other Jewish doctors working for Bata.?? Martinevans123 (talk) 15:01, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Tom Stoppard. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090629183519/http://alanthornhill.co.uk/sm_011.htm to http://alanthornhill.co.uk/sm_011.htm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 11:02, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Name pronunciation
I've heard his last name pronounced a few different ways. I tried to look up the correct pronunciation and found line an an article from The New York Times:

"If one needs a sign of Stoppard's own inner balance, consider the pronunciation of his name. It is STOP-PARD, with the accent on both syllables."

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1984/01/01/magazine/the-real-tom-stoppard.html

Not sure how to best include this sort of info, but I feel info on the pronunciation ought to be included in some way. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Paco2718 (talk • contribs) 00:15, 9 June 2019 (UTC)

Age contradiction
His age based on the years of his fathers death in the early life section don’t add up 142.126.185.19 (talk) 22:52, 27 July 2022 (UTC)