Template:Did you know nominations/The Secret River (Rawlings book)

The Secret River (Rawlings book)

 * ... that Leonard Weisgard illustrated Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings' The Secret River in cream on dark brown paper because publishers in 1955 did not allow characters to be shown with dark skin?
 * Comment: Moved to the mainspace in this edit. The hook fact appears in the Editions, awards section.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 16:39, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

Created/expanded by Tlqk56 (talk). Nominated by Fuhghettaboutit (talk) at 16:39, 28 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Symbol question.svg. Length OK, etc. I made a few edits, some of them for style, and I hope you'll nominate this fine article for GA. (Before that time, maybe tweak "deliberately avoided Negro dialect. 'No Uncle Remus or Little Black Sambo sort of stuff'" so it doesn't have wikilinks in the quote). But I think the hook is problematic, as is the claim in the article itself. This source, the reference for "the convention of the time did not allow her to be portrayed as dark-skinned" does not verify the convention of the time; it can be gathered, more or less, from the rest of the paragraph, but that's pushing the point too far esp. for a DYK hook. Note also that the hook is even stronger than the claim in the article, and the claim is so general that it's probably unverifiable. I think you should re-tweak the hook: in its current state it cannot go on the front page. That's a shame cause it's a very salient fact--you can either tone it down or go with the unusual quality of have an African-American heroine in a book like this. Good luck, Drmies (talk) 20:33, 6 August 2012 (UTC)


 * I have looked at the source, and having done so, I agree that the statement in the article and the hook here even moreso, went well beyond what it actually says. I have changed the statement in the article, and suggest the following replacement hook. However, I would like the article's creator to look at both. She may have a different take, and I would defer to her if she wants to suggest something else entirely:


 * ... that Leonard Weisgard illustrated Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings' 1955 book The Secret River in cream on dark brown paper to indirectly suggest she might be African-American, thus circumventing a racial taboo of the era?
 * --Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 01:57, 7 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Here's a question, which isn't really answered in the article: she is African-American? If so, then "indirectly suggest she might be" can be replaced with "indicate that she is". (Either way, "indirectly suggest" is a bit redundant: "suggest" is good enough by itself.) Going through it I found it odd that this wasn't made explicit--surely the critics would have remarked on it and I would expect to find it in the lead as well. Now, that the author wasn't explicit on the issue isn't all that important: the article seems to suggest that the later, revised edition is clear enough on that topic, as the reviews suggest. That point should be made explicit. I still think that the claim in the first sentence of "Editions, awards" needs stronger sourcing; of course it's easy for us (well, someone like me, who has taught literature in the South for the last decade and a half) to imagine this taboo, an encyclopedic article can't really rely on that. Perhaps a relevant quote can be found in the Harris article, but there's a problem there as well: I am not convince that the source is reliable; after all, it's published through this site, not a publisher of scholarship. If that taboo can find a stronger source then I have no problem with the (tweaked) ALT lead. BTW, I'm also nitpicking since this is the kind of concern that will be brought up in a possible GA review. Tlqk, please peruse the databases, JSTOR etc, to see what you can dig up if only to nail this point. Drmies (talk) 04:06, 7 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Insofar as I can tell it doesn't "indicate she is" at all. From what I understand, the point was that because everything was brown in this drawn world, the very dark brown background and the much lighter "cream" brown of the characters would allow readers of the era to still interpret the illustrations as of caucasian characters being drawn in a stylized fashion, while nevertheless allowing the character to actually be drawn in a brown shade. Here's a panel. An indirect suggestion is not the same as a suggestion; I don't think it's redundant; whether it is indirect or not here is another matter. But yes, it would be good if there were better sourcing, and I agree: this is another good candidate for a GAN nomination—I nominated Tlqk56's last fine article, John R. Tunis already. If you do reviews, it is waiting.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 04:48, 7 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Hello, and thanks for your interest in this article. I've been away from the computer for a few days -- sorry about that. I appreciate your concerns, and never want to do anything that isn't accurate. I always appreciate input into an article and have no problem with either of you changing anything. If i do, I'll speak up. :) The second lead is fine with me, BTW. The first point to clarify is that no one knows for sure what race Calpurnia was "supposed" to be, though the Uncle Remus quote implies the people in the book are African American, and so Calpurnia would be. (If you read the story, they are the only people in the book.) So we can't quote a fact about what Rawlings intended, unfortunately. There's a ref for that here, about page 55. I read it in the library, but you can see it here: and it's vague, too.
 * I can hunt some more for a statement about the racial "taboo". It wasn't something I was looking for at the time. I will do some more looking, but where should we go from here? Tlqk56 (talk) 22:47, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

(Edit conflict; I'll just leave what I wrote before you arrived) Since the creator doesn't seem to be around, and I think it would be a shame for this lovely article not the make it to the main page, let me suggest a hopefully completely uncontroversial (albeit, less interesting) hook so there's an option for inclusion:
 * ... that in Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings' 1955 children's book, The Secret River, a girl convinces a magical river to yield its precious fish in order to save a village starving during the Great Depression?


 * Hi again. The third hook would work, though its the kind of hook that makes me go "so what". But I've had to travel to a different state to take care of my sick, pregnant daughter-in-law and two year old grandson, so my computer time is limited. What about using the Scribner's quote about not wanting to upset the school board? A few minutes searching and I did find three possible publishing sources here:, , . But I don't have JSTOR access. And clearly my current priority isn't this article, much as I did enjoy writing it. I will try to check back tomorrow to see what you think. Thanks again. Tlqk56 (talk) 03:42, 8 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Tlqk, those articles are great--that's precisely the kind of thing I had hoped could be added to the article. The Scribner school board quote would make for an excellent hook, but since someone suggested that reviewers not propose hooks and then approve them I don't want to even suggest one. Now, I'm also dealing with a pregnancy so I might not be back here regularly, but there no rush, I think. Good luck with hook and article and with those other matters. Drmies (talk) 17:21, 11 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Okay one more!


 * ... that Charles Scribner described his suggestion to illustrate Marjorie Rawlings' The Secret River in cream on dark paper as "one of my silent contributions to dissolving the color barrier in the 1950's"?
 * --Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 05:07, 13 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Symbol confirmed.svg Excellent. i hope I can get to the review of that other one, but I can't make any promises that it'll be soon. Sorry. Drmies (talk) 23:14, 13 August 2012 (UTC)