User talk:ReubenFrankau

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Hello, ReubenFrankau, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful: I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your messages on talk pages using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place  before the question. Again, welcome! --CherryX (talk) 19:31, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
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Owen Hall
Dear RF: Good work on Hall. Thanks for pointing out that the Australian novelist was an entirely different fellow. The British Musical Theatre site has that wrong. By way of explanation about my edits: I felt that some of the detail about the family was too tangential to Hall's article, but you might consider putting some of it into the other family members' articles wherever the information is more directly applicable to that person. I also thought that some of the quotes about women and money were too similar to what we already had there.

If possible, can you add the dates when he owned The Cuckoo, together with a citation to your source? Also, the dates when he wrote for The Sporting Times? Indeed, I think that there could be more information in the article about his work and reputation as a critic and journalist, if you have more details on that. Also, do you have the [know the name of] the revue Hall criticized that made Edwardes challenge him to write his own libretto? What exactly did he say (harshly) about Wilde? Any more about his relationship with his parents and sisters? Was he close to them? What was his mother's maiden name? Was her family famous? Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 05:41, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Dear World: The above dude has left me a friendly & constructive message. My upbringing & instincts are telling me to click immediately on a thingummy (or possibly a whatsitsname, or maybe even a tiddlypom) that says "REPLY" but I can't find one. I've just spent fifteen exasperating minutes stumbling around the Wikipedia system trying to ascertain what the polite & correct way of responding may be. During this time I have consumed a pint of strong coffee & come very very close to throwing my computer out of the window. Wikipedia help pages are only helpful if one happens to be acquainted with all the computer jargon. My qualifications are in History, English, and Latin. The Wikipedia help pages are written in language I cannot comprehend. I need a help page to help me to translate the help pages. Somewhere out there is an organic life form known as Ssilvers with whom I would like to engage in worthwhile dialogue. Alas this appears to be way beyond my capability. I like books. I hate computers. The other day, a schoolboy from the other side of the world corrected my spelling (incorrectly). I am out of my depth here. Does anyone happen to know the way back to the Twentieth Century? That's where I'm from. Stuff made sense back there. Oh no, now I can't even find the button for the squiggly thingies ... is this it?ReubenFrankau (talk) 09:38, 15 January 2013 (UTC)


 * If you look at the section header - "Owen Hall" and follow it to the right, you should see an "edit" link. If that's too hidden for you, you can actually go to Special:Preferences (while logged in) and choose from various other ways to choose to edit a section, including by double-clicking.  While you're at it, look around at the other options in Preferences (it has several tabs to click through) - every person thinks differently, so we have provided quite a few ways to customize the software to make it easier to use for different people/circumstances.   Also, if you're using a standard American keyboard, you should be able to find the "squigglies" on the button to the left of the numeral "1" - just hold  to get .  – Philosopher Let us reason together. 21:55, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for this. I would agree that every person thinks differently. The problem here is that I lose an exponential proportion of my thinking ability the further I move outside my comfort zone. It would be unfair—& perhaps actively confrontational—if I were simply to re-edit the other chap's extensive re-editing of my previous edit: at this stage I'd prefer to discuss with him, share my own information with him, & let him decide. Is there an approved/correct/standard means by which I can reply to his message? (p. s. Found the squiggly line button, thanks!) ReubenFrankau (talk) 05:28, 16 January 2013 (UTC)


 * You usually just put your reply under his (where you put your "Dear World" message), indented by putting a colon before the beginning of the message. (Additional colons increase the indent.)


 * (For more on simple coding techniques, we have a WP:CHEATSHEET with details.)


 * Usually people watch pages that they have commented on (either by clicking the star at the top of the page so it turns blue or by setting their Preferences so such page are automatically watched; you check watched pages at the "Watchlist" link at the top of the page), so you just expect that they'll notice it. If you are concerned they might miss it, though, you can leave a note on their talk page (it's usually the second link in their signature - for Ssilvers, it's the "talk" link, for me it's the "Let us reason together." link).  Depending on how you want to do it, it can be either the actual reply (in which case, you'll want to watch their talk page in case they reply there) or just a note saying "I replied on my talk page, take a look".  The latter is often communicated via the talkback template - if I wanted to let you know you had a message on my talk page, I'd put  on your page - it would look like this once I'd typed the code:


 * This all sounds way more complicated than it actually is, by the way. Editing is meant to be simple.  Because anyone can edit, no one can ever really break the encyclopedia, so most of our conventions are fairly flexible.  If you start feeling too far outside of your comfort zone, either ask or ... be bold and just try something. Face-smile.svg  And, feel free to leave a note at User talk:Philosopher if you ever want to ask me a question.  You'll get the hang of it in no time. Face-smile.svg – Philosopher Let us reason together. 08:32, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

Owen Hall—a hesitant attempt to reply to the original message from Ssilvers:-
Hi Ssilvers, thanks for your message, sorry I couldn't work out how to reply more promptly. On the plus side, during my frantic manipulations of mouse & keyboard, I accidentally found out how to put "en" and "em" dashes instead of plain old hyphens. Basically I am out of my depth editing Wikipedia & will immediately plead Guilty to any accusations of incompetence which may be laid against me. It has been suggested that I could re-edit your re-edit of my re-edit. This sounds to me like a good way to start an Editing War, which is not what I want. It appears you care about the Owen Hall page at least as much as I do. I think all I can do at this stage is address the points you raise & then let you decide how to proceed.
 * Hi. The answer to your first question above about how to initiate a conversation with another user here:  It is better to respond on the other person's talk page to make sure that they see your response.  To write on my talk page, you would just click the word "Talk" after my signature.  Or, you can write on the Owen Hall article's Talk page.  Every Wikipedia article has a tab to the left of the Edit tab that says "Talk".  If you click on the Talk tab at the top left of the Owen Hall page, you get to the related Talk page, which is probably the best place to talk about improvements to that article, because other people who are interested in the article will see the discussion and be able to participate.  Philosopher just alerted me to your reply here, however, and I'll respond to you below.  But eventually, we should bring discussion to the Owen Hall talk page.  -- Ssilvers (talk) 05:26, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Tangential family detail—Jimmy Davis was my grandfather's uncle (& as such partly responsible for inspiring his celebrated UK stage career): so it may be that my idea of what people might find interesting & relevant about family detail is over-inflated by family loyalty, but Jewish researchers such as Todd Endelman, and those with an interest in Victorian/Edwardian literary & theatrical circles, are sometimes quite intrigued to learn that "Owen Hall" + "Frank Danby" + "Mrs Aria" + the Collins brothers + Ronald Frankau + Gilbert Frankau et al. (e. g. actor Joseph Frankau of New York, and his theatrical daughter Aline Bernstein) were all so closely connected, and were part of the same circle as J. T. Grein, George Edwardes, "and that crowd" (as Tom Lehrer might well have put it). For theatre buffs, Eliza Aria's relationship with Henry Irving wins extra bonus marks of course.
 * I agree with you, mostly. This article is about Owen Hall; it does mention his siblings, and it should also mention their blue-linked spouses and descendants.  I don't think it needs to mention his sister's lover, even though he was the famous Henry Irving, because *her* article is the better place to discuss that.  Hall's article also doesn't need to mention Aline Bernstein, since she is only the daughter of a cousin of Owen Hall's sister.  However, Aline could be mentioned more plausibly in Julia Frankau's article; and there could be a separate Frankau family article that lists all of the notable members of that family and links to related persons, such as Julia Frankau's siblings. It could even give a family tree.  With respect to Hall's circle of friends, many articles do discuss the subject's friends.  If Davis had any friends that were particularly influential in his life, and you have reliable sources that discuss these relationships, then we can certainly mention that in Hall's article.  Also, if the major sources discuss Hall's "crowd", we could certainly discuss how they were influential in his development as a playwright, or how they had some other important effect on his life and career.  If you look at some of our best theatre biographies, like Noel Coward, Elaine Paige, Stanley Holloway or W. S. Gilbert, you may get some idea of how this is usually handled.  -- Ssilvers (talk) 06:06, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Quotations regarding women & money—this is a matter of opinion: I was aware that there was some overlap/duplication but it still seemed to me that the additional quotations shed further light on Owen Hall both as a man and as a wit.
 * It is a question of balance, as well as repetition. We already have these quotes from his family.  We could use more quotes from the critics.  The article needs more substance about Hall's life and career. If it needs more about his gambling, then it can describe his gambling in more detail, together with citations to reliable sources: Did he own any racehorses, or make any particularly famous bets?  If you think it needs more about his relationships with women, then describe one or more of them - did he date any famous women?  Did anything about his love life make big news?  Was there anything else of interest about his law career?  What about his journalism and other writings?  Sources mention his caustic reviews - let's quote one.  Let's quote one or two of his most witty lines from his libretti and what the critics said about it. As I said, see these excellent biography articles for an idea about how other articles in this encyclopedia discuss these kinds of issues: Noel Coward, Elaine Paige, Stanley Holloway and W. S. Gilbert.   -- Ssilvers (talk) 06:20, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Dates and citations for The Cuckoo and The Sporting Times—that whole line was/is a direct quotation from Mrs Aria's memoirs, hence my use of quotation marks + precise citation of pp16-17. My Sentimental Self (Chapman & Hall 1922) can be read/downloaded free on-line, and sometimes cheaply purchased from eBay or AbeBooks; vide Ch. II, "About My Girlhood and My Brother James" (pp15-26). My recollection is that Uncle Jimmy's racing column was actually called "On the Road to the Races", or something like that, hence Aunt Eliza's deliberate play on words (which has now been cut). However I am not well enough to go crawling around in the attic in current sub-zero temperatures to furnish corroboration. Dates for The Cuckoo would presumably be after The Bat and before The Phoenix, since that is the order in which his sister chose to list them, but it seems to me that one makes a rod for one's own back by specifying dates for some of these papers if one is not in a position to do the same for the others (hence I refrained from attempting it ... call me a coward, & I'll plead Guilty to that too).
 * So, you don't have the dates handy, and they are not in Mrs. Aria's book. That's OK.  If you come up with more sources in the future, we would be grateful for more details.  If not, eventually, someone here will find the information elsewhere, as the information obviously exists.  That's one of the great things about Wikipedia: there is no deadline to "finish" an article.  Note that the chronology of the subject's life is of considerable interest in an encyclopedia article.  To figure out what is most important about any topic in an article, I always ask myself: "who" "what", "where", "when", "how" and "why".  For example, regarding Jimmy Davis's law career: who hired him, what was the nature of his practice, or what famous legal matters was he involved with, where did he work (in London only?), how did he become interested in the law, where did he study law, why did he want to be a lawyer, why did he quit the profession?, etc.  Then I would ask the same question about his journalism; then about his play writing. -- Ssilvers (talk) 08:06, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * More information on his work and reputation as a critic and journalist—apart from Mrs Aria's personal recollections there are intermittent references to Jimmy Davis in his nephew's autobiography (Gilbert Frankau, Self-Portrait, Hutchinson 1940), copies of which are available for pocket-money prices. Professor Endelman quotes briefly from George Moore's Confessions of a Young Man (see below): this is a potentially interesting source which I have not yet managed to follow up. Victorian editions of Punch comment gleefully on any setback or misfortune which happens to befall Jimmy Davis, e. g. (from memory) a rhyming couplet on the libel case Davis v. Peck which was the beginning of the end of The Bat – bear in mind that "Beak" used to be slang for a Magistrate, & ditto "bird" for "chap/bloke/geezer" – "There were birds, large and small, wishing everywhere that/A Beak, with one Peck, could have settled The Bat"; not exactly Shakespeare, but anyway if you leaf through period issues of Punch you will find this or similar droplets of vitriol, I think motivated not least by good old-fashioned anti-Semitism.
 * Perhaps we can explain the history of "The Bat" or describe what happened in "Davis v. Peck" and what effect this had on our subject's life. Then we might say that this is how Punch commented on it.  -- Ssilvers (talk) 07:51, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * George Edwardes review—never seen it, not convinced it necessarily exists! Could equally have been a facetious quip made in person.
 * All the sources agree that Davis criticized some production by Edwardes (either in writing or in person), that Edwardes challenged him to "do better", and that, in response, Davis wrote his first show, which was a hit. Some sources claim that Edwardes' production was In Town, which would make sense based on the timing, and I cited a source that says so.  However, if you ever see anything that either refutes or confirms this, we would definitely be interested in that information.  -- Ssilvers (talk) 07:51, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Anti-Wilde sentiments—never seen them recorded, but they are expressly referred to (and at length) in Frank Danby's passionate foreword to The Sphinx's Lawyer, written (in Mrs Aria's phrase) "to defend the undefendable Oscar Wilde" (Sentimental Self, bottom of p54): vide under "Later novels" on the Frank Danby Wikipedia page + Margaret D. Stetz's article "To Defend the Undefendable": Oscar Wilde and the Davis Family at http://www.oscholars.com/TO/Specials/Wilde/Stetz.htm
 * Thanks. Stetz only says that no one knows why Owen Hall grew to hate Wilde. Like I said before, it would be interesting if we could say what Hall actually wrote about Wilde.  It is not your responsibility to come up with this, I was just asking if you had the information handy.  -- Ssilvers (talk) 07:51, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Relationship with parents & sisters + was he close to them?—brief perusal of My Sentimental Self will give you some idea, ditto My Best Riches [Horace Collins, as cited], ditto Self-Portrait [Gilbert Frankau, as cited] + I quote here from p128 of Prof. Endelman's article "The Frankaus of London" [as cited]:-
 * "Through him, Julia, then in her late-teens and early twenties, was introduced to a broader social world. ... After James married, the sisters were allowed to attend the remarkable parties he hosted at his house in Curzon Street, Mayfair. These evenings attracted an unconventional mix of persons – journalists, dramatists, novelists, actors, music hall comics and singers, aristocrats, sportsmen, "pretty ladies of high and low degree" (to use Eliza's words), and assorted hangers-on. The novelist George Moore remembered them for their champagne, late hours, evening clothes, passionate discussions of literature and art, and "fabulous bohemianism".
 * Whoa!!! James Davis married?  Who?  When?  That's totally missing from the article - Can you can help with this?  -- Ssilvers (talk) 07:51, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Mrs Aria's memoirs describe her first meeting with George Moore at one of Jimmy's parties [pp17-19]. In the context of this intellectual relationship between Jimmy & Julia & Eliza, that quotation likening Owen Hall lines to comments from "an upmarket gossip columnist" really seems to me all the more striking in the light of the fact that his sister Mrs Aria became an upmarket gossip columnist – as does the fact that Frank Danby, like Owen Hall, made enemies by her breathtakingly incisive caustic wit – but perhaps I am not qualified to make that judgement. Gilbert Frankau mentions that Frank Danby's best-seller The Heart of a Child, later filmed for the big screen, was based on an Owen Hall storyline [Self-Portrait pp215-216] – this again strikes me as very interesting & very indicative of the intellectual & social links between them. But that too is evidently a matter of opinion.
 * If Hall's sister wrote a book based on one of his libretti, we could certainly mention that in the article. Would you kindly give the details and refs on the the Owen Hall article's talk page, and I'll be happy to help format it and put it in the article. Regarding the rest, see WP:Original research, which is one of our most important policies here at Wikipedia, and let's discuss it more specifically on the Owen Hall article's talk page. -- Ssilvers (talk) 07:51, 17 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Mother's maiden name & family—aha, yes, well, hummm, funny you should mention that ... this isn't actually as bad as it sounds, but Great-Great-Grandmother Isabella's maiden name was, er, Davis, in fact! Davis (like Morris and Collins) seems to have been a very common choice of English surname amongst Jews settling in London. I know that "Collins" was the customary subsitute for "Kalisch", & "Morris" for "Moses" or "Moshe". Not sure about "Davis" – something to do with "David" possibly? I don't think Isabella's family were famous but they were certainly affluent & clearly well placed in Jewish society: the archivist Aryeh Newman describes Julia as "a Jewish girl from an Anglo-Jewish family of impeccable orthodoxy", and notes that Hyman & Isabella "were married in 1850 at the Great Synagogue, Duke's Place, by the Chief Rabbi, Dr Adler. [Aryeh Newman, "From exile to exit: the Frankau Jewish connection", The Jewish Quarterly Vol. 34 No. 4 (128), 1987 p50]
 * Do you know what Isabella's father's profession was? -- Ssilvers (talk) 07:51, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

I personally would not be comfortable deleting substantial chunks of what someone else had uploaded, unless they were just plain wrong (as I indeed did in the case of the Australian novels) – I always make an effort to combine other people's existing verbiage with my own, even if I have to shunt it around for ages until it fits. If you are comfortable making wholesale excisions of someone else's work, then I shall certainly refrain from putting anything else on the Owen Hall page myself, because I have not the heart (nor the time) to spend ages pulling books off my shelves & fishing out quotations & lovingly marshalling literate sentences & painstakingly citing references, only to have them electronically wiped out within 24 hours. It seems to me the best thing I can do is to share the above information with you, so that you can refer to the sources yourself & (if desired) ask me any further questions you see fit. Your preference is for a terser style and a commensurate economy of content. I certainly have no wish to get in your way. Best wishes for now ReubenFrankau (talk) 19:23, 16 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia works by consensus. If you think I am wrong about something, explain what the problem is on the article's talk page, and If I still disagree, we can invite some more Wikipedians to review the text and see if they think that it adds useful information to this article.  They might agree with you.  Just for historical context, I have been contributing to Wikipedia for more than 6 years, and in that time I have worked on thousands of articles here.  You can see more about my editing history on my user page.  So, this informs my opinion about what material probably ought to go in articles; but as you said above, it is just my opinion.  You added some information to this article that I thought was very helpful and kept, and you added some material that I thought did not add anything new to a reader's understanding of the life and career of Owen Hall.  New Wikipedia users are often frustrated when they start editing here, especially when they start by working on a relative's article. I think that you can help us add more information about Hall, and if you want to do this by just giving us the information on the Talk page, I am happy to put it into the article.  But I hope that, ultimately, you keep contributing yourself.  As you do so, I think you will see more clearly what sort of information should go here, and what should go in other forums, like books, scholarly articles, or magazine features that you might write.  All the best!  -- Ssilvers (talk) 08:23, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

When people start quoting policies and guidelines to justify their own inflexibility, that (in my professional academic experience) is a sure sign that common sense and common decency have gone right out of the window. The Davis family tree is fairly readily accessible on the Internet, and I can only apologise for being tangentially connected with it myself. Other sources I have cited are either likewise available on the Internet, or easily obtainable for very modest monetary outlay. I absolutely decline to devote any more of my own time or effort to the Owen Hall page. Indeed, now it has been demonstrated in such categorical and forensic detail that I am unqualified to involve myself – to the extent of being disqualified, seemingly – it would be sheer stubborn foolishness to persevere. Others who feel themselves capable of meeting the standard which has been set for the Owen Hall page will have minimal difficulty in looking up the sources I have cited. I have no option but to retire from the field here. There is nothing defamatory or malicious on the Owen Hall page as it stands, and I must rest content with that. The page is neither as full nor as accurate as it might be, but I know now that am not up to the task of improving or rectifying it. ReubenFrankau (talk) 10:04, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Arthur Collins (theatre manager) hidden comment
Hello Reuben, I have left you a hidden comment on Arthur Collins (theatre manager). No grief, I just wanted some carrification on the quotes you have used. It's a great start and I'm happy to help where needed. --  Cassianto Talk    22:37, 20 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I do not possess the computing skills to find your "hidden message" – I can't even find anything on Google about how to find it (I've tried numerous searches along the lines of "how to find hidden message", "Wikipedia access hidden message" and suchlike...)! If you hid it because it was even more hostile & destructive than the very public demolition I suffered above, then perhaps I ought to be glad it's actually hidden from me (but I gratefully note your assurance that it represents "no grief")! What the "professional" Wikipedia dudes appear to forget is how incredibly demoralizing and exhausting the whole challenge of grappling with unfamiliar computer systems can be. Then on top of that comes the "Russian Roulette" experience of finding out whether or not one was actually wasting one's time & effort all along. I have spent several pampered decades being told that I was a capable researcher & a gifted writer (alas, I made the classic mistake of "believing my own publicity"). I now find that my friends and colleagues were obviously easier to please than the Wikipedia community. I notice that the Arthur Collins page currently contains spelling & punctuation errors which it did not have before, and it appears to me to say less about his life than it previously did. I am not sure how such changes really constitute improvements, but no doubt someone could readily furnish guidelines and policies to justify them (please don't bother, though!). Far be it from me to argue. I'm just too disheartened and disillusioned to reply constructively to your message, even if I had the time & expertise to locate it. There is no room on Wikipedia for the "gentleman amateur". I'm leaving it to the "professionals" from now on. All I can say is that the quotations I rendered were correctly cited to the best of my ability & understanding from books which I have in my possession. If there is any discrepancy in page numbers, I can only suggest you may be looking at a different edition of the book. I am assuming that "carrification" is a typo for "clarification". Feel free to delete everything I've written – in the nicest possible way, I'm past caring. Sorry, but I'm not about to devote any more of my time or energy to this situation. The Wikipedia "professionals" can have the field to themselves if that's how they prefer it.—Reuben — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.141.127.221 (talk) 05:55, 21 January 2013 (UTC)