Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2019 March 31

= March 31 =

Papa Hemingway
Why is Hemingway nicknamed Papa? Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.128.169.188 (talk) 03:56, 31 March 2019 (UTC)


 * There are several websites including this one that state "Ernest Hemingway did not like to be called by his first name. He wanted to be called Papa Hemingway". This one mentions that he chose the nickname at the ripe old age of 27. MarnetteD&#124;Talk 04:08, 31 March 2019 (UTC)

Why is the Russia-North Korea border so narrow?
Why is the Russia-North Korea border so narrow? Based on the map in this Wikipedia article (China-North Korea-Russia tripoint, the border between Russia and North Korea could have easily been much longer, but for some reason there is a very narrow Chinese territory in between Russia and North Korea that makes their border much shorter.

Why didn't Tsarist Russia demand a longer border with Joseon Korea in 1860 when it forced Qing China to give up Outer Manchuria in the Convention of Peking? Futurist110 (talk) 20:59, 31 March 2019 (UTC)
 * One possibility is that this was settled on as part of the Treaty of Portsmouth, intended to separate Russian and Japanese (Korean) territory in the wake of the Russo-Japanese War. Blueboar (talk) 22:50, 31 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Have you read North Korea–Russia border? It says "" Nil Einne (talk) 03:55, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * The very basic narrative: the Chinese territory granted to Russia was Outer Manchuria. As you can see from the map in that article, Outer and Inner Manchuria had the same long, looping border following the Tumen River that is now the international border between Russia and the PRC. No one at the time apparently felt it necessary to revise the border. As others have noted, at the time, Korea was basically a client state of China. (See History of Korea and the background to the First Sino-Japanese War for some more information.) Since Korea was heavily dependent on China for military and foreign policy, few likely thought it a problem that there was a funny border. Then history happened, and now there's a funny international border. There are all kinds of examples of this sort: for some more, try List of enclaves and exclaves, Category:Border-related lists, or try a Web search for terms like "unusual borders". --47.146.63.87 (talk) 05:00, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah, that makes sense--though it would have still been a prettier border had China been forced to give up that little strip south of Hunchun in the map on the right. Futurist110 (talk) 00:20, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
 * No one really cares about the "prettiness" of borders. Borders, as legal entities, are established by legal precedent and international agreement, and not by "what Randy in Boise thinks is aesthetically pleasing on maps".  Maybe there's a natural resource in a certain area; maybe there's a railroad that needs the land to go through, maybe there's a port someone needs access to, maybe it's a negotiated border that was decided as a compromise, maybe it's been that way so long, no one remembers why, but it just is.  There's any of a thousand reasons why a country might want to claim a bit of land, or why two countries might decide on the location of a border, and "it looks neater when charted on a piece of paper" has not often, to my knowledge, been all that useful to do so.  Indeed, when borders are decided in that way, it can cause numerous, far ranging problems.  See Berlin Conference and Scramble for Africa for one; many of the modern borders in Africa came about because some European powers, sitting around tables back in Europe, drew straight, pretty lines on maps.  Many of Africa's political problems stem from this unnatural practice of dividing up land.  Other examples of such terrible ideas include the Sykes–Picot Agreement in the Middle East, the Durand Line between Afghanistan and Pakistan, etc.  Making pretty maps only causes ugly wars.  -- Jayron 32 16:31, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Fair points. Futurist110 (talk) 19:49, 2 April 2019 (UTC)
 * In a sense, yes, the aesthetic qualities of a border aren't necessarily a big deal. And of course, arbitrarily-drawn borders are frequently problematic. But, it certainly is the case that borders can cause geopolitical headaches in cases such as the Russia–PRC–North Korea border. A somewhat similar case is the Siliguri Corridor, a bottleneck connecting India's easternmost states with the rest of India. All traffic between these parts of India has to go through the Corridor if it doesn't wish to cross into Bangladesh and be subject to customs, possible denial of entry, etc. Bottlenecks, projections, and enclaves/exclaves are vulnerable in a military conflict because they can easily be cut off, and this ironically often makes conflicts more likely because the country to which they belong may fortify the area out of fear of attack, raising tensions with neighbors. Another apropos historical example is the Polish Corridor, which many Germans regarded as an unjust imposition and probably helped inflame tensions between Germany and Poland as well as the WWI victors who imposed it. --47.146.63.87 (talk) 00:46, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
 * And the Poles would have seen being forced to be landlocked an unjust imposition. International relations is all about choosing the best outcome for humanity given mutually exclusive unjust impositions.  -- Jayron 32 11:11, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I suppose that a German nationalist could have offered a compromise where Poland was allowed to keep Gdynia while Germany would have had a land connection to East Prussia further south (specifically in the Bromberg-Torun area). Still, you're correct about trade-offs and compromises needing to be made. Futurist110 (talk) 23:47, 3 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Unless you build a bridge of land floating in the air, you can't connect BOTH Germany proper/East Prussia AND Poland/Baltic. Giving one of those countries a corridor cuts the other into two pieces.  It's a physical impossibility.  -- Jayron 32 12:16, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, this is correct--which is why an elevated extraterritorial road for either Germany or Poland might have been a good idea. Such an elevated road could have connected Germany to East Prussia or connected Gdynia to the rest of Poland in the event that Germany would have had a land connection with East Prussia in the Bromberg-Torun area. Futurist110 (talk) 19:22, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Ah. But doesn't Poland have air rights to its own land? What about the land under the pylons supporting the road?  -- Jayron 32 12:20, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I have solution. One country gets everything from a certain depth (quarter kilometer?) to space, the other gets the right to dig any amount of tunnels it wants below that and ban wells deeper than that. Poland gets the land and the air cause Germany already has ports and Poland would have to limit itself to a strip thin enough that Germany wouldn't have to put any ventilation equipment on Polish soil. If the DC, Baltimore and Philly to NYC and Boston railroad can cross a river 2/3rds miles wide without any wet air shafts in 1910 then Germany could cross a strip over a kilometer wide without needing Polish soil in 1919. Whoever is hurt less by this plan could pay the other country money. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 18:33, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
 * The inanity of this tangent grows exponentially with each passing comment. -- Jayron 32 19:04, 5 April 2019 (UTC)


 * When the Panama Canal Zone existed, there was a road through it that was all Panama's; where it crossed another highway, the overpass and the road under it were in different territories. So it's not entirely unheard-of for boundaries to deviate from the vertical. (The book in which I read this is in some box in the garage, so no more details for now.) —Tamfang (talk) 20:45, 6 April 2019 (UTC)


 * For example, go read about the India/Bangladesh border was until 2015: India–Bangladesh enclaves. --Khajidha (talk) 14:27, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Yep, I've already read about that. It's good that they got rid of their various enclaves in 2015 through a land swap. Futurist110 (talk) 19:50, 2 April 2019 (UTC)