Talk:Strange Tales (pulp magazine)

Comments

@Tenebrae: I have a couple of comments that I'd like to get your feedback on. First I should say it's a pleasant surprise to have someone else edit one of the magazine articles I work on; I don't often find anyone else interested in these. Anyway, here are a couple of comments.

• You've removed some of the material about Weird Tales. I take your point that this is not an article about WT, but not only do the sources make a point of comparing the two, but it's necessary to give the reader a bit of background. See Unknown (magazine)#Background and publication history, which I wrote, and which discusses WT for the same reason. (In fact, I took the text almost verbatim from there.) Would you mind if I re-added this, or something similar? It would have to be part of a larger discussion; I left that section half-done, not realizing someone would come along so quickly and clean up after me. (As I said, I rarely run into anyone else editing these magazine articles.)
• Any objections if I switch back to <references /> instead of {{reflist}}? There's really no benefit to {{reflist}} unless its parameters are used, whereas <references /> is much easier to work with in VE. I've no objection to using {{reflist}} when we need to use its parameters.
• I'm not sure what is deprecated about the referencing approach I'm using, but I'd be glad if you could clarify.

Thanks -- Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:37, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Hi, Mike. And may I say it's a pleasure as well. I find articles improve rapidly when more than one editor is involved. I'm not sure how much more there is to say about Weird Tales other than that Strange Tales was meant to compete with it, but certainly anyone can add something and other editors can trim it so we might bat the ball around a little. There's a phrase we use in journalism: "throat clearing" a.k.a. "spinning gravel," which means content that prevents us from getting to the point of something quickly. We also ask ourselves, "Do we need to say this or that? Is the gist of the point the same without it?" My thinking is if we can find quotes or citations that directly compare WT and ST, that would be pertinent. Deep background on WT strikes me otherwise as original-research essaying.

Not sure if the two reference templates do anything different, but the older one has been deprecated for the sake of consistency throughout Wikipedia. I would look at WP:ASL.

OK, now let's knock this one out of the ballpark! : )   --Tenebrae (talk) 18:28, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Sounds like a plan to me! I'll try to put something together in a sandbox and we can review it; maybe later this week or this weekend.

I've done quite a few of the magazines on the {{ScienceFictionFantasyWeirdPulpMagazines}} template and the section format I've been using is as follows:

• Publication history - Background to the launch (competitors, genre history); information about the launch; editorial succession, financial and circulation information if known, changes of ownership.
• Contents and reception -- Well-known or well-received stories, well-known authors who published frequently there or who published their first or significant stories there; cover art, interior art; awards; non-fiction departments if any. For really short articles this sometimes gets combined with the publication history section.
• Bibliographic details -- table showing volume/issue numbers by date, editorial succession summarized, any reprints (Canada or UK, usually); reprint anthologies if any; price and page count history.

For most of the magazines that covers everything; every now and then there's some reason to add an extra section, but I don't see that happening here. This is going to be a pretty short article -- I think a good comparison would be Miracle Science and Fantasy Stories, which is a GA. So far all I can really find on Strange Tales is the Tymn/Ashley chapter and a few comments in Ashley's Time Machines. I'll look through some other refs and report back. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:36, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Your categories and organizational structure sound eminently sensible. I would only caution to avoid the temptation — we all have it with subjects in which we're well-versed — to do OR essaying. But it's great to see this magazine rescued from just being a small section elsewhere! --Tenebrae (talk) 22:47, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

I filled in the biblio details section and added a couple of refs to support a couple of points. I also put back the <references /> instead of {{reflist}}; if you think it should be changed back to {{reflist}} again, can it wait till we're done working on the article? {{reflist}} is a pain in VE. I looked at WP:ASL, by the way, and as far as I can see <references /> is not deprecated -- I think the main reason people use {{reflist}} is to get the column output for the footnotes, and we don't need that yet.

I'll have another go at the publication history next. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:06, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

Draft of publication history done

I've done a rework of the publication history section. There are quite a few references to Weird Tales but I think they're supported by the references -- to be honest, pretty much every source I have makes a point of comparing the two magazines, so I think we need to do the same. I haven't tried to polish the text much since we're still discussing what should be there. Let me know what you think.

I'll have a quick go at the lead next. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 00:06, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

OK, lead is done, and I've done some linking. Let me know what you think.

Also, I have a question. I think we should mention the three (at least) facsimile editions that Wildside reprinted; see here: Jan 33, Mar 32, and Oct 32. Can you think of a better way to cite this than to simply include the three as references, and cite them directly? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 02:29, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

I've made mostly copy-edits, trimming redundancies, condensing wordy phrases and polishing for encyclopedic WP:TONE. Since we're showing a cover that contains the subtitle, it's more specific and less vague to say "cover-titled such-and-such."

The Wildside content is in there and cited, so I guess that's a moot point.

WP:LINKFARM also applies to laundry lists of References and Further reading. The References section should not contain books that aren't cited as reference in the footnotes, and having two uncited book by an author who already has two books cited is appears promotional and unnecessary.

Otherwise, a very nice job in giving perspective and context to the place this magazine holds in popular-literature history! --Tenebrae (talk) 16:37, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the copyedit; definitely an improvement. I re-added the Encyclopedia of Fantasy; it's used in a footnote. Otherwise, no disagreements with your edits.

The Wildside question actually isn't moot yet -- Wildside brought out three more issues, numbered 8-10, and those are mentioned and cited. However, they also brought out three facsimile reprints of the original magazine, and the article doesn't mention those. I found a page on Wildside Press's website that mentions these, so I'll cite them to that -- I think that's good enough. Ideally I'd like to find a third-party source for this sort of thing, but I think it's fine to use the website just to demonstrate existence.

Anything else needed for GA, do you think? I think this is ready to nominate at GAN. Oh, and I saw your self-revert the other day; we can go back to the reflist template now if you like, since I'm no longer editing the article actively. You asked what VE was; it's the visual editor, which I use for almost all my article editing these days. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:20, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Looks like I was mistaken about the web page; I had to cite them to the books themselves. Does that look OK? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:34, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Article looks pretty good — not sure how much more there is to say on the topic other than adding vintage interview quotes from the original editor and writers themselves, if they ever discussed the magazine. I have to admit the footnoting format looks weird — or perhaps strange!  : ) — since the book sources could be in the footnotes, thus saving space, avoiding repetition, etc. But if this is an accepted footnote format, then I guess it's proper to use and just a matter of taste. Overall, I think we, mostly you, did good work on this article. --Tenebrae (talk) 21:31, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks -- I appreciate the compliment, and your edits (and input) were definitely helpful. I'll go ahead and nominate for GA. Not sure what you mean about the footnotes; can you give me an example of an article with the footnote style you're used to? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 21:36, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

It's OK -- it really doesn't matter since Wikipedia accepts both types of formatting. I find it less redundant, simpler and easier to read to have the book information right there in the footnotes, as at, say Jack Hill, rather than spread across two sections, but both ways are perfectly fine. This is a good article, you did a nice job, and I'm happy to have supported you with copy edits and an extra eye for perspective. It's been good teaming with you. --Tenebrae (talk) 23:39, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Strange Tales (pulp magazine)/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: J Milburn (talk · contribs) 21:38, 24 November 2014 (UTC)

I enjoyed reviewing the last one, so I'm happy to take this on. (For what it's worth, I've never read much in this genre, but I've done some pulp-inspired roleplaying.) J Milburn (talk) 21:38, 24 November 2014 (UTC)

• It'd be good if you could specify the country in the lead. I'm assuming this was US-based?
• Perhaps the lead should say that it was first published from 1931 to 1933?
• "the "Conan the Barbarian" stories" If you're referring to a series, I think it should be italicised; if you're referring to the character, it probably shouldn't be; either way, I don't think the speech-marks are needed.
• "June 1932 issue'.[5] Howard" Rogue apostrophe? Or were you meaning to do something else with the sentence?
• Perhaps you could, in some way, provide an indication of what the payment/prices are in more recent money?
• Perhaps facsimile is worth linking? Possibly not a word familiar to some readers?
• Odyssey Press worth redlinking?
• Price worth redlinking?

  All the above points done; sharp eyes on that apostrophe! I was hesitating about redlinking Price so I googled him and discovered he already has a substantial WP article, so I linked him. That'll teach me to be sceptical. Odyssey Press is probably borderline but I would guess Locus has enough coverage to justify an article. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:49, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

• I feel a little more about the recent issues would be valuable. Any work by anyone of note, for instance?

  Not much. L. Sprague de Camp has a very short story in issue 9; it appears to have been his last published story but my only source for saying that is the ISFDB which is not an RS, unfortunately. It's a very minor story. The best-known other author with a new story in it is probably Richard Lupoff, who is not that well-known. I think the reason that the contents have not been remarked on much is probably just that they're unremarkable. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:49, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

• Category:Defunct American literary magazines?

  Does it qualify as literary? I think of that term as referring to the more high-brow magazines, targeted at people who are up on the most modern fiction. This was certainly a fiction magazine, but I don't think it really fits under "literary". Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:49, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

• A subcategory of Category:American magazines by state?

  Done; Wildside Press moved from Pennsylvania to Maryland between issues 9 and 10, so I added three separate categories for this. I didn't know about these categories and will use them in future. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:49, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

• Page 253 of this book picks out Ashton Smith's "The Nameless Offering" as worth mentioning.

  Unfortunately Google Books won't show me this -- can you clip an image for me if it seems worth it? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:49, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

Sources look good. Happy to take your word on the cover image- the PD claim seems plausible. Generally very good. J Milburn (talk) 22:12, 24 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the review! Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:49, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

Interesting new discovery: Page 17 of this book suggests that Lovecraft did submit to Strange Tales; see this pic. The Ashton Smith thing isn't really worth mentioning- there are actually loads of references to this one on Google Books (I was surprised!), but they're mostly just little anecdotes about well-loved authors. J Milburn (talk) 19:54, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

A good find! Price's comments are a direct quote from Lovecraft: "You may recall that I wouldn't contribute to Strange Tales because Bates couldn't guarantee me immunity from the copy-slasher's shears and blue pencil". I think the only sensible way to interpret this is that he submitted the stories, and Bates expressed interest, but Lovecraft turned down the sale because Bates couldn't promise the stories would be left untouched. I've edited that sentence to try to reflect this; see what you think. I've also just ordered the issue of Crypt of Chthulhu that Joshi and Schultz cite, in case it has more information. Thanks for finding this! Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:56, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Ok, I am going to go ahead and promote, on the understanding that further improvements may be made in the future. I think there is potentially a little more material out there about this one which might give you enough material to push FAC-wards, and I do think a little more about the new issues (even if they're mostly unremarkable) would be a nice addition, but I am happy that this is worthy of the green plus. Great work, as ever. These kinds of articles are one of the best things about Wikipedia. J Milburn (talk) 20:22, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

I've plonked it in Wikipedia:Good articles/Social sciences and society#Magazines and journals- if you think it belongs somewhere else, I have no objection to you moving it. J Milburn (talk) 20:26, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

That seems the right place to me. After thinking about it I think you're right that some mention is appropriate; I also realized that I wasn't giving the Wildside Press issues proper coverage with regard to details like length and format. I've made the relevant changes, and when the source arrives I'll add what I can from that. Thanks! Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:50, 27 November 2014 (UTC)