Talk:Willard Price

Questions

OK, some questions that could do to be answered here...

When was Willard Price editor of "Survey" and "World Outlook" magazine? It seems that Drew University have microfilms of these during a period that probably included his editorship: http://www.depts.drew.edu/lib/uma_film.html

I've found issues of World Outlook ranging from August 1915 to August 1920 that list him as either "Managing Editor" or "Editor" in the table of contents. Unfortunately "pictures of magazine pages from Ebay ads" is probably not a good source citation. ThinkingGuy (talk) 22:38, 10 February 2022 (UTC)

Also, when did he graduate from Columbia? There's not much on-line there in the way of graduation roll stuff, but probably someone who was there could find out that sort of information.

According to the 1942-43 edition of "Who's Who in America" (which is available on the Internet Archive), he received his M.A. from Columbia in 1914. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ThinkingGuy (talk • contribs) 21:37, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

I guess this really needs me to read his autobiographies, since my researching to this point has at least found that he wrote a couple!

Obviously this article could do to be a _lot_ better than it is at present. I put it in, however, because there does not seem to be anything much on this (very interesting) chap available on-line. {from User:Karora. Niteowlneils 12:08, 10 September 2005 (UTC)}

Rights sold?

During October 2006, the Price family of Holden, Massachussetts, entered into an agreement to sell the copyrights and related legal rights in the 14 adventure series titles (plus the right to use the name WILLARD PRICE) to London-based literary brand owner and investor, Fleming Literary Management LLP (see www.flemingliterary.com ). Fleming Literary is reinvigorating the brand, including through the planned publication of new book # 15 in the series (to be co-written with a new writer but branded with WILLARD PRICE), and the development of television and or film(s) based on the series. Fleming Literary's associated company, Ian Fleming Publications Limited, owns publishing rights to writer Ian Fleming's works including James Bond 007.

• Any chance of getting a direct citation for this information? Also, it'd probably be more at home at the The Adventure Series (Willard Price) article. I'll wait on a citation, and then I might consider moving it. Ackatsis 15:28, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I just had a strange thought. How can this 15th book be "co-written" by a new author?! Willard Price passed away some time ago - is there an unfinished 15th story that I don't know about? Ackatsis 00:48, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Response to merging his books into this article

There's an Amazon preview for Underwater Adventure, so I'll use that book for talking points about this one. Looking at the first paragraphs suggests these books are not of high literary quality. The third sentence/paragraph abruptly changes tense, and in fact seems as if it might be "cut-and-pasted" from another book. Vocabulary such as "great fish" seems peculiar and inept. "Doctor of Science" is spelled "doctor of science". A few pages on, the word "snorkel" is described as coming from German "schnorkel": "Our word is the same, only simplified." What? Then as an example of inept writing about a diving snorkel "...the snorkel rose out of the sea like the head of a sea serpent." Um, it looks like some unspecified fantasy serpent that's swimming sideways or backward?

From the three enthusiastic Amazon reviews apparently this book was compelling to encourage new readers, and it has been reprinted recently, but there doesn't seem to be any significant literary value. Is it worth describing each 130 page book separately? My vote is not. Leptus Froggi (talk) 19:59, 21 November 2012 (UTC)

Entirely depends on what can be reliably sourced. If there are RS reviews/articles about him and/or his books, then content based on them should exist; and vice-versa. (I would tentatively agree that most of the pages should be merged and shortened. However, I'm not a frequent participant in WP:LIT or WP:CHL, and would defer to whomever wished to actually invest time in these pages.)

(Disclaimer: I read and enjoyed them, a lot, as a kid in the 1980s. There was much to intrigue a young reader, from swashbuckling-high-adventure to zoological-trivia. However, rereading a few of them, as an adult, was a let-down. I should perhaps try his adult non-fiction.)

Also, do keep in mind he was born in 1887...! —Quiddity (talk) 00:06, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

Oh, agree, Quiddity. Price seems to have made some rather interesting contributions in his time. Like you, I read a good quantity of duff as a kid. And have even reread some with pleasure. Here, for me the question was whether Wiki needs seperate articles on very brief books that may largely have been circulated, not for their inherent quality, but on account of marketing processes. I'm feeling it would be fair to say here that there are single issues of several comic books that have more encyclopedic weight. I can think of a few. I wonder what people might think about individual Wikipedia articles on those? I'm somewhat serious, I know a couple people in the comic book world who would be supportive. Leptus Froggi (talk) 02:36, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

If you're interested in working on this, and are looking for suggestions, then I'd recommend merging&redirecting as much of the content from Category:Willard Price as possible, into the 2 articles Willard Price and Willard Price's Adventure series. Any single novels that have been extensively remarked upon, might deserve their own article. (I'm not sure if any have, or not).

When in doubt, check out related FAs and GAs, and duplicate their methods and coverage (of things like character/plot/etc): WP:Featured articles#Literature and theatre and The Hardy Boys and Warriors (novel series). :) —Quiddity (talk) 05:33, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

I suppose the main motivation behind the merge suggestion is that the single book articles are very brief. Your concept for two articles sounds like a reasonable balance. But I'm unsure how I even got to these articles, lol, so I have no definite ideas! Leptus Froggi (talk) 10:45, 22 November 2012 (UTC)

Books not notable

Having just been tagged for notability in an article I wrote by an author with a major section in the Hugo award-winning "The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction" ... about one of the books that was his major work ... I'd say in contrast the whole Adventure series is non-notable. Nothing, except perhaps point 5 at in WP:BK seems close to supporting their notability. Leptus Froggi (talk) 05:34, 1 December 2012 (UTC)

Test section

Comments — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bstrides (talk • contribs) 11:49, 16 November 2015 (UTC)