Talk:Elros

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From VfD:

There is a separate page for each of the 25 rulers of Numenor. It seems to me to be excessive detail from a fictional works. Indeed, as I look further, there seems to be a lot of material detailing background material from the Lord of the Rings series. I've also proposed a policy on excessive detail from fictional works. It seems to me that an encyclopedia should highlight the cultural or societal significance of the work and especially note any common allusions to works, but should otherwise avoid excessive detail about the work, especially detail that is not in the work itself, but it merely part of a supplement or appendix. Such levels of detail should be left to people who actually want to read the work and its supplementary material. Acsenray 14:14, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)

  • Keep . If and when that "policy" is there, then discuss deletion/moving the material. [[User:Anárion|Image:Anarion.png]] 14:33, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • Sorry, there seems to be a misunderstanding. My recommendation for deletion is not based on my proposed policy. It's the other way around. My recommendation for deletion is based on lack of notability. My observation about the detail from the Tolkien works prompts my proposal on fictional works. Nevertheless, all this material (in my opinion) is deletable without such a policy, based purely on lack of notability. Acsenray 14:41, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • Google test for Elros: 14,200. For Ar-Pharazôn: 3'930. Plus notable for Tolkienists. [[User:Anárion|Image:Anarion.png]] 14:46, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
        • That means nothing. The internet is skewed toward fantasy/male adolescent fiction/games, etc. And that's a very small number of hits anyways. Terrapin 15:29, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
          • It does mean something: there are many Tolkien fans on the web. Wikipedia is also on the web. Hence the average Wikipedia reader is more likely to be a Tolkien fan. Keep, by the way. • Benc • 19:42, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Elros is certainly notable. And while I personally don't care about the other rulers, some people find them interesting. If you get upset about this, there are literally hundreds of articles on more obscure characters in Tolkien. Just a thought - you don't need anybody's vote to make these pages into a composite page and redirect the individual rulers to it. But do make sure you talk to the people who are working on these pages first. (I guess that's a keep vote) DJ Clayworth 14:57, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • Acting on such a suggestion would NOT be appreciated, and would be IMMEDIATELY reverted. RickK 19:07, Aug 31, 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete. Non-notable. Drastically edit and incorporate into J.R.R. Tolkien, etc. One of the problems is that articles like this are essentially "Kidi-wiki" written by "adults". So Wiki is filled with obscure minutiae about the family line of fictional characters in fantasy fiction, etc, but if you search for Pierre Bezuhov (main character of War and Peace, no less), there ISN'T one. It's the nature of the internet, alas. Terrapin 14:59, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • This only means that nobody was interested to write one yet, apparently. Google test: 1,060. [[User:Anárion|Image:Anarion.png]] 15:43, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • (FWIW, Pierre Bezukhov (alternative spelling) googles at 2270.) I agree he deserves an article much more than all the Numenor rulers combined, but I vote Keep nevertheless. There are enough readers ("kiddish Tolkienists") who certanly think the other way around about Bezukhov and Elros relative importance. WP is a reference material for many kinds of readers, and while I shrug at Pokemons and Slashdot trolls listed here, I certainly understand that even they're notable for enough readers to stay. Personally, I find the Tolkien characters more influential and notable than Pokemons and Slashdot trolls. BACbKA 11:12, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
    • By the way, let me know when you begin merging these articles with J.R.R. Tolkien: should be interesting to see the resulting moloch! [[User:Anárion|Image:Anarion.png]] 15:48, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • For the love of bananas don't do that: if you have to merge these articles, merge them to "Rulers of Numenor" or somesuch. When you're finished with those you might be interested in Kings of Arnor. Plenty more where they came from. DJ Clayworth 15:59, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • Ugh. Nevermind. Too each their own minutiae, I guess Terrapin 15:54, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep, there is no good reason for removing articles on fictional works. - SimonP 16:05, Aug 31, 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. Wikipedia is not on paper. There's no harm in having stuff like that. Ausir 16:32, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. The Middle-Earth mythos is a significant literary work, and many people study it in great detail. This isn't a "Pokedex" situation. — Gwalla | Talk 16:40, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Delete all kings of Numenor: useless pseudoinformation, fancruft. Let's build a real encyclopedia, folks. Wile E. Heresiarch 16:54, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. Elros is extremely significant within the mythology - you certainly should keep the Elros article, if nothing else. This would be in an encyclopedia of fantasy fiction. There is lots of very good, researched information here that, while you might not care (neither do I care about , is of use to Tolkienists and is often not available anywhere else. The synthesis of new and old material that is going on with the Tolkien articles here is not happening elsewhere. By the way, I'm an adult female, not an adolescent male. I agree that some of the articles are a bit kiddie in feel - I'm working on correcting that, especially some documentation (i.e. where this information comes from) to substantiate it. The lack of "adult" feel to some of the articles is a problem to be corrected, not cause for deletion. --[[User:Aranel|Aranel ("Sarah")]] 17:07, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep - if they were all stubs ("Elros was a king of Numenor.") then you would be justified in merging them. (If only there were so much information about real rulers, sometimes...) Adam Bishop 17:11, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. This isn't just stub material, there's a lot of information there, and several people have worked on it. Just because somebody doesn't like the idea of material from fictional worlds having their own articles doesn't mean that it should be deleted. Why not start on all of the Pokemon articles? There are hundreds of them.
  • These materials derive largely from Simarilion, don't they? For fictional break outs, they're more august than hundreds of other items we have, but I maintain my dislike of such granularity. Rulers of the 2nd Age, Rulers of the 1st Age, etc. would be so infinitely better than Weirbob the Thin Blade and Gorsiajer the Ban-jo, etc. I'm abstaining, because what I really want is a willing merge and redirect from the people who make these, and only their source's age and long standing keep me from voting delete. Geogre 19:37, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Actually, much of the existing information comes from the back of Return of the King (especially for the later rulers). Bringing in more information from Silmarillion is, of course, a goal; a more significant goal is bringing in material for History of Middle-earth (which is less easily accessible). A merge might be appropriate for some of the less significant rulers (specifically those for whom we have nothing but dates), and I'd be glad to do it, but Elros does need his own article. --[[User:Aranel|Aranel ("Sarah")]] 20:36, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • I'd vote move if there was some collection of fictional references wiki to move it to. As it is... well, high quality cruft is still cruft, but on the other hand it's high quality (and not Pokemon). So I'm abstaining as what I'd like (some form of transwiki to somewhere else) isn't an option. Average Earthman 20:42, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • The tolkien-related articles are of much value for Tolkienists - Wikipedia has one of the best collections of Middle-earth lore, and it'd be a shame if it was all deleted. Some of them could use a merge, though. Ausir 21:14, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep Elros, and other kings that actually do something in the narrative; merge the remainder to a single list. Lacrimosus 22:34, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • I see articles like this (and Pokemon articles, and characters in soap operas, and actors "best known" for playing some small part on somebody's favorite series) and I think, "Gosh, if people spent this much time on 'real' topics, what an amazing resource we would have!" But I know that the definition of "real" topics is pretty fluid, and I wouldn't want to try to come up with a rigid definition (and there are probably more people who read Tolkien than there are people who read the sort of academic history I am most interested in). So when I come to an article like this, I say to myself, "look buddy, there's a whole rest of an encyclopedia out there, don't you trouble your little head worrying about whether some king of the elves belongs in here." So I guess I'd vote a "I'm just going to click somewhere else and not worry about it." I think it's nonsense and trivial but I live in a house with pretty big glass windows. --Fastfission 23:02, 31 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep all. If you think Wikipedia should have more aricles on non-fiction than on fiction, create more articles on your preferred real-world topics. -Sean Curtin 23:52, Aug 31, 2004 (UTC)
  • Merge and redirect these kings as much as possible. Elros is wroth keeping. But also do some Delete of content on these kings. And keep separate articles only for rulers when there is enough information for a full article, whether they are Assyrian, Egyptian, Hittite, Elamite or Númenorean, ancient Danish, etc. Stubs are supposed to be for articles that can be expanded. Short-short articles sometimes are the best way to present particular information. But short-short articles are useless when all the information can be easily put into another larger article in an annotated list or otherwise. It is annoying to click on a reference and to jump to a short-short article that give no more information than the main article gives (or that could be easily incorporated in that point in the main article). This goes for both fictional and for non-fictional personages. Much fixup needs to be done with non-fictional persons as well.

    Also, is it proper to provide all the information given by Tolkien about these rulers and other characters in his fiction in Wikipedia, in effect producing spoilers to reading this in Tolkien's own prose in Unfinished Tales (and other works)? With personages of history or real-world mythologies such an issue doesn't often come up. With fictional characters it does. They require far more restraint in their handling. One could shorten many articles on fictional persons (persons created by Tolkien and others) to their betterment by including only the information necessary to understand those personages when they are encountered outside the works or passages that give the fullest information on them. What is the point of spoiling a fictional work by providing articles that give away every piece of information written by the author about the persons in that work as though the author's own writing was of no value at all? Perhaps revealing all might be done in The Tolkien Wiki as a more technical wiki for people who have already read most of Tolkien's own writing while Wikipedia should perhaps be more restrained.
    Wikipedia is not supposed to be a dictionary in which every proper name in fiction or in real life has its own article. They can have redirects, which partly fulfils the function of a selected index in a scholarly book. Redirects pointing to one main article often do a far better job than short-short articles littered about the place.

    I'm not anti-Tolkien or against this kind article per se. I am a very strong Tolkien fan. Years ago I edited a book on Tolkien's languages of which I wrote about half. But I am bothered by the balance of Wikipedia being thrown off by an increasing number of "fannish" articles that mostly only regurgitate. I also believe that unnecessary spoiler information within articles should be deleted. You don't have to summarize everything that an author put in a book or a series of books. Let the reader encounter most of this material as the author intended. I am a Tolkien fan and it is partly because I am a Tolkien fan that I think Tolkien information in Wikipedia should be cut back. What would Tolkien feel about his writing being spoiled in this way by fans who are enthusiastic but get carried away by their enthusiasm and don't think about what they are doing? Less is sometimes more. If you want Tolkien you should be reading Tolkien, not soulless spoiler summaries in CliffsNotes or in the Wikipedia. Cut down on the fan-cruft.

    Jallan 00:40, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
    • Well said, Jallan. In fact, we do tend to lump together, for example, real life princes who don't make it to the throne, and yet, with this fictional realm we have great detail. I think Tolkien is a much more special case than Pokemon or Digimon or DragonballZ or Gundarm or Sailor Moon or Magic or Star Wars Expanded Universe or Fanfic or.... However, I also think that sticking to the kings who actually appear and act in the narrative (and Elros is one of them) and then doing a bulk discussion of others would be much sweeter than individual items. Of all the excessive lists Acsenray could have picked as an example, these are the least offensive. Geogre 02:51, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • There's way too much detail in these to merge into a large article, is there not? Keep. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 00:44, 2004 Sep 1 (UTC)
Comment: Then don't keep all the details. A Wikipedia article should not normally be a replacement for the writing of an author of fiction with every detail from the book or books. Jallan 01:22, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
I'd have even more of a problem with removing details. It's not like we're lacking in hard-drive space. Why would we do this? The information is presented encyclopedically, and there seems to be agreement that it's important enough. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 04:22, 2004 Sep 1 (UTC)
That we aren't lacking in hard drive space has never meant that one should not exercise discretion in what is included in Wikipedia. That'a non-argument. It usually appears when someone is arguing for retention of material that would indeed be immediately thrown out if there was space pressure, in effect an admission that there is little compelling reason to include the material. For most entries about the Númenorean kings the material is simply paraphrased from "The Line of Elros" in Unfinished Tales. Yet duplicate information appears in more than one entry. That material is presented "encyclopedically" is another non-issue. I could pick up a bunch of novels from second-hand bookstores, novels that have never been popular, never sold well, are almost unknown, and enter every proper name in those novels into articles in Wikipedia and present the information "encyclopedically". That doesn't mean it should be in Wikipedia. One could also enter articles in encyclopedic style on every character that has ever appeared in a comic book. I don't agree that fine details of a trivial nature dashed down by Tolkien or any author always deserve an article in Wikipedia. Most of this information is not important by any standards beyond Tolkien trivia contests. Most of it is found only in one text, "The Line of Elros", and casts no light whatsoever on the rest of Tolkien's writing, much less on anything else in the real world. How is most of this important? It is only part of the scafolding background of Tolkien's imaginary world. Tolkien produced a far more detailed scafolding than most fantasy authors. That is hardly an excuse for presenting this scafolding even more verbosely than Tolkien's original text. Proper encyclopedic material for a real-world encyclopedia would be to summarize the material and try to show it in perspective, not reproduce it in full and more verbosely than the original. This is literature we discussing, not real-world data. We should not be including full paraphrases of literary material except when required by a surrounding discussion. Presenting material in encyclopedic format does not make it encyclopedic in other sense. Jallan 15:17, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
So its presentation needs work. Most of us are agreed on that point. Vfd is not about the presentation of the material. Why not fix it rather than writing about it? --[[User:Aranel|Aranel ("Sarah")]] 15:38, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep, but only reluctantly. I personally do not think that fictional characters and settings belong in an encyclopedia except when they are analyzed to illustrate how they relate to the human condition, the important themes of a work, or other more scholarly pursuits. To those who say that Tolkien is more worthy of this than Star Wars or Pokemon, I would also have to disagree. I am a huge Tolkien fan and think he has written a beautiful work, but Prince Imrahil or Beregond or Galdor have no more signifigance than Mara Jade or Admiral Piett or Pikachu. Neither do the actions of Gandalf or Frodo merit a section in a reputable encyclopedia, though an exploration of the archetypes they represent might. If this were my work, I would remove all of this, but it is not my work. This is a community project, and if a large portion of the community finds it useful, that is their right. Since wikipedia is not limited by space, the inclusion of this material is not harmful and those who do not like it can ignore it. Indrian 04:54, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)
Comment. Gandalf and Frodo belong just as Sherlock Holmes and Raffles and Dracula and Micky Mouse and Victor Frankenstein and the Mad Hatter belong, as often mentioned material other than the texts in which they originally appeared and therefore likely to be looked up in an encyclopedia. But every person who appears in a Sherlock Holmes story does not belong, and so forth. Jallan 15:17, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Comment. And rulers of Numenor are quite likely to be looked up by tolkienists (of which tere are quite many). And in addition to Mickey Mouse, there are dozens of other Disney characters that have their own articles. Ausir 21:48, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
    • So would you advocate the removal of all articles about movies and TV shows, since they're in most cases about ficitonal characters? Would you advocate the removal of all articles about novels? RickK 18:58, Sep 1, 2004 (UTC)
      • Oh my, someone did not read my post very carefully, for it clearly states that when characters or settings have an impact on the "real world" they should be discussed in that context. Furthermore, I discuss character and setting pages, yet this somehow gets extrapolated to include all pages on entertainment media. It has been a few years since I took logic, but I am sure there is a logical fallacy in there someplace! I find it rather humorous how far beyond my argument you decided to go, RickK. Certainly the fact that movies, novels, etc. exist merits the inclusion of notable examples of these forms of expression in an encyclopedia. Entertainment media can be profound, or groundbreaking, or popular, or many other things that warrant its inclusion. The merits of whether a story is about a fictional character or not has not been discussed by me and has never been at issue, at least until the above statement. My only point is that the ACTIONS of fictional characters and the HISTORY (not of development but their history within the fantasy world) of fictional characters is trivial and superfluous in an encyclopedia such as this one. Articles on a fictional character are certainly acceptable when they discuss how that character follows certain literary models or when discussing how the portrayal of that character relates to the themes of a story, but saying that Elros was a king and here is his story serves no purpose unless it relates in a meaningful way to the message of the author. You will notice, however, that I gave a keep vote, so be careful about what motives you ascribe to me. As for the statement about "Tolkienists" by Ausir,it is true there are a small number of scholars who devote their lives to the study of Tolkien's work, and it is also true that these are legitimate scholars who are adding to our collective understanding of the human condition. However, this is far different from a Tolkien "nut" (which could describe me, certainly) who is interested in the minutiae of the world and its history. The former would not need to consult these articles and the latter can go the the Encyclopedia of Arda website for gratification. Indrian 02:47, Sep 2, 2004 (UTC)
Actually Wikipedia already has better Tolkien materials than Encyclopedia of Arda. Especially that they accept only the LotR, Hobbit and Silmarillion stuff, ignoring the History of Middle-earth, while here many articles have sections about the character's development in different phases of Tolkien's legendarium. Ausir 09:21, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. Someone nominated these when we have Errol (Harry Potter)? Taken a look at Category:Lists of fictional characters lately? We have others that are much more granulated than these. I would, however, like to see a policy limiting the granularity of articles on fictional works. SWAdair | Talk 05:11, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep Elros at least, if not all of the other 24. -- SS 21:32, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
    • Comment. I think that at the very least Elros, Ar-Pharazon and Aldarion should definitely stay. Ausir 21:59, 1 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • It seems to me we can treat Minor characters from Tolkien (or some such heading) much as the recently created Minor characters in Star Wars page. Major characters get their own articles, ones with only a paragraph or 2 written about them get thrown in this lot. While it's nice to include all these names, many do NOT deserve their own page. There have been multiple books written that are basically Tolkien encyclopedias, and many of them have entries of a single short sentence for minor characters. Now I'm guessing that one "Minor characters" page might not be enough, so I propose breaking them down more, much as others have suggested. The Kings of Numenor page could have a brief description of each of them, with links to Elros, Ar-Pharazon, and maybe another notable one or two who deserve their own page. "Minor hobbits..." "Minor elves..." etc. could merge alot of stubs into single articles. I'm as big a Tolkien fan as the next guy, but some of these things are getting a bit carried away. -R. fiend 01:41, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)
    • I don't understand this comment. What information in the several rulers' pages would you delete? None of it, all of it, some of it? Why do we want to LOSE information? If you propose that we delete NONE of it, but merge ALL of this information (not just of these rulers, but of lots of minor characters), do you realize just how HUGE the article would be, and how difficult it would be to find anything in? I'm hearing a lot of elitism in this argument -- I don't care about this information, so it isn't notable, so let's get rid of it. RickK 19:52, Sep 2, 2004 (UTC)
      • Click here for an idea of what I'm proposing for the Kings of Numenor. Basically all the information is still there, but it's presented more efficiently. Elros still has his own page, but the minor kings are listed together. I did the first 5, and can do the others in much the same way. If people can agree to this general idea we can use it on the real Kings of Numenor page, with redirects there for all the kings who don't have a page of their own (ie most of them). And check out Minor characters in Star Wars as an example of what could be done with, for example, Minor hobbits from Tolkien for guys like Fatty Bolger and Hamfast Gamgee. -R. fiend 20:56, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)
        • Already I see information that you decided to leave out. The names of Vardamir's four children, which includes a link to Nolondil (although that's probably the point, hoping to lose information because it doesn't meet the elitist ideal of worth inclusion). the list of Tar-Amandil's children, which includes a link to Eärendur. The information about Silmariën, including any information about her right to rule. The entire link of genealogical tables at the Tar-Elendil article ( you made it a flat list). Any mention of Isilmë. The sentence "Little is known about Tar-Meneldur's rule, other than that evil began to stir in the continent of Middle-earth at the time.". So, you see, you've left out quite a bit just to lump everything together. And even at the level of information that you've left off, do you really expect an entire article about Minor characters of Middle-earth to be useable? RickK 21:14, Sep 2, 2004 (UTC)
          • because it doesn't meet the elitist ideal of worth inclusion -- Wow, it seems some degree of introspection might be called for. Ask yourself what the difference is between cataloguing in encyclopedic form made-up data on fictional characters and between cataloguing obscure, real-life facts. Fictional "facts" are best learned from actually reading the literature. Where are real-life "facts" best learned? Acsenray 21:11, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
      • Comment: I'm hearing a lot of trivialism in this discussion. Should there really be 25 articles in Wikipedia. based mostly on "The Line of Elros", a single essay by Tolkien that runs barely over 8 pages as published. Is it encyclopedic to include every piece of information from this single short essay, most (though not all) of which has not pertinent to anything that Tolkien wrote outside that essay. The majority of the names of these rulers are otherwise only found in a single list in an Appendix to The Lord of the Rings. Including all this information in a general encyclopedia article is fanishness ( < fanaticisim ) run wild. Including so much information from one single short essay spread over multiple articles suggests a granularity far exceeding anything that that would mostly be tolerated in other areas of interest once spotted. RicK asks "Why do we want to LOSE information?" Yet RicK votes again and again to LOSE information by deleting articles on institutions and organizations and real people that, at least by Google standards, are far more notable than most of these rulers. Currently Google searches are likely to make these rulers seem more notable than they actually are because of the tendency of Tolkien fan sites to include them in lists and because of the current upsurge in general Tolkien interest because of the recent films which means occassionally one of their names is dropped in a Tolkien forum. Yet Google Search: "Tar-Atanamir" -Wikipedia (with "-Wikpedia" included to remove Wikipedia and most of its mirrors) gets 685 hits. While Google is not the be-all and end-all, would it be RicK's contention that anything that gets over 600 Google hits is likely to deserve an article of its own. My secondary school gets significantly more than that: Google Search: "Etobicoke Collegiate" OR "Etobicoke C I". But I don't consider it and most other secondary schools notable enough for Wikipedia inclusion, though many do think all secondary schools should be included. Until now RicK has been one of those who didn't. Does RickK now agree with Gzornenplatz that we should keep all B-Movie Bandit entries because we don't want to lose information? I note that search on Tætwa, mentioned only a few Anglo-Saxon genealogies and about which we know nothing except name of father and son in those genealogies, gets 1,070 Google hits. There are also non-Tolkien articles on fictional works or persons which are arguably over-detailed and could arguably be improved by removing some of the information. Often information is purposely removed from such articles by an editor with the intention of improving an article and the results are generally accepted as an improvement. One should want to keep less information for single-author fictional material than for real-life material, all things otherwise being equal, because single-author fictional material should mostly be approached through the author's own writing and because such details have no relevance outside the world created by that author. Let a reader discover the details Tolkien put into the short essay "The Line of Elros" by reading the author's work in the author's own words, not in hacked-up format spread over 25 separate articles that repeat information from article to article. Summarizing information from the "Line of Elros" or any fictional work shouldn't mean keeping every trivial detail. Even CliffsNotes does not do that. Jallan 14:17, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
          • This is not only the information from The Line of Elros. The Wikipedia articles include also stuff from the History of Middle-earth and Unfinished Tales. Ausir 14:45, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
          • A list like that is a bad idea. Each king having his own section like the Female hobbits would be a much better one. And at least Elros, Tar-Meneldur, Tar-Aldarion, and Ar-Pharazon deserve their own articles. Ausir 21:37, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)
          • It's not even true we "know little about Tar-Meneldur's rule": it just wasn't added in yet. This just proves the point that any merger and reduction of data will only lead to a gradual (re-)expansion, which will lead to unmanagable and unusable articles. [[User:Anárion|Image:Anarion.png]] 21:52, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)
              • The problem of re-expansion of articles by including supposedly missing material is a difficult one. We probably do need a policy statement that in regard to fiction, that less is often more, and that Wikipedia should not be duplicating all information found in a fictional work, that one should be restrained in such matters. One answer is that talk pages of such articles should indicate that information has been left out purposely for people to discover by actually reading the sources. Including every piece of information from every fictional work is undesireable even if it were possible. It spoils the works. Literary works should not be treated so crassly, as though they were only pieces of data to be scattered through encyclopedia articles. That's not what literary works were created for. A good encyclopedia article on an historical person should explain as much as possible and provide as many details as possible. A good encyclopedia article on a fictional person should rather hold back, should indicate enough about the person to indicate what function that person plays in a work as a whole and how that person is distinctive but should hold back from revealing all. Fictional persons and events and places and real persons and events and places ought to be treated differently. 14:17, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
                • We probably do need a policy statement that in regard to fiction, that less is often more, and that Wikipedia should not be duplicating all information found in a fictional work, that one should be restrained in such matters. -- Have you commented on my policy proposal at Wikipedia talk:Deletion policy? Acsenray 21:17, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
            • I disagree. The articles about fictional characters here are read mostly by people who already read the books they come from, but want the information about that character, which is otherwise scattered throughout the source materials, gathered in one place. Ausir 14:50, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
            • Sure, a little information was left out. It could probably be included elsewhere. And I readily admitted Minor characters of Middle-earth in itself would be unmanageable, which is why I suggested (if you care to read my comments) breaking it up into smaller subjects (like Minor hobbits from Tolkien, Minor elves from Tolkien, etc.). As it is there are plenty of stubs that could readily be merged into a single group. If someone likes the format used in the Female hobbits article, then fine, its a minor difference. The point is in both cases they're listed under a single heading. The format I suggested keeps the chronology, rather than listing them alphabetically, which personally I consider an advantage. And I certainly agree (and stated from the beginning) that Elros, Ar-Pharazon, and some others deserve pages of their own, but others do not. (And anyway, I think the sentence "little is known about Tar-Meneldur's rule..." says almost nothing, and little is lost by leaving it out) Information about Silmariën could be supplied by a link to her (which perhaps could be merged with some sort of "minor characters..." list at some point). In a way some of these merged lists might increase the information available. Various characters who don't deserve articles of their own could more readily be included in such lists without having to worry about adding a plethora of substubs (I'd be happy to add Odo Proudfoot to a list of Minor hobbits from Tolkien, but I won't write a whole article for him). In any case, I maintain that my suggestions are preferable to mass deletions, which seems to be what others are suggesting. -R. fiend 02:38, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. Elros is definitely notable, as well as several others. If merges are feasible without losing any information that is acceptable, too. Eric119 21:45, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. With due respect, do please think before submitting these. Exists , Notable, Many articles, Passes Google Test, Too much data to merge, Wikipedia is not paper. I respectfully submit that the VFD lister and Delete or Merge voters please each defend against *each* of these points in turn, or otherwise please change their vote. Kim Bruning 03:27, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)
    • (comment) If you'd like to actually change vfd policy, do so on the relevant pages, and we can take a look. This isn't exactly the right place to do it I think, bit impractical eh? :) Kim Bruning 03:27, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • Keep. zoney ▓   ▒ talk 22:02, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)
  • Certainly keep Elros, Ar-Pharazon, &c. - otherwise we're setting a path towards deleting pretty much all fictional characters (is my article on Simon Dedalus in danger? Or is it safe because it's not nerdy Tolkien fannishness?) I'm very strongly inclined to keep the rest of them, too. What's the harm in it? Wikipedia's Tolkienology is of a high caliber, and I don't see any particular problem with it. That there is no article on Pierre Bezuhov simply means that someone needs to create one (I would, if it hadn't been so long since I've read War and Peace). Note, also, that there are hundreds of articles on individual Pokémon. john k 05:35, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

end moved discussion

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