Talk:Paul Bowles

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article falls within the scope of the WikiProject contemporary music, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of contemporary music subjects. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the quality scale.
Low This article has been rated as low-importance on the importance scale.
LGBT Portal
This article is within the scope of WikiProject LGBT studies, which tries to ensure comprehensive and factual coverage of all LGBT related issues on Wikipedia. For more information, or to get involved, visit the project page.
B This article has been rated as B-class on the quality scale.
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.
Biography Portal
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the project's quality scale. [FAQ]
Photo request It is requested that a picture or pictures of this person be included in this article to improve its quality.
Morocco Portal
This article is within the scope of WikiProject Morocco, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to Morocco on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please join the project.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the quality scale.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the importance scale.
Flag of New York City
NYC Portal

This article is part of WikiProject New York City, an effort to create, expand, and improve New York City-related articles to Wikipedia feature-quality standard.

Bulletin: The next New York City meetup is Sunday June 1st.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the quality scale.
??? This article has not yet received a rating on the importance scale.

I have added Points in Time under short stories, although Miscellaneous might be more appropriate. It certainly is not a novel, though it was so described when it was first published.Chris k 17:29, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Without Stopping reference

[JoshMahar:] In the opening section entitled "Youth and Childhood" there is a reference in the last line to his starting of writing "Without Stopping". I was wondering if this was true since this is his autobiography and not published until 1972. Perhaps it is suppose to be Sheltering Sky?

Josh:

That is a bit of a puzzle. I have to refresh my memory; it may be that the "Without Stopping" referred to is not the same book, since I believe I remember reading that Bowles re-used one title (and perhaps didn't publish the first book he applied it to?). In any case, it can't be The Sheltering Sky, which could not have been begun at that time.Chris k 03:00, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

I have now clarified the reference to "Without Stopping" and removed the characterization as a "mature work," since it was never finished. I have also corrected the year of Bowles's final departure from the University of Virginia to 1931. These corrections are based on Sawyer-Lauçanno's biography, Invisible Spectator.Chris k 17:09, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article protected

I've just protected this article and a few other related articles as per the mediation process going on at User:FayssalF/JK. Thanks for your understanding. -- FayssalF - Wiki me up® 15:40, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Link added by User:PiCo

The link to an article from a paper of record The indpendent , London was in fact added by User:PiCo Opiumjones 23 (talk) 01:51, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

The proper procedure is to link it directly without using a partisan reference. If there is no direct link then try to use a reliable third party as a source. Anyway, this article is on Paul Bowles and not Mohamed Hamri. -- FayssalF - Wiki me up® 13:50, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] What's it all about?

I wandered into the middle of this war by accident. I like Bowles' writing. I was surprised to find that the article is caught up in a battle, spread over multiple fronts (the most active area is in the Master Musicians of Joujouka/Jajouka, tho I don't quite know why), involving someone called Lisenbee ( I think) on one side and apparently half the known Tangerino world on the other. And Fayssal plays the role of UN. Anyway, I never would have known of the existence of Joe Ambrose and Frank Rynne if it hadn't been for this little war. Who the hell, I wondered, is Frank Rynne? I googled him and came up with an interview involving him and Joe Ambrose. Both, from their bios, sound a bit dippy. But when you start reading, they come across as intelligent and reasonably balanced individuals, for musicians. But to the main poin t: apparently Ambrose/Rynne have been saying things about Paul Bowles that Lisenbee doesn't like. Lisenbee is the (or just "a") caretaker of the Offical Paul Bowles Website (it's in the External Links). And I'm not surprised he doesn't like what R/A say about PB. Like this: "He was a murderer, a sadist, a voyeur, a poisoner, a polymath, a sexual exploiter of adolescent boys. He tried to kill Hamri once. Most entertaining company." As this suggests, R/A actually to admire PB - but not without reserve. They see a wart or two. Whether the warts were there or not I have no idea. But Lisenbee sees no warts. And that's the essence of the edit dispute, and I think Fayssel has his work cut out. PiCo (talk) 03:57, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Gay

Reading through the article, one gets the impression that he was a straight man (he was married, to a woman) who happened to have some gay friends. Who doesn't? Then we see the categories Gay writers, Gay composers etc etc. So, if he was indeed gay, let's have some information about that. It's misleading as it stands because the details of his marriage are all there but there's nothing about his other side, so any reasonable reader would come to the wrong conclusion about him. -- JackofOz (talk) 07:59, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

That is because the Estate of Paul Bowles have had the webmaster of their official website sitting on this page since 2005, editing any info they disliked and removing all gay refs see User:BKLisenbee's edits in the history. You are welcome to try bring some truth to this page Opiumjones 23 (talk) 20:14, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. I haven't trawled through all the relevant edits back to 2005, but as far as I can tell it's been a very long time, if ever, since we've mentioned anything at all about his sexuality in the body of the article. There was a link that talked about his predatory habits with Moroccan boys, which was removed, maybe for good reason (its veracity was disputed). But that seems to be all. If I missed anything pertinent, let me know. The LGBT categories started appearing, but without any supporting evidence, which in itself is a no-no, so we can't just point the finger in one direction if any finger-pointing's to be done. What I've gleaned about Bowles from other reading tells me he was at the least bisexual, and possibly exclusively homosexual and used his wife as a "beard", so it's appropriate to make some mention of this as long as it's properly cited. But we can't have what we have now and have had for a long time: categorisation without explanation. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:33, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
I've added some brief words taken from the Bowles official site to explain the nature of the marriage. -- JackofOz (talk) 23:06, 10 June 2008 (UTC)
Those lines you added are very conceited way of saying that they married but were both gay . The truth is more interesting told as it was. Opiumjones 23 (talk) 22:10, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
Well, this says they were both gay, as do various other sources. If the "truth" you refer to is that they were both bisexual, we need to state that explicitly. We can't have him in an LGBT category without saying something about why that category is relevant to him. I'm sorry if you thought my post was conceited - it was taken directly from the official site. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:49, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
Sorry Jack, I did not mean that you were conceited but rather that the info from the official Paul Bowles Estate site was. As to the Cats they are recent and seem to be changing. Perhaps a Cat Gay/Married that would apply to a few pages no doubt. Opiumjones 23 (talk) 23:53, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
Ignorant readers would assume only that just because someone was married they where straight. Reasonable readers would not. Hyacinth (talk) 23:32, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
That could start the great debate. What defines ignorant (a pejorative term in this case)and reasonable(in this case what is that?)The Paul Bowles official site is not a good source either by Wiki standards or given the POV edits of its webmaster as User:BKLisenbee and his socks on this site? Perhaps independent sources like Michelle Green's book should be used? She has great insights and information Opiumjones 23 (talk) 23:47, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
Oh, come on, Hyacinth. Would a reasonable reader read the articles on George W Bush, Winston Churchill, Paul McCartney, Pablo Picasso or any number of others, and form the conclusion that they were, or may have been, anything other than straight? I hardly think so. There would have to be something in the article that gives the reader that impression. Until yesterday, there was nothing in Paul Bowles article that gave the impression he was anything other than straight. (Having stacks of gay friends and associates doesn't make you gay.) Except for the LGBT categories, which many readers don't even read. A reasonable reader who did scan the categories would ask themselves "Hmm, I wonder why Wikipedia is classifying him as gay, when they say nothing about this in the article. Moroever, everything they do say, in particular the fact that he was married, led me to believe he was straight". I'm simply putting myself in the readers' shoes, as any decent writer does, and as we all here at WP should do. -- JackofOz (talk) 00:00, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
Well he was gay and there is tons of secondary sources that ref that. He also hated being viewed as such, hence his Estate's websites paulbowles.org's equivocation. His marriage is the subject of debate by biographers. Jane also had lesbian relationships , the main one with a Moroccan woman. There is speculation that this may have been a direct reaction to her husband's relationships with young Moroccan men.Opiumjones 23 (talk) 00:08, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

C'mon Jack! Instead of making standards stuff up, quote some Wikipedia policies and find some sources on Bowles. Does Wikipedia have standards for the inclusion of LGBT categories in biography articles that indicate he should currently be left out? ("out" of the category, "in" the closet)

I would be willing to assume that a reader is not familiar with Bowles sexuality. I don't assume all our readers are blindingly heterosexist, is there a Wikipedia policy or guideline indicating we should do so?

If there are tons of secondary sources referencing Bowles sexuality they should be easy to find either way and this argument should have been short lived. (Lastly, homophobes, that's who may try not to have gay friends) Hyacinth (talk) 01:24, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I fear you may have misconstrued what I'm saying. I am not for a moment denying Bowles was gay. Nor am I attempting to remove anything about his sexuality from the article. The very opposite, in fact. What I'm trying to do is ensure that, when we put someone into Category X, there's some information in the article that makes it clear why they're in Category X. Can you imagine putting someone into the category Opera singers from Peru but making no mention of opera in their article? Well, that was the analagous situation with Bowles's article until I did something about it yesterday. We have to write for readers who've never even heard of Bowles before, not for readers who've researched his life or written books about him or know more than we do about him. It has nothing to do with anyone being heterosexist or any other kind of -ist. It has to do with common sense and not creating confusion in readers' minds. And it has to with Wikipedia's credibility and reputation, something very dear to my heart.-- JackofOz (talk) 06:58, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
It's a reasonable bet that the average male Western visitor to Morocco, Algeria or Tunisia between, say, 1880 and 1980 was not there for the cous-cous. Nor the kus-kus. (I've been longing to make that joke). Ok, so let's exculpate Matisse and a few others. But Bowles and Co (that means assorted American millionaires in publishing, British aqnd American dramatists and drama-queens, and artists with bars) were voluminous letter-writers and diarists and memoiristes, and the evidence is all there. But to get it, you have to visit a "library" (gasp) and get a "book" (shock). Start with a biography or two. But if you don't want to go to the trouble of (horror) reading, try this.
Some second thoughts: Bowles is famous only for his writing and, to a lesser extent, music. His sexuality should only be mentioned insofar as it directly connects with his achievement. Since many of his short stories have homosexual themes, and since much of his fostering of talented young Moroccan musicians and writers had a sexual component (or at least tinge), it does. But the link is essential if the mention is to be justified.PiCo (talk) 13:54, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. I'm afraid I have no idea what it is I'm supposed to be "getting". The link you provided gave me no more information about his sexuality than I was already aware of. There's no disagreement about the facts, only about whether we can say anything about his sexuality in the article, and if so, what. You talk of justification; fair enough. But if we can't justify saying anything about it, how can we justify making him LGBT? Conversely, if we can justify categorising him as LGBT, that must mean we can justify talking about it in the text. That's been my goal all along. Does nobody understand where I'm coming from? -- JackofOz (talk) 23:15, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

If you follow the category up to Category:LGBT people one finds a box which reads: "This category may inappropriately label persons. See Wikipedia:categorization of people for advice on how to apply categorization to articles relating to people." Hyacinth (talk) 00:19, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:categorization of people says: "The article must state the facts that result in the use of the category...Category tags regarding religious beliefs and sexual preference should not be used unless two criteria are met: (1) The subject publicly self-identifies with the belief or preference in question; (2) The subject's beliefs or sexual preferences are relevant to the subject's notable activities or public life, according to reliable published sources." Bowles and the article meet none of these criteria - the article doesn't mention his sexuality, and he never self-identified as homosexual. It would be possible to add a few paras discussing his short stories and the gay themes they contain - sometimes quite explicit - but at the moment there's not even enough here even to establish that he was a notable writer. PiCo (talk) 02:25, 13 June 2008 (UTC)
The passage you quote refers to #Biographies of living people only. Hyacinth (talk) 02:38, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Categorization/Gender, race and sexuality. Hyacinth (talk) 02:40, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

I've added a section on his achievement which should justify adding him to your category - Kenneth Lisenbee isn't going to like it, though.PiCo (talk) 09:38, 13 June 2008 (UTC)