Talk:The Nightmare
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[edit] Sources
The bibliography I have added to the Henry Fuseli page might offer some good sources for this page, particularly Henry Fuseli: The Nightmare. Awadewit | talk 20:29, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Changes
Hi Jclerman: you asked in an inline comment why I don't discuss changes on the talk page. I've been a little impatient with some of your edits because they seem to contradict best practices for articles. My concerns are the need for referencing (not that I'm slavish about it), the use of see-alsos, and listing a "further reading" item as a "reference". I'd also like to note that you consistently don't use edit summaries. (Usually, I think the editor who has added the vast majority of the substantive content to an article is the one who asks why another editor didn't discuss their changes on the talk page.)
The list of "see alsos" is extraneous and not particularly relevant to an article on a painting. Wikipedia recommends making the see-also section as short as possible, if not eliminating it – and in any case, not linking terms under "see also" that are already linked in the text, such as "Nightmare" and "Hag". Entering a long list of see-alsos linking to every aspect of the sleep experience almost touches on original research as well, in my opinion. See WP:SEEALSO.
You placed the E. Jones book under references, but I'm not sure how was it consulted in writing the article? It may be mentioned in the text, but that doesn't make it a reference. In fact, your text says that Jones doesn't mention the painting in his writings. So I commented out the book because it doesn't belong under References.
You mention waking dreams in the article, but in the dozen or so references I've consulted in writing this, I've not seen a mention of this term. A reference would be helpful.
You seem quite interested in subjects related to sleep, but I hope you will agree that an article on a painting, whether or not it's titled Nightmare, does not need to be a repository of links to articles about sleep! I have been thinking of improving this article to a degree that might make it "featured", so if you can provide any referenced material from the many Fuseli books out there, that would be great. –Outriggr § 00:25, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
[edit] GA hold
This is quite good - such a fascinating and haunting painting! I just have a few little picky things.
The canvas seems to portray simultaneously a dreaming woman and the subjective content of her nightmare. - I am not really sure what "subjective content" means - I don't think "subjective" is quite the right word there.- I just removed "subjective"--"content of her nightmare" should be good.
The first first paragraph of the article proper seemed to dive right in. What do you think about starting with the second paragraph, which is the description of the painting, and inserting the first paragraph where the other dream material is, in what is now the third paragraph?- Oddly, I thought the first paragraph was better as the first para, to provide some context about Fuseli and this painting. Unfortunately my writing on these subjects makes paragraph order almost arbitrary, and I do agree about moving the description para to be the first.
As far as I know from my research on The Loves of the Plants (I wrote that little page), Fuseli only designed the frontispiece - William Blake did the rest, so I don't think you can say he "illustrated" it.- I'm sure the source (which I can't find) said there were multiple illustrations, but you must be right! I didn't expect to conjure up links to your articles in this one--a nice surprise. Changed.
Best not to say "obvious sexual themes" - best to explain them - just in case someone doesn't see them.- OK.
The writer and the artist shared an interest in dreams; both experimented with the contemporary belief that eating rotted meat would induce nightmares. - This doesn't seem that important and is just kind of hanging off of the end of the paragraph.The "Legacy" section starts to feel a little listy at the end, but I never know how to fix this.- I subsectioned it, but I agree.
The "See also" list seems irrelevant to me.There were two quotations without citations that I tagged.- Citations added. I thought the single citation already in each paragraph would implicitly suggest the source. Now that I think about it, the text is also the citation: Frankenstein and House of Usher... Anyway, added.
A pleasure to read. (By the way, I have a very rough draft going on Boydell and his Shakespeare gallery, if you want to work on that with me. I have all of the sources - I just have to rewrite an essay I wrote once, basically, and put in all of the notes. It is more of a writing exercise than a research exercise at this point.) Awadewit | talk 05:24, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
- Thanks for the comments. I'll reply below the points. I think everything is in order now. –Outriggr § 09:22, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Translation
Into French! Yay! –Outriggr § 20:30, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Surviving versions
Any pics of the other two surviving versions? They get a very cursory treatment at the moment. Andplus 00:15, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
- Can't find any. Very little is said of them in the sources I've reviewed. Tomory was the only book I could consult that was dedicated to Fuseli. It confused me by showing a third item (this is from memory) that was titled Nightmare and was a sketch that included a horse and rider jumping out a bedroom window. It was not a "variation" on the main painting, yet all evidence suggests that the other two versions are mild variations. From my skimming of that book I couldn't find any more information about or illustration of the other two. –Outriggr § 05:34, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
- That will probably be one of the two shown here: [1] I just find it strange that there doesn't seem to be any record of the other versions: you'd think the holding galleries would be quite eager to let people know they had them (unless they are tucked away in a private collection somewhere) or there'd be some mention of them when the original was exhibited. The article is coming on nicely though - I saw it in a plate of a book I was browsing through yesterday and thought I'd come back for another look. Andplus 09:46, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
- That's it (An Incubus Leaving Two Sleeping Women). I like this parody, overkill is so funny. I still don't feel like I've seen this painting. The book reproduction had reddish and yellow stripes, I think, on the first blanket under the woman—you'd have no idea from the current JPG. I think I am done with the article , incidentally (except for another arbitrary copyedit for jaggies), unless you have any ideas and sources for further content. –Outriggr § 00:02, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
- History of Art (the above mentioned book) has a couple of paragraphs which somewhat damn it as a hotchpotch of styles (though I'm not sure the intention wasn't to praise it) and suggests the horse as a common sexual symbol quite aside from its penetration through the curtains. A quick skim of Google books shows that a popular tale held that Fuseli conceived the painting after dining on raw (or half raw) pork. Perhaps Nicolai Abraham Abildgaard's version Image:Abildgaard Nightmare.jpg is worth mentioning. Andplus 01:23, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
- Right, I'd been meaning to add the general notion of horse as sexual symbol. I made an attempt to add the meat-eating anecdote but Awadewit suggested it was integrated poorly, which was true. I hadn't seen the Abildgaard painting before... do feel free to add to the article. P.S. My pet painting article is now The Heart of the Andes. Still formative. –Outriggr § 00:53, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
- That's it (An Incubus Leaving Two Sleeping Women). I like this parody, overkill is so funny. I still don't feel like I've seen this painting. The book reproduction had reddish and yellow stripes, I think, on the first blanket under the woman—you'd have no idea from the current JPG. I think I am done with the article , incidentally (except for another arbitrary copyedit for jaggies), unless you have any ideas and sources for further content. –Outriggr § 00:02, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
- That will probably be one of the two shown here: [1] I just find it strange that there doesn't seem to be any record of the other versions: you'd think the holding galleries would be quite eager to let people know they had them (unless they are tucked away in a private collection somewhere) or there'd be some mention of them when the original was exhibited. The article is coming on nicely though - I saw it in a plate of a book I was browsing through yesterday and thought I'd come back for another look. Andplus 09:46, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
