Talk:List of literary works

Should we add the author to each of the entries on this page e.g. The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce? Nanobug 16:43, 29 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I reckon we should do. I'll make a start with the authors I know of.

Comics?

Should comics, like X-men, be considered literary works? As it, per definition, only is a related narrative form to literature?

Sorting

This list really needs some sorting work. Some titles are sorted with their leading articles, but some aren't. I recommend using the system adopted by List of films and Television shows — list the titles in index form, but be sure to make the link to the correct form; e.g.:

• [[A Tale of Two Cities|Tale of Two Cities, A]]

I wasn't going to bother bringing this up, but at the moment, the sort function of the new dynamic list system (which was supposed to make these lists obsolete) doesn't appear to be working, so it's worthless for anything but tiny lists. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 06:59, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

After carefully reading the docs, it appears it only allows sorting based on various times, which is useless to WQ. We should probably see if we can ask for a new version with more flexible sorting options. (I am almost tempted to install mediawiki at home and write it myself, if not for the fear of forever tainting my soul with PHP programming) ~ MosheZadka (Talk) 07:06, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

I've had the same thought about setting up a wiki for writing fixes for various annoying problems. If I can only find the time to get my Linux machine running… ~ Jeff Q (talk) 07:21, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Book characters

Is there any place for quotes made by particular book characters, or are they just merged into the actual book quote section? If there is a character who has a lot of great quotes, wouldn't it be okay to create him/her an own place, for example a sub-section on the book page, for quotes? Thanks. ~ 20 October 2005

Chapters

For literary works, the chapter in which the quote can be found should be included. For referencing, it makes using these quotes much easier. --Major Despard 08:52, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Good suggestion. I think even we sorted those quotes as unsourced, if they are claimed to be taken from a book but there is no information from which chapter they appear, as Laozi does for now. It is obvious all his legitimate quotes from one sole book, but quotes without chapter information are then called "unsourced". --Aphaia 09:02, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

anarchy?

what about anarchistic works such as the anarchists cookbook, or steal this book?

surely they would meet "literary works"

Zadig

How about Voltaire's other scathing novel? Certainly as entertianing and philosophical as Candide.

Baffled

I don't understand why you have a list of literary works here, but you have literary works on this site that aren't listed. How intelligent is that?

e.g.1 - You have a section elsewhere for 'Blood Meridian' by Cormac McCarthy (on the Cormac McCarthy page). But you don't have any listing for that book here. Then you have someone filing a "request" for quotes from 'Blood Meridian' by Cormac McCarthy further down this page.

e.g.2 - You have an entire page of quotes for 'The Road' by Cormac McCarthy elsewhere, but that page isn't even listed here. Anyone consulting this page is going to assume it isn't within your system when it is.

If you can't be bothered to put a system in place that works, and maintain it so it works properly, what earthly use is it? You are misleading people. Crazy.

92.11.113.157 10:16, 26 August 2010 (UTC)

I just redirected a few requested literary works pages to the pages of their respective authors because that's where the quotes are. I'm going to assume consent until anyone says otherwise. Right now I'm not sure if I should put those in the list of literary works since they just redirect to another page. Help please? Raisin56 05:29, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Redirecting names of works to sections on those works seems like an eminently logical solution. BD2412 T 18:19, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

These redirects are fine, especially when they steer readers to primary literary works instead of derivative things. However, they have limited usefulness because they are nowhere near complete. Manually indexing all of the works quoted on author pages would be a monumental undertaking, and readers are usually better served by using the full text search tool. Neither lists nor categories are really adequate for indexing all of the works quoted on author pages: note the introduction I added to Category:Literary works and some related categories. It is indeed a baffling situation. ~ Ningauble 18:54, 6 September 2010 (UTC)