Talk:Beatrix Potter

Potter local history and film

Beatrix Potter was born in "The Boltons", a street in Kensington. Just round the corner, on Brompton Road is a plaque showing coloured portraits of Peter Rabbit and Jemima Puddleduck. In 2005 it was announced that Rene Zellweger and Ewan McGregor would be playing the parts of Beatrix and Warne in a film version of Beatrix Potter's life. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.122.47.146 (talk • contribs) 16:07, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

Self-contradiction?

She also became secretly engaged to the publisher, Norman Warne... He died before the engagement Could somebody please clarify/correct this? --Calair 23:20, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

She was cremated at Carleton Cemetery (under her married name) in Blackpool, but strangely no memorial was erected for her —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.192.178.45 (talk • contribs) 16:06, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

BBC News

It's interesting how this BBC News page has very similiar phrasing to this article... the phrase which grabbed me was "She found consolation in her menagerie of pet animals including frogs, newts and even a bat." (The WP stuff came first - the dateline is 8/Dec). Tompw (talk) 21:04, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

SQUIGS GHOST - However, if you read the references you will find that the phrase "She found consolation in her menagerie of pet animals including frogs, newts and even a bat." was sourced from a BBC article some 5 years earlier. Please feel free to click on reference 4. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.242.221.176 (talk • contribs) 20:36, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

rating this article / getting it up to GA status

Hi--Anybody else interested in cleaning up this article, evaluating it, and bringing it up to GA status? I'm going to dig into the process a little bit. Thoughts from other regular editors of this article? --lquilter 17:11, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

We've got a rating of B, which is a good start. I'm going to list the "B" criteria and specific notes as a list of things to do to improve the article.

• Reference formatting (from Talk/Beatrix Potter/comment) Rated as B-Class, although it needs better formatting (e.g. the citations - you can use Template:cite news or Template:cite web), better lead per WP:LEAD, and better citing per WP:CITE and WP:FOOTNOTES.--Yannismarou 20:00, 16 January 2007 (UTC)
• B-class criteria - I take it, from looking at the B criteria below, that we need to flesh out the various subsections.
  • B-class criteria:
    • Has several of the elements described in "start", usually a majority of the material needed for a completed article. Nonetheless, it has significant gaps or missing elements or references, needs substantial editing for English language usage and/or clarity, balance of content, or contains other policy problems such as copyright, NPOV or NOR. With NPOV a well written B-class may correspond to the "Wikipedia 0.5" or "usable" standard. Articles that are close to GA status but don't meet the Good article criteria should be B- or Start-class articles.
    • Useful to many, but not all, readers. A casual reader flipping through articles would feel that they generally understood the topic, but a serious student or researcher trying to use the material would have trouble doing so, or would risk error in derivative work.
    • Considerable editing is still needed, including filling in some important gaps or correcting significant policy errors. Articles for which cleanup is needed will typically have this designation to start with.
  • In particular, I think the literary biography is lacking;
  • Potter's later career and work as a conservationist could stand some fleshing out.
  • And her mother's name is missing.

Other thoughts about specific things to improve the article? --lquilter 20:26, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

William Heelis

It states that William Heelis was a local to the Lakes District. Does this mean she had known him during her visits as a child, like the movie indicates? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.45.129.203 (talk • contribs) 11:11, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

The film commentary indicates that this was a fictional device. To their knowledge, Potter did not meet Heelis during her childhood visits. Swango 01:46, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Algae & Fungi

The text says they are part of the 'same family'. Surely not. —Preceding unsigned comment added by The Yeti (talk • contribs) 18:20, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Publication of Peter Rabbit

According to the OED, "Peter Rabbit" was first published privately by Potter herself in 1900. This ought perhaps to be recorded in the article. Captainbeefart 15:53, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

engaged to ...?

An editor made a change to long-standing text describing Potter as engaged to her publisher; the editor changed it to say that Potter was engaged to her publisher's son. (diff) I've reverted for now but we should have a source and verify. --lquilter 02:52, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Beatri xPotter "heirloom" pottery.

I'm surprised to not see any mention of the Beatrix Potter ceramics, which, in the UK in the 1950's at least, were possibly as popular as her books. Every child was given a set of Beatrix Potter crockery at birth, which was highly prized.--Richardb43 (talk) 11:03, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

If it was this common, perhaps it can sustain its own article. Can you propose a line of text to include about this, and find a reference about it that describes that this pottery was very prevalent? I don't think we want to include all sorts of licensed products like this, but if it was very wide-spread then it seems reasonable to consider it. --Lquilter (talk) 21:08, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

"Every child was given a set of Beatrix Potter crockery at birth". Utter rubbish. From personal experience, my family members born in the 50s were not given this, and I know of many other people born then who also were not.86.137.139.82 (talk) 11:31, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Which might be why it has never been added to the article! In fact, I suspect the pottery Richard is thinking about is the bunnykins set, which is derivative but is not Beatrix Potter at all. [1] --Slp1 (talk) 11:39, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Bit irrelevant now, but the original editor was thinking of this stuff which all my kids had as babies. The china merchandising is mentioned in the Peter Rabbit article - I would think that covers it. Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:40, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

Cause of Norman Warne's Death

Other sources, like bpotter.com, say the cause was "a virulent form of leukemia." Is there a reference to justify the anemia cause? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.102.188.144 (talk) 18:45, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

I have also read in a different source that he passed as a result of lymphoid leukemia. I haven't found anything regarding the anemia death, other than the Wikipedia article for the same illness. Lord1023 (talk) 18:48, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism

For some reason this page gets weird attacks of vandalism. Does anyone have any clues why? Is there a way this page can be at least partially locked? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.107.81.16 (talk) 07:18, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, this should definitely should be locked. Because Google has links to a search with this page as the first result, random people are trying to vandalize it. --70.19.155.178 (talk) 07:27, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

House(s) as museums?

One of my elementary school teachers said Potter's house (one of them, anyway) is a museum that can be toured. Anyone know anything about this? The article mentioned nothing. --Ragemanchoo (talk) 05:41, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Inconsistency about the bequest to the National Trust

There is an inconsistency between what the summary says about Beatrix Potter's bequest of her property to the National Trust and what the main article says. The summary says that she left all her property to William Heelis who then left it to the National Trust, The main article says that she left it to the National Trust in her will. Only one of these statements can be true. A possibility is that she left the properties to the National Trust with some sort of codicil that allowed William Heelis to live on and manage the properties until his death.

Supposed influence of Joel Chandler Harris

"Much of Potter's stories' vocabulary and artistic practice stemmed from Joel Chandler Harris's Uncle Remus stories."

Where is the evidence for this assertion? Apart from the fact that both wrote about animal characters including rabbits, and they clearly shared ancestors in Aesop and La Fontaine, there is little in common between the two writers. Harris delights in reproducing the rhythms of the spoken word, while Potter's style, though apparently simple, is literary and often achieves a classical balance in the sentences. Harris celebrates the folklore of the Southern USA of his time, while Potter portrays an idealised pre-industrial English landscape and presents a mix of traditional stories (eg town mouse/country mouse) and her own invented fables.

I have not edited this statement as there may be a reference somewhere to demonstrate that Potter was influenced by Harris - though I cannot remember any in the various works by Margaret Lane, the foremost expert on Potter - but the statement should be substantiated. In any case I do not believe one can fairly state that 'much of her vocabulary and artistic practice stemmed from' Harris's work. If anything, one could say that like Harris, she recycled material from La Fontaine and hence from Aesop.

It seems very likely that the success of Potter's books in the USA was due to many American readers being familiar with 'animal stories' from reading Uncle Remus, but that is a different matter. Zephirine (talk) 14:17, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I now think the source of this assertion may be John Goldthwaite's somewhat opinionated take on children's literature The Natural History of Make Believe. If anyone can provide the reference perhaps they would kindly do so? If not, I propose to edit the sentence.Zephirine (talk) 23:00, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for questioning this; I didn't add the material, but it looks like the source is possibly a book about Potter by Ruth K. MacDonald; see this google book snippet view for the original reference. [2] --Slp1 (talk) 23:07, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Hi, thanks very much for the link - Macdonald seems to make a more moderate statement. I think the source was probably Goldthwaite who makes exaggerated claims for the influence of Uncle Remus. I've now found another reference to some illustrations Potter did for the Uncle Remus stories, so that proves she did know and like them. But the same book shows a number of other influences. I've re-worked the sentence to be a bit less of a sweeping statement, and put in the ref to the book I've read - should probably ref to the MacDonald book too? Zephirine (talk) 00:47, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

More emphasis/new section on Potter as artist?

Should there be more on Potter the artist? She was a gifted painter and exceptional among children's writers at the time (as far as I know) in illustrating her own books and doing it so well. At present we have one sentence "Part of the popularity of her books was due to the quality of her illustrations" - should this be expanded?Zephirine (talk) 00:54, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Any Connection Between Beatrix Potter and Harry Potter?

Since both Beatrix Potter and J. K. Rawling, author of the Harry Potter series, are from England, is it possible that Harry Potter was named in honor of Beatrix? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.191.242.2 (talk) 19:05, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, and Josaiah Wedgewood the Potter also came from England, and there are 100,000 Potters in the English Phone Book, and...... In short, no.Elen of the Roads (talk) 18:35, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

BBC adaptation(s) of books

I just rented some BBC adaptation of the Peter Rabbit tales from the video shop. It seems that this is missing from the Wikipedia entry. I am not sure of the exact details (and I'm actually confused as to whether the books have been adapted twice as there seems to be a different set of DVD's available on amazon produced in 2008; the one's I rented seems to have been produced in the 1980's) but it would be great if this could be added to the entry. Thank you. PS: the BBC did a great job. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Adeleida (talk • contribs) 05:40, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

It sounds like The World of Peter Rabbit and Friends. As far as I know, this is the only animated adaption of the tales. Likely, they have just been released in several different editions of DVDs. The mention of it in this article was removed back in December.[3] I'm not sure why. Siawase (talk) 09:18, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

File:Beatrix Potter signature.svg Nominated for Deletion

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References needed

I added the {{refimprove}} tag to the article as it needs more citations to reliable sources. The article is rated C class currently, and if it is to be improved to B or GA or FA, it will need more refs (in its current state it, the lack of reference would be a quick fail at both WP:GAN and WP:FAC).

The lead does not need refs, as it is a summary of the whole article, so the refs should be there (Plot in works of fiction is also assumed to be based on the work itself and does not need refs). My rule of thumb is that in the body of the article at least every paragraph needs a ref. If several sentences are based on one part of a source, then they do not need to each be referenced (they can all be Jones, pp. 24-32 or whatever after the last sentence in the set). However, if there are direct quotations in several sentences in a row, they should each be cited, and if several sentences in a row are each dependent on a different source (or part) then each should be cited. If a ref is followed by one or more uncited sentences, they need ref(s) too.

The Story of Miss Moppet is an article on one of Potter's works which is a FA here. It has 54 footnotes (this has 10 currently) which are cited about 71 times. Except for the lead and plot, every paragraph has a ref, and many have multiple refs as needed.

Looking at this article and its refs, there are two works by Lear, so the work needs to be indicated (by year). Internet refs need URL, publisher, date accessed, and if known, author, date created or updated, etc. All sources also have to be reliable - IMDb is often not seen a RS, and I am not sure what makes ref 10 (^ "Cottage Tales". Susan Wittig Albert. Retrieved 13 June 2010.) a reliable source.

Citations help readers find more information, allow claims to be checked, and also mean that copyvios and close paraphrasing can be detected more easily. Please see WP:V, WP:CITE, WP:RS, and WP:WIAGA and WP:WIAFA. Hope this helps anyone interested in improving the article. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 01:58, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for this, Ruhrfisch. I do have [Lear, 2007] and I'll cite it over the next few evenings along the lines you suggest above. 81.178.38.169 (talk) 18:21, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Some biographical details from The Tale of the Pie and the Patty-Pan

Hello. I've taken the liberty of transferring some biographical details from the The Tale of the Pie and the Patty-Pan#Background (over-detailed IMHO for that article). I am doing this not just for the benefit of this article, but also because I think that - in theory - Potter's biography should really be covered here and the "Pie and the Patty-Pan" article should focus more or less exclusively on that book and its creation, reception etc. I've already proposed on the talk page there that its "Background" section should therefore be more or less removed. Does anyone here have strong feelings about this? Alfietucker (talk) 00:23, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

It's detailed for that page, but a lot of it is plagiarized. Unfortunately many of the Potter pages were plagiarized, so I'd suggest just deleting or trimming from there. Isn't most of that information already covered here? This page has been somewhat, but not completely, scrubbed. Truthkeeper (talk) 00:48, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

British English?

I'm surprised to see there are a number of American English spellings in this article (artifacts, favoring etc.) which is about a quintessentially British author. I believe that according to wp:ENGVAR it should use British English spellings throughout. Does anyone have any objections to me changing them and adding a British English template to this page? Richerman (talk) 09:50, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

No objection at all.VenomousConcept (talk) 10:16, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

 Done Richerman (talk) 00:28, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

Letters to children

Digital facsimiles of twelve of Beatrix Potter's letters to children mentioned in the article are now online at The Morgan Library & Museum:

http://www.themorgan.org/collections/works/potter/default.asp

Would someone consider adding the above to the external links section? Thanks Morganlibrary (talk) 19:37, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Nice, thanks for linking. I've added it to the article. Truthkeeper (talk) 19:42, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Scientist, yes

She was an accomplished botanist and mycologist, and may have been the very first scientist to propose that microbial cooperation gives a basis to extrapolate that life is based almost entirely on co-operation, that completion in life is quite rare, and only on the surface does it appear to be the other way around. (The source for that is somewhere in my 'puter.) Lewis Thomas, though not to my knowledge alluding to Potter's premise, went on to propose that germ theory had run its course and needs to be replaced with information theory. —Pawyilee (talk) 14:00, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

And this article is actually called Beatrix Potter, Scientist Richerman (talk) 19:53, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Beatrix Potter Society

What is known about this subject? Candleabracadabra (talk) 00:59, 31 October 2013 (UTC)

Passion for botany

I can well believe that Beatrix Potter had a passion for botany, but the article says that 'most Victorians' did. Surely that is overstating it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.34.246.121 (talk) 20:55, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

first name pronunciation

hi. re her first name, is it pronounced w/two syllables, or with one? ("bea-trix", or "bea-uh-trix"?) it would be helpful if the article included this. thanks. 63.142.146.194 (talk) 04:05, 9 July 2014 (UTC)