Good articleThe Bone People has been listed as one of the Language and literature good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
October 17, 2022Good article nomineeListed
Did You Know
A fact from this article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on November 1, 2022.
The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that The Bone People by Keri Hulme nearly ended up as a doorstop instead of a Booker Prize-winning novel?

Capitalization of title[edit]

I just capitalized the title. —Preceding unsigned comment added 23 September 2004 (UTC)‎

The title WASN'T CAPITALISED. —Preceding unsigned comment added 5 October 2004‎ (UTC)

I own a copy, and it's capitalised. -- Greaser 04:03, 2 February 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

If it isn't supposed to be capitalised then this article name is wrong. We need to move to "The bone people" and tell people that the article is actually called "the bone people". I wasted my time making edits. Skinnyweed 19:56, 1 March 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

The correct title of the book is the bone people. Not in title case, as The Bone People. This was done, by the author for what she obviously felt were valid reasons.

If you own a copy with the incorrect title, it is indeed a poor cousin.

Whether the title on the book itself uses initial capitals, no capitals at all or, in the case of the copy I own (Picador, 1985) is a matter of the publisher's - or even the graphic designer's - style and very unlikely to reflect the views of the author. Amended accordingly. specialknives 00:06, 9 August 2006 (UTC)Reply[reply]

The author used title case for a reason - this had nothing to do with some graphic designer's whim. In NZ literary and academic circles, you will generally see the novel referred to, correctly, as the bone people, especially by those close to the book http://www.library.auckland.ac.nz/subjects/nzp/nzlit2/hulme.htm http://www.vuw.ac.nz/staff/marian_evans/about-us/aboutus.html Amended accordingly Notalent (talk) 07:04, 25 December 2007 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Since the author originally called the book the bone people [1] shouldn't the article be moved to the bone people from The Bone People? Note that the Wikipedia article on bell hooks already uses this same format. Copana2002 (talk) 05:40, 17 November 2008 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Kerewins cancer?[edit]

I just finished the book yesterday and as far as I can remember Kerewin doesn't know she has cancer until after she burns the tower down, unless of course I completely missed the point? She's not running from Simon and Joe because shes sick but they have all been separated and she wants to leave to get away from another mess like she did before. Anyway that's what I think maybe we should edit tht second paragraph of the summary. Drac90 15/8/06 9.50

Kerewin as a Self-Insertion Character / Mary Sue[edit]

I notice a prior version of the article contained: "Kerewin Holmes - Kerewin is a reclusive artist who is running away from her past. The character's name seems intentionally similar to the author’s. This could mean that the author wishes for some reason to draw parallels between herself and Kerewin. Kerewin also shares the author's appearance and lifestyle, but the character's realism and obvious flaws such as short-temperedness and alcoholism suggest that Kerewin is not a Mary Sue." But it's been removed.

That the character is a self-insertion of some sort is damn obvious to anyone who's seen the name, and it's one of the biggest examples I've seen in a recognised literary work. Not mentioning that it's a self-insertion, is trying to retain some scrap of modesty that the book doesn't have.

The only thing I'd question is the statement 'is not a Mary Sue', and the reasons given. Alcoholism and short-temperedness isn't a character flaw in the authors eyes, given that all the sympathetic characters in the book have no problem with it (same goes for smoking - a Doctor offers a Cigar to a 6-7 year old, if you've read it, and all the sympathetic characters think people are being a bit 'PC' for not letting a kid smoke or drink). If anything, the only flaw acknowledged in Alcoholism is having a hang-over, and 'Kerewin' generally drinks people under the table, and yet, doesn't. Let's not forget her expertise at any skill mentioned (architecture, herbalism, guitar, painting, carpentry, chess - is there anything she *isn't* good at? Why, no!), and her ability to handle 'at least 6 attackers' with ease, due to her elite Aikido skills. ;P C'mon, it's a gem! -- A. Nonymous, Wellington. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.154.238.36 (talk) 02:05, 3 March 2008 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Capitalisation: the bone people or The Bone People[edit]

Kia ora all! I'm about to start working on this page (it's an important one I think!). I've previously been in touch with Marian Evans of Spiral who has kindly organised for photographer Philip Tremewan to upload some photos of Keri Hulme to Commons (see this Commons category). I'm hugely grateful to her for this.

Something else Marian has raised with me is that Hulme's preferred capitalisation was the bone people. This is how it was stylised in the first edition, but not always in later editions. Secondary sources are mixed in how they refer to the novel but the sources I'd consider most authoritative in the area of New Zealand literature use the lower-case, for example Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature and other scholarly sources, while newspaper articles (such as the various obituaries for Hulme after her death recently) tend to use the upper-case. So this is not a very clear-cut case, and I'm wondering what others think of the best approach? Is this the kind of thing where a RfC might assist, or would the author's preference + use in reliable sources justify a bold move to lower-case? Cheers, Chocmilk03 (talk) 23:50, 9 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

This isn’t straightforward and apart from waiting a few days to see what other editors may have to say, the next logical step would be a move request. Showing a cover of the original edition (or linking to it) would strengthen the argument. Schwede66 23:58, 9 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Lower case first letters for proper nouns are generally avoided, but a note on stylisation is usual. The first sentence is about right, although given that it is the author’s preference, I would consider taking the note out of parenthetical, putting it between commas. MOS:TMLOWER is the best guide for this. — HTGS (talk) 00:03, 10 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
My understanding of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Titles of works#Typographic effects is that WP style is to capitalise, per "Do not attempt [...] to emulate any purely typographic effects used in titles when giving the title in Wikipedia [...]", and similar to Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Trademarks, where trademarks not infrequently do funky things with case. Nurg (talk) 00:34, 10 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
@HTGS: Thanks, a helpful suggestion about taking the note out of the parenthetical, and one I've taken up. Cheers, Chocmilk03 (talk) 03:46, 10 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
This seems analogous to bell hooks? I think the key test is what reliable sources do (so in my view, the fact that the Companion to New Zealand Literature uses low case is decisive. Newspaper articles are less reliable and posting the cover of the book seems unnecessary. Furius (talk) 16:49, 12 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
bell hooks is a person—we tend to treat people very differently to things, and give them the benefit of naming themselves. (Though I’m sure there would be an argument for capitalising hooks too, if editors at that page weren’t so adamant.) A more appropriate comparison would be Milk and Honey (poetry collection). I also wouldn’t like to rest style decisions at the feet of a single source, especially when common use is so mixed. — HTGS (talk) 20:39, 12 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
That comparison is really helpful, thanks HTGS. I wasn't super convinced by the comparisons to trademarks, and had been trying to find a good literary comparison (I'd been thinking that there is a distinction between what might be a purely typographical/design decision, and a conscious decision by an artist that their artistic work should be portrayed in a particular way). I'd been looking at the poetry of E. E. Cummings in the first instance and did note that is 5 and some of his poems are titled in lower case, but it didn't appear to me that those articles have had a great deal of attention, so I didn't find them of much use. milk and honey seems a better example. Cheers, Chocmilk03 (talk) 22:03, 12 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Funnily enough you went through the exact same search, came to the same page, and reached the same conclusion that I did. I should say, I would consider a lowercase title much more seriously if reliable sources were consistent in keeping the lower case; this might be the case for Cummings’ works, though I haven’t checked. — HTGS (talk) 03:41, 13 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Oh, and I don’t love that the section at TM is about trademarked works, but one of the primary considerations they make there is for films, and I see film titles as very comparable to book titles.
It might be worth reassessing—merging or moving or changing—the style guides at some point. But: if we didn’t have any guidance on the subject I would still recommend avoiding lowercase (or other stylisations) unless a work were treated as lowercase unanimously or near-unanimously in RSs. — HTGS (talk) 03:49, 13 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I'd recommend following the style of Archy and Mehitabel, e.g. " The Bone People (styled as the bone people) ". Daveosaurus (talk) 08:15, 24 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Some suggestions[edit]

I see you wanted feedback, Chocmilk:

This isn't far off a GA. Great work. And the revision history shows how much work you've put into this. Schwede66 06:46, 14 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

@Schwede66: As always, immensely helpful, thank you! I know it has been translated into numerous languages (that often comes up alongside the impressive sales figures), so am sure I will be able to track down a bit more there. :) and leads are always the most challenging article section for me, I'll work on that more before putting it up for a formal review. Ngā mihi nui, Chocmilk03 (talk) 09:58, 14 July 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
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