Talk:The Carpetbaggers

Quote: "Like many of Robbins' other novels, The Carpetbaggers combined good writing, a strong story, and numerous more-or-less-gratuitous scenes of explicit sex. The sex scenes were at the extreme outer boundaries of acceptability for a mainstream novel at its time of publication; The Carpetbaggers was probably the first New York Times bestseller to include scenes in which characters engage in fellatio." That is POV. [[User:Mike Storm|Mike∞Storm]] 20:47, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I'm not clear on whether you feel that

• the description is inaccurate (which I would dispute);
• the description is biased, in that it gives too much weight to the sex/profanity/shock aspects of the book and not enough to its literary merits;
• the description is unsubstantiated and unreferenced. This is true, and yes, it is a problem, and I intend to work on it as time permits. I need to find some reviews and comments on it that are contemporary with the book.

Meanwhile, just to show that my opinions are not solely my own, I note these remarks from the eleven Amazon reader reviews of the book. I may try to work some of this into the article in lieu of stating my own opinions, if I can't find anything better. For now, I'll leave this material here on the Talk page:

Five suggest that it is not of serious value:

• "it may be classic trash . . . but it's still trash."
• "Not my typical brand of trash, but I liked it"
• "The Carpetbaggers may not be great literature [but] it is a great read."
• "Pop fiction like this is like candy. It does not stimulate great or exciting thought but it sure is fun."
• "It's pure entertainment..."

However, four suggest that it has more than entertainment value:

• "The writer takes you through the realities in life. Thought-provoking."
• "This is a book that sooner or later everyone should read. It represents the change in the literary paradigm that has given the paperback world its direction for the last 40 years."
• "One does not so much as read it but lives the lives of these characters if only for a little while."
• "No doubt, one of the greatest books writen in this century. Every man and woman in this world have a Jonas Cord and a Rina Marlowe somewhere in them...Mr.Robbins you will be remembered forever for giving us Jonas Cord" (No, I can't tell whether this was written tongue-in-cheek).

Four refer to its use of what was for its time shockingly explicit sex and profanity:

• "Until I read Hollywoodland Kingpin, I thought this was the most profane book of them all"
• "...the scintilating erotica that Harold Robbins got us hooked on"
• "tremendous fun in the vein of Sheldon's "Master of the Game" or Archer's "Kane and Abel," but there's a lot more sex, violence and language in this one."
• "Robbins has one foul mouth..."

Three suggest that the sex is gratuitous:

• "If you can make it through the sadly desperate attempts to work sex into what is otherwise a good story"
• "it seemed to be the same thing over and over again--business deal, gratuitous sex scene, business deal, gratuitous sex scene"
• "racy passages" (I'm interpreting the use of the word "passages" to mean that they seem to be have been inserted rather than being an integral part of an erotic or romantic story)

Seven suggest that Robbins is a compelling storyteller:

• "I have to admit, Robbins is a great story teller"
• "This is a fascinating story told by a master storyteller"
• "the story is just as good as it was in the early 1960's"
• "It's pure entertainment, with a page-flipping pace and an excellent story. This was a monster bestseller in the early 1960s and you'll see why after Robbins hooks you on page one."
• "Robbins is a very good storyteller"
• "Harold Robbins, love him or hate him you cannot deny that he was a master storyteller."
• "The book is a good read"

TV Guide's review of the movie says "The Carpetbaggers is first-rate trash--and trash of so high a caliber is not easy to find.... By today's standards, this movie is about as mild as typical Friday-night television fare, but it was hot stuff in its day."

The tagline for the movie was "This is adult entertainment," showing that the movie was promoted as "hot stuff." [[User:Dpbsmith|dpbsmith (talk)]]

I'm assuming that you are citing movie critics' reviews. Erm... isn't it a little obvious that those reviews are opinions? Wikipedia is about facts, not opinions. And furthermore, if you must include quotes, attribute those quotes, otherwise you might have just made them up. Also, please sign your name after you post by inserting four tildes (~~~~). [[User:Mike Storm|Mike∞Storm]] 18:07, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)

No, as noted above most of them are from Amazon reader reviews. (However, those movie reviews I was able to find are also in good accord with my assertions). As such, they are easily verifiable, although the persons who posted them are not easily identifiable and not particularly authoritative. As for opinions, Npov does not mean absence of opinion. It rather means "assert facts, including facts about opinions--but don't assert opinions themselves." Thus, the above discussion is an assertion that Amazon readers who have chosen to post reader reviews hold certain opinion about Robbins.

But you still haven't answered my question. Which are your objections:

• the description is inaccurate;
• the description is biased, in that it gives too much weight to the sex/profanity/shock aspects of the book and not enough to its literary merits;
• the description is unsubstantiated and unreferenced. As noted, I acknowledge this and plan to work on it.
• (or something else)

[[User:Dpbsmith|dpbsmith (talk)]] 19:49, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Request for discussion leading to resolution

It is hard to write anything meaningful about literary topics without presenting material that cannot be fully objective; the best that can be done is to synthesize consensus views, substantiate them, and fairly present opposing views.

The original article contained this sentence, to which User:Mike Storm objected.

"Like many of Robbins' other novels, The Carpetbaggers combined good writing, a strong story, and numerous more-or-less-gratuitous scenes of explicit sex. The sex scenes were at the extreme outer boundaries of acceptability for a mainstream novel at its time of publication; The Carpetbaggers was probably the first New York Times bestseller to include scenes in which characters engage in fellatio."

Since Mike didn't articulate his objections very well, I have to guess. There are two likely possibilities. The sentence makes a number of assertions. I don't honestly believe that the truth of these assertions is seriously disputed by anyone familiar with the book or its history. Therefore the basis of the objection could be:

• I didn't substantiate the assertions
• The paragraph is out of balance and dwells too much on the sex scenes.

I've now written a great deal more. For the time being I've left out the claims that it has "good writing" and "a strong story" until I can substantiate these by references to contemporary reviews, etc. I have made the point about the book's sex scenes by quoting a 1961 New York Times review of the book, and have tried to put it into context in a section about the sexual revolution. The book was regarded as borderline-pornographic at the time and this is a relevant feature of the book. On the one hand, you had the books that landed into court—Lady Chatterley, Memoirs of Hecate County, Tropic of Cancer, Fanny Hill. On the other hand, you had the books that almost landed in court: Butterfield 8, Peyton Place, The Carpetbaggers, The Story of O. The Carpetbaggers was a famous example of the latter category.

I'd appreciate comments here and I'd appreciate it if someone could see their way to removing the {{NPOV}} notice, or make constructive suggestions on things that could be done to make the article neutral without totally removing important things that ought to be said about the book. [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 12:39, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

• Personally, I think the article is a fine one, and very judicious about the book. I read it 40 years ago, when it came it, and it was, just as you said, exciting, fun, page-turning trash. Sexy for the time, of course, just borderline publishable. Peyton Place had had a cunnilingus scene (on a pregnant woman yet), in 56 or 57, but fellatio hadn't yet gone mainstream. Rabbit, Run referred to it a couple of years later.... Anyway, it seems to me that it is a perfectly NPOV article and I really can't see what the objection is to it.... Hayford Peirce 17:57, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

NPOV dispute: summary and current status

On August 2nd, Mike Storm placed an {{npov}} notice on the page, with this comment:

Quote: "Like many of Robbins' other novels, The Carpetbaggers combined good writing, a strong story, and numerous more-or-less-gratuitous scenes of explicit sex. The sex scenes were at the extreme outer boundaries of acceptability for a mainstream novel at its time of publication; The Carpetbaggers was probably the first New York Times bestseller to include scenes in which characters engage in fellatio." That is POV. [[User:Mike Storm|Mike∞Storm]] 20:47, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Over the next couple of weeks, the article was enlarged and expanded, mostly by me, and, at the same time, I tried to address Mike's objections. In particular, I thought I had removed the references to "good writing and a strong story," and that I had provided NPOV material on how its sex scenes related to contemporary mores at its time of publication.

In response to a request for discussion, Hayford Peirce expressed a generally favorable opinion and did not note any NPOV issues (see above).

On August 16th, I asked Mike if he could see his way to removing the {{npov}} tag. He removed, then reinserted it. In response to my queries, his last reply was:

...what I care about is you asserting your own opinion about the author's writing style. You're misinterpreting my complaint. By the way, how is the consensus opinion if the book a "good story and strong plot," when you cited the New York Times review of the book as saying that it was terrible? The "consensus" opinion seems to be more like your opinion. [[User:Mike Storm|Mike∞Storm]] 16:01, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I am puzzled by this comment which I don't understand and am not sure how to address, as I don't see where in the current article I am "asserting my own opinion about the author's writing style." [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 16:35, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

• • I'm just baffled. Where is the NPOV that Mike Storm apparently refers to? I've just reread the entire article and I can't find a hint of it. I wish he'd spell it out for us one more time, with some exact quotes. Hayford Peirce 16:47, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I removed the NPOV notice. Should Mike Storm wish to re-apply it, he must note here why. The latest version doesn't seem to have POV problems. Pcb21| Pete 23:15, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks. Just a caution to other contributors. I didn't like staring at that notice, and it's a relief to have it gone, but if anyone puts it back let's not be in any hurry to remove it. (Or vice versa). Me, I want to keep tinkering with this article myself, and I'd rather not have a silly revert war over the {{NPOV}} notice that might end up with the page being protected. Of course anyone who inserts or removes an {{NPOV}} notice should give reasons here, and in an ideal world we might discuss them here before inserting or removing a notice, or edit the article to add balance in places that need it. It is very hard to say anything meaningful or useful about a literary work without getting into iffy areas. [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 12:49, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

• For what it's worth, discussions of literature are always going to involve some assessment and some valuative language. The usual way to avoid such opinions is to use passive or attribution ("it was considered" or "TV Guide says"), but I don't think there is any POV in saying that the writing is "good." "Good" is very light weight. I can think of one way out, since it seems to be a bone of contention, and that's to say, "Writing that put it ahead of other genre fiction" or "Strong plot and action." It's pretty indisputable that Robbins has strong plotting and action. Sales figures alone will tell you empirically that he did, and the reviews saying so would be pretty darned numerous. In fact, I'll bet that the book jacket would have about a dozen. At a certain point, adjectives like this are just plain justified. Geogre 13:21, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Robbins is always described as a "storyteller." Typical blurb copy for a Robbins book was usually something like "the new blockbuster from the master storyteller." I or somebody else can insert that with proper attribution sometime. Unfortunately my paperback copy of "The Carpetbaggers" came out at the same time as the movie Nevada Smith and devotes all of its promotional space on the cover to the movie, and oddly enough there are no reviews quoted. The important point—that the book is, dare I say "surprisingly," well-written—is already made now by the quotation from the New York Times review that says "In the sections in which he avoids the lurid, he writes graphically and touchingly; on these pages, his dialogue is moving and his people have the warmth of life." [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 14:28, 2 Sep 2004 (UTC)