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There is little information in this article about the demimonde, though a wealth of information on those classified as demimondaine. It provides the illusion that the two were synonymous. I would recommend splitting the two articles, preferably after more content, and citations, were added to both.
Dak06 ( talk) 19:44, 8 November 2010 (UTC)
Anytime you see the word "me" in an encyclopedia article, you reeeeeeally have to question the POV. =P Also, 'Demimonde', as a dictionary term, refers to women of the 19th century on the fringes of 'respectable' society who were supported by wealthy lovers. Socially, they were viewed as barely more respectable than upper-class prostitutes, the word was essentially a polite term for 'mistress' or 'kept woman.' As this article is linked directly from the dandy article in an attempt to say that a demimonde was a female dandy, this is doubly problematic. Their link to the Bohemianism movement of the 19th century is debatable, the women of the bohemian movement can be just as easily shown to reject the lifestyle of a mistress or 'kept woman' as being degrading to the more intellectual aspects of Bohemianism. The lifestyle of a demimonde, a high-society mistress, is completely at odds with that of the Dandy this article is linked from, and the general artistic/intellectual counter-cultural outlook of 19th century Bohemianism. This article needs a serious re-write. Xaa 17:56, 28 July 2005 (UTC)
You are referring to one definition of demimonde. Proplerly speaking, what you are referring to is actually the demimondaine. Demimonde is indeed the proper term for the world of the marginalized players in the bohemia of Paris in the 1880-1939 period. Dictionaries don't always take this usage of the term into account. Youuuuuu are splitting hairs with your POV argument. Go ahead, take the offending phrase "to me" out. It's hard to argue for POV when this is done. If that's all it takes, your contention seems silly. You have my permission as the original author. Incidentally, I had nothing to do with the link from dandy.--David Westling 28 Jul 05
I hope this helps to make things clearer. =) Xaa 01:27, 29 July 2005 (UTC)
xaa--you are out of your mind. A simple 5-minute browse through the internet yelded this definition of demimonde: 2. "A group whose respectability is dubious or whose success is marginal. (Example) The demimonde of ghost writers, hacks, and publicists."--dictionary.com. It's a perfectly common use of the term. There seems to be a whole class of would-be writers out there who just live for these high-octane outbursts. Get a life. I don't really care if you use your overweening influence with the awesome powers that be in wikipedia to ax the article. I'm not angling for the attention of some literary bigwig.--D. Westling, esq., July 29 05
Just wanted to point out that it's hard to take anyone seriously on this that can't spell "bourgeois" and "bourgeoisie". 89.247.86.166 ( talk) 11:06, 14 February 2011 (UTC)
Hi all,
I come here from the posting at WP:3O, and a request for such an opinion on my talk page. I have read the article, and have read this talk page. I know nothing about this area, and so my outside view is that of a person wanting to be able to learn something from the article. My thoughts are these:
I do not think that the author's second response was a helpful way to proceed: it can be hard to see your article being criticised, but it is a healthy part of writing a good, thorough encyclopedia. Moreover, the comments were not criticisms, they were suggestions. However, User:Xaa might note the {{ sofixit}} philosophy: if you see something you don't like, be bold and fix it. If you think this article can be turned into a good thorough reference work, go ahead and do it. You do not need anyone's permission! Ultimately, if you think it cannot be fixed and there is nothing to be had from the article, take it to VfD.
I would urge you both to get along with one another: you both evidently know something about the area, and a good article prepared jointly by knowledgeable people would have long term value to the project. - Splash 23:55, 3 August 2005 (UTC)
A question and a proposal.
(1) Why use the spelling "demimonde"? It seems that the correct spelling is "demi-monde". See for instance OED (which doesn't even offer "demimonde" as alternative spelling) or the next item, (2).
(2) The term "demi-monde" happens to have a very well-defined, recent, traceable (and well-known!) origin: it is taken directly from a well-known play by Alexandre Dumas fils. Of course the meaning can have evolved since, but it seems more than a little ridiculous to argue endlessly about it without even mentioning (or knowing?) its origin... such "information" just reflects at best the POV (or prejudices) of the contributors. 129.194.8.73 06:48, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
I checked out this article because I wanted to link it to the "See also" section of another Wikipedia article. When I glanced over the first paragraph, it looked like it said that "demimonde" means "mistress," which of course it doesn't. The problem was that the first sentence of the article actually introduced "demimondaine" as meaning "mistress." I thought this was a really misleading way to write the artice, because a casual reader could take away from it that "demimonde" simply means all the mistresses of the 19th century (a bit more slanderous accusation than a correct definition, which would include anyone, male ofrfemale, who basically led a racy or non-conformist night-life among similarly-minded people during the 19th century- men who went to a disreputable cabaret to hear iconoclastic, bawdy poetry or people who met in a salon to talk very taboo politics were just as much part of the demimonde as a woman who was doing nothing notable besides sneaking around behind her husband's back with another man).
So I very gently re-wrote the first paragraph, especially the first sentence, to clear this up, and moved the "demimondaine" sentence from the first sentence of the article to a bit later on in the first paragraph- a much more appropriate place to introduce a related term, especially one that is spelled so similarly to the title of the article it appears in. I hope other Wikipedia contributors will also try to stay aware of the ways in which ignorance is likely to be spread, and least likely to be corrected/detected once they are out there, when they write. After all, we don't want a young student to quickly read this article, and then some time later when they are sitting in a professor's class and hear "demimonde," "demimonde," "demimonde," at different points in the lecture, to think the professor is saying "mistresses," "mistresses," "mistresses," when what she meant to communicate was "19th century counter-culture," "19th century counter-culture," "19th century counter-culture"- right? The professor may be trying to praise the demimonde or just say something neutral about it, but if Wikipedia is not clear enough, part of their audience could think that what the professor was praising was sex out of wedlock (and then in turn the professor's credibility or reputation could be hurt when the professor was in fact not at all trying to devote ten minutes of her lecture to championing cheating on one's spouse).—Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.3.104.225 ( talk) 15:01, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
So it isn't put back, I'm noting a removal from the fictional references section (does Wikipedia allow this now?) for Showtime's Penny Dreadful series that refers to a word that is actually something like Demi-Mundi (half-world) -- 184.63.132.236 ( talk) 20:04, 7 October 2015 (UTC)
As far as I know, Countess Castiglione came from an aristocratic and wealthy family. I never read or heard that she was destitute and only when in Paris became wealthy. It seems very odd to me as she was wealthy herself, related to wealthy people, and part of the establishment before moving to France.
For this reason, I suggest that the paragraph related to her (pasted below) is modified. At the very least, a reliable source should be added confirming the fact that when she moved to Paris she was not wealthy.
"A famous beauty was Virginia Oldoini, Countess di Castiglione, who came to Paris in the 1850s with very little money of her own and soon became mistress of Napoleon III; after that relationship ended she moved on to other wealthy men in government, finance and European royalty. She was one of the most aristocratic and exclusive of the demimondaines—reputed to have charged a member of the British aristocracy one million francs for 12 hours in her company." — Preceding unsigned comment added by AnimalSymbolicum ( talk • contribs) 18:35, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Demimonde article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
![]() | This article is rated Start-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
There is little information in this article about the demimonde, though a wealth of information on those classified as demimondaine. It provides the illusion that the two were synonymous. I would recommend splitting the two articles, preferably after more content, and citations, were added to both.
Dak06 ( talk) 19:44, 8 November 2010 (UTC)
Anytime you see the word "me" in an encyclopedia article, you reeeeeeally have to question the POV. =P Also, 'Demimonde', as a dictionary term, refers to women of the 19th century on the fringes of 'respectable' society who were supported by wealthy lovers. Socially, they were viewed as barely more respectable than upper-class prostitutes, the word was essentially a polite term for 'mistress' or 'kept woman.' As this article is linked directly from the dandy article in an attempt to say that a demimonde was a female dandy, this is doubly problematic. Their link to the Bohemianism movement of the 19th century is debatable, the women of the bohemian movement can be just as easily shown to reject the lifestyle of a mistress or 'kept woman' as being degrading to the more intellectual aspects of Bohemianism. The lifestyle of a demimonde, a high-society mistress, is completely at odds with that of the Dandy this article is linked from, and the general artistic/intellectual counter-cultural outlook of 19th century Bohemianism. This article needs a serious re-write. Xaa 17:56, 28 July 2005 (UTC)
You are referring to one definition of demimonde. Proplerly speaking, what you are referring to is actually the demimondaine. Demimonde is indeed the proper term for the world of the marginalized players in the bohemia of Paris in the 1880-1939 period. Dictionaries don't always take this usage of the term into account. Youuuuuu are splitting hairs with your POV argument. Go ahead, take the offending phrase "to me" out. It's hard to argue for POV when this is done. If that's all it takes, your contention seems silly. You have my permission as the original author. Incidentally, I had nothing to do with the link from dandy.--David Westling 28 Jul 05
I hope this helps to make things clearer. =) Xaa 01:27, 29 July 2005 (UTC)
xaa--you are out of your mind. A simple 5-minute browse through the internet yelded this definition of demimonde: 2. "A group whose respectability is dubious or whose success is marginal. (Example) The demimonde of ghost writers, hacks, and publicists."--dictionary.com. It's a perfectly common use of the term. There seems to be a whole class of would-be writers out there who just live for these high-octane outbursts. Get a life. I don't really care if you use your overweening influence with the awesome powers that be in wikipedia to ax the article. I'm not angling for the attention of some literary bigwig.--D. Westling, esq., July 29 05
Just wanted to point out that it's hard to take anyone seriously on this that can't spell "bourgeois" and "bourgeoisie". 89.247.86.166 ( talk) 11:06, 14 February 2011 (UTC)
Hi all,
I come here from the posting at WP:3O, and a request for such an opinion on my talk page. I have read the article, and have read this talk page. I know nothing about this area, and so my outside view is that of a person wanting to be able to learn something from the article. My thoughts are these:
I do not think that the author's second response was a helpful way to proceed: it can be hard to see your article being criticised, but it is a healthy part of writing a good, thorough encyclopedia. Moreover, the comments were not criticisms, they were suggestions. However, User:Xaa might note the {{ sofixit}} philosophy: if you see something you don't like, be bold and fix it. If you think this article can be turned into a good thorough reference work, go ahead and do it. You do not need anyone's permission! Ultimately, if you think it cannot be fixed and there is nothing to be had from the article, take it to VfD.
I would urge you both to get along with one another: you both evidently know something about the area, and a good article prepared jointly by knowledgeable people would have long term value to the project. - Splash 23:55, 3 August 2005 (UTC)
A question and a proposal.
(1) Why use the spelling "demimonde"? It seems that the correct spelling is "demi-monde". See for instance OED (which doesn't even offer "demimonde" as alternative spelling) or the next item, (2).
(2) The term "demi-monde" happens to have a very well-defined, recent, traceable (and well-known!) origin: it is taken directly from a well-known play by Alexandre Dumas fils. Of course the meaning can have evolved since, but it seems more than a little ridiculous to argue endlessly about it without even mentioning (or knowing?) its origin... such "information" just reflects at best the POV (or prejudices) of the contributors. 129.194.8.73 06:48, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
I checked out this article because I wanted to link it to the "See also" section of another Wikipedia article. When I glanced over the first paragraph, it looked like it said that "demimonde" means "mistress," which of course it doesn't. The problem was that the first sentence of the article actually introduced "demimondaine" as meaning "mistress." I thought this was a really misleading way to write the artice, because a casual reader could take away from it that "demimonde" simply means all the mistresses of the 19th century (a bit more slanderous accusation than a correct definition, which would include anyone, male ofrfemale, who basically led a racy or non-conformist night-life among similarly-minded people during the 19th century- men who went to a disreputable cabaret to hear iconoclastic, bawdy poetry or people who met in a salon to talk very taboo politics were just as much part of the demimonde as a woman who was doing nothing notable besides sneaking around behind her husband's back with another man).
So I very gently re-wrote the first paragraph, especially the first sentence, to clear this up, and moved the "demimondaine" sentence from the first sentence of the article to a bit later on in the first paragraph- a much more appropriate place to introduce a related term, especially one that is spelled so similarly to the title of the article it appears in. I hope other Wikipedia contributors will also try to stay aware of the ways in which ignorance is likely to be spread, and least likely to be corrected/detected once they are out there, when they write. After all, we don't want a young student to quickly read this article, and then some time later when they are sitting in a professor's class and hear "demimonde," "demimonde," "demimonde," at different points in the lecture, to think the professor is saying "mistresses," "mistresses," "mistresses," when what she meant to communicate was "19th century counter-culture," "19th century counter-culture," "19th century counter-culture"- right? The professor may be trying to praise the demimonde or just say something neutral about it, but if Wikipedia is not clear enough, part of their audience could think that what the professor was praising was sex out of wedlock (and then in turn the professor's credibility or reputation could be hurt when the professor was in fact not at all trying to devote ten minutes of her lecture to championing cheating on one's spouse).—Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.3.104.225 ( talk) 15:01, 27 September 2010 (UTC)
So it isn't put back, I'm noting a removal from the fictional references section (does Wikipedia allow this now?) for Showtime's Penny Dreadful series that refers to a word that is actually something like Demi-Mundi (half-world) -- 184.63.132.236 ( talk) 20:04, 7 October 2015 (UTC)
As far as I know, Countess Castiglione came from an aristocratic and wealthy family. I never read or heard that she was destitute and only when in Paris became wealthy. It seems very odd to me as she was wealthy herself, related to wealthy people, and part of the establishment before moving to France.
For this reason, I suggest that the paragraph related to her (pasted below) is modified. At the very least, a reliable source should be added confirming the fact that when she moved to Paris she was not wealthy.
"A famous beauty was Virginia Oldoini, Countess di Castiglione, who came to Paris in the 1850s with very little money of her own and soon became mistress of Napoleon III; after that relationship ended she moved on to other wealthy men in government, finance and European royalty. She was one of the most aristocratic and exclusive of the demimondaines—reputed to have charged a member of the British aristocracy one million francs for 12 hours in her company." — Preceding unsigned comment added by AnimalSymbolicum ( talk • contribs) 18:35, 17 May 2020 (UTC)