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T E Lawrence died in 1935. So the story of him meeting Driberg in 1940 suggests a typo.
I once read the following (the words are to the best of my memory): "To write an obituary of Tom Driberg without mentioning homosexuality would be like writing an obituary of Maria Callas without mentioning opera". Google has proved fruitless in my search for its author. Can anyone help? -- JackofOz 08:30, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
The link to Great Work redirects to Magnum Opus, a multi-concept page. Should the Alister Crowley section be extended to specify/link to Thelema or Thelemic mysticism? Please Note - I write from a position of complete ignorance, as my casual attempt to link and learn ended in confusion. Perhaps ... solemnly pledged himself to the Thelemic mystical concept of the Great Work in the presence of the Beast 666. Autodidactyl ( talk) 22:42, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
"He is the man who brought pederasty into disrepute" is referenced only to Wikiquote's page on Winston Churchill, and on that page we discover that the quote is listed under the "Unsourced" heading. I can't see that this is a good enough reference, therefore, for a Wikipedia article. 86.143.48.55 ( talk) 15:17, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
It is important to state hear, the extent to which Driberg participated in his homosexual proclivities. He was a keen cottager and any book on the man would link him to the most depraved acts of perversion, including many of the infamous gatherings set up by Ronny Kray. —Preceding unsigned comment added by KarlVKrish ( talk • contribs) 23:25, 2 March 2009 (UTC)
We say However after his death, it was revealed that he had been ... a [sic] undisclosed homosexual".
Sodomy was illegal, as was any gross indecency in public. Importuning was illegal, that is just offering to perform sexual acts, for money or not. The police concentrated on venues likely to be hosting these activities. Being gay per-se was not indictable as there was no evidence. 203.194.47.168 ( talk) 05:34, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
I am beginning an expansion of this article into a comprehensive biography. I will shortly post a revised structure, and new sections and text will be added. Comments on the new material will be welcome, though I ask at this stage that these be made on this talkpage, rather than by alteration to the text. Thanks, Brianboulton ( talk) 21:19, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
He was created a life peer, as Baron Bradwell, of Bradwell-on-Sea in the County of Essex, shortly before his death at Paddington, London. His autobiography, Ruling Passions, was published posthumously in 1977 and disclosed the conflict between the three passions that drove his life: his homosexuality,<ref>Ball, 2004</ref> his left-wing political beliefs and his allegiance to the High Church tendency of the Church of England. Winston Churchill, who died in 1965, had said of him, "Tom Driberg is the sort of person who gives sodomy a bad name."<ref>[http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-5316833.html A.N. Wilson in the (London) ''Evening Standard'']</ref> Driberg's will insisted that at his memorial service, the reader excoriate him for his sins rather than praise him for his virtues. Driberg set the crosswords for Private Eye for some years, under the pseudonym " Tiresias". Peter Cook, who provided financial backing to Private Eye, refers to him in a Derek and Clive recording from 1977 as "Lord Driberg, or Lord Bradwell I think he's called", and has him wearing "fine fishnet stockings" and accompanied by a " chicken".<ref>''[[Derek and Clive Come Again]]'', 'Back of the Cab' (Track 8).</ref>
On the various issues raised above
I have moved the article title to "Tom Driberg" (from "Tom Driberg, Baron Bradwell). This is the normal practice in Wikipedia for articles where the subject received a peerage late in life, having been known by their true names through their main years of achievement and noteworthiness. See, for example, Benjamin Britten, Harold Wilson, James Callaghan, Laurence Olivier, Harold Macmillan and many others. The references to Driberg's title in the text and infobox remain unchanged. Brianboulton ( talk) 22:29, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
Pearl Harbor was attacked on Sunday 7 December 1941; President Roosevelt's famous speech asking Congress for a declaration of war against Japan and beginning "Yesterday — December 7th, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy — the United States was wantonly and deliberately attacked ...", was on Monday 8 December 1941. The regular (non-special edition) morning newspapers that reported the Dec. 8 speech and declaration of war were dated Tuesday, December 9, 1941; for example a facsimile of The New York Times front page that I have before me. Now it's possible that Tom Driberg was in Washington on Tuesday the 9th but not Monday the 8th; it's also possible that the source cited (Tom Driberg) confused the days of the week (his report of Monday's events was no doubt published on the 9th). But the anomaly needs to be resolved somehow, because to anyone who knows anything about the attack on Pearl Harbor, one of the memorable elements (with a dramatic contrast, used in countless later portrayals, of sudden war with innocent weekend relaxation or worship) is that it happened on a Sunday (U.S. and Hawaiian time). The Sunday newspapers had already been printed and delivered, so Americans first got the startling news either by word of mouth or from radio reports while expecting to hear athletic, religious or musical programming. [The only afternoon paper that day, and thus the only U.S. newspaper to report Pearl Harbor on December 7th, was The Westerly Sun in Rhode Island, published by Seventh-Day Adventists who took Saturday for their Sabbath and treated Sunday as a weekday.] —— Shakescene ( talk) 07:40, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
jeez I have read some booring articles on here, but this one takes the biscuit as the first choice for the main page. I mean just out of interest I went back to 2009. That short article then told me everything I needed to know. He was a labour MP who was a shameless homosexual who probably betrayed his country for some "rough trade". This article on the other hand is the work of an apologist. The old article hits the tone immediately whereas this one drowns out his scurrilous reputation with narrative that is both verbose and boorish. Very clever! Who ever thinks this is a good article needs their head examined?!!!
As noted above, someone said he was a well-known gay man who did not care that homosexuality was illegal. Churchill even said Driberg gave sodomy a bad name (whatever that meant!). The bottom line is this that this article far from accurate. Imagine the uproar if an article about Adolf Hitler was written in the same self-serving manner, there would be little room for any mention of anti-Semitism then!
From the intro down, there is little but dull narrative prose about he did this and he did that, yeah he did plenty of this and that with little care for the consequences, too! This article is piss poor with capitals. There should be tags that could be added to these articles warning all those college plagiarists that they would not be getting an a good grade if they copied this drivel. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.169.90.201 ( talk) 15:42, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
I am surprised by your comments,I came here because I wanted to say that I think this is actually one of the very best Wiki articles I have ever read. It gets to the heart of the man and shows that he was much loved by his friends and even fondly loathed by his enemies. A truly remarkable,unique and very individual character and this article does him great justice. Frglee ( talk) 20:25, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
"to get off later charges" should be replaced with something NPOV. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.86.117.208 ( talk) 09:51, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
I suggest that the reference to "Ena Mary Binfield, née Lyttelton, the common law widow of Joe Binfield" should be changed to "Ena Mary Binfield, née Lyttelton, the former mistress of Joe Binfield". There is no such thing as a common law widow. Royalcourtier ( talk) 01:57, 18 April 2015 (UTC)
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@ Vodka lemon lime: Please explain why "gay sexual orientation" is better than "homosexuality", why "Oxford" (the city) is synonymous to the university in that city and most of all what on earth you mean by "given the retrograde social and political context of the times" and what exactly are the sources for that claim. Thanks. Kleuske ( talk) 18:57, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
The longstanding lead image, under a fair use rationale, was recently replaced by an image which purported to be "free". If that image is to be used it needs to be demonstrated that it is free in the US, not just in the UK. I have restored the original image until the US copyright status of the proposed replacement is established. Brianboulton ( talk) 20:03, 12 July 2018 (UTC)
The main caption reads "Chairman of the Labour Party", as though this was some form of high dignified public office. It isn't and wasn't: the party chairmanship was awarded yearly, on the basis of Buggins' turn, to whoever had sat on the National Executive the longest. No honour whatever - about 90% of the holders were nonentities, and Driberg was unusual in that many people had actually heard of him. Of course, the pompous jackass tried to pretend to his foreign friends that it was an importsnt office, and some of the Soviets might have believed him... I'm not sure what if anything ought to be done to clarify the position, but it looks annoyingly misleading at the moment. Brianboulton ( talk) 20:20, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for speedy deletion:
You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. — Community Tech bot ( talk) 12:55, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
One of Driberg's main political activities in 1943-1945 was opposing the abuse of Jews in the
Polish army in the UK. This led to hearings in parliament, inquiries, and was a factor in the dissolution of the Polish army in the west. This page should at least mention this.
[1]
[2] — Preceding
unsigned comment added by
Semper honestus (
talk •
contribs)
03:55, 22 May 2020 (UTC) - (ArbCom banned user)
{{
cite news}}
: Check date values in: |date=
(
help)
More sources:
SarahSV (talk) 21:39, 22 May 2020 (UTC)
Am in the process of working up an article on Bradwell Lodge. A, quite nice, 21st-century image of the lodge can be found there. We could replace the 1960s image currently here with that one. However, it may be felt that the current image is more suitable, particularly as it purports to show Driberg, although he’s close to unrecognisable! I’d be interested in others’ thoughts. KJP1 ( talk) 10:40, 11 September 2022 (UTC)
You’re very kind. I also personally prefer the more recent image of the lodge, and think it gives a clearer view of what the building actually looks like. That said, the older image does have some nice detailing, although not of Driberg! Let’s see whether anyone else has a view. KJP1 ( talk) 16:22, 11 September 2022 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Tom Driberg 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 |
![]() | Tom Driberg is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so. | ||||||||||||
![]() | This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on February 15, 2012. | ||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
Current status: Featured article |
![]() | This article is rated FA-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
![]() | Daily page views
|
T E Lawrence died in 1935. So the story of him meeting Driberg in 1940 suggests a typo.
I once read the following (the words are to the best of my memory): "To write an obituary of Tom Driberg without mentioning homosexuality would be like writing an obituary of Maria Callas without mentioning opera". Google has proved fruitless in my search for its author. Can anyone help? -- JackofOz 08:30, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
The link to Great Work redirects to Magnum Opus, a multi-concept page. Should the Alister Crowley section be extended to specify/link to Thelema or Thelemic mysticism? Please Note - I write from a position of complete ignorance, as my casual attempt to link and learn ended in confusion. Perhaps ... solemnly pledged himself to the Thelemic mystical concept of the Great Work in the presence of the Beast 666. Autodidactyl ( talk) 22:42, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
"He is the man who brought pederasty into disrepute" is referenced only to Wikiquote's page on Winston Churchill, and on that page we discover that the quote is listed under the "Unsourced" heading. I can't see that this is a good enough reference, therefore, for a Wikipedia article. 86.143.48.55 ( talk) 15:17, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
It is important to state hear, the extent to which Driberg participated in his homosexual proclivities. He was a keen cottager and any book on the man would link him to the most depraved acts of perversion, including many of the infamous gatherings set up by Ronny Kray. —Preceding unsigned comment added by KarlVKrish ( talk • contribs) 23:25, 2 March 2009 (UTC)
We say However after his death, it was revealed that he had been ... a [sic] undisclosed homosexual".
Sodomy was illegal, as was any gross indecency in public. Importuning was illegal, that is just offering to perform sexual acts, for money or not. The police concentrated on venues likely to be hosting these activities. Being gay per-se was not indictable as there was no evidence. 203.194.47.168 ( talk) 05:34, 26 June 2016 (UTC)
I am beginning an expansion of this article into a comprehensive biography. I will shortly post a revised structure, and new sections and text will be added. Comments on the new material will be welcome, though I ask at this stage that these be made on this talkpage, rather than by alteration to the text. Thanks, Brianboulton ( talk) 21:19, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
He was created a life peer, as Baron Bradwell, of Bradwell-on-Sea in the County of Essex, shortly before his death at Paddington, London. His autobiography, Ruling Passions, was published posthumously in 1977 and disclosed the conflict between the three passions that drove his life: his homosexuality,<ref>Ball, 2004</ref> his left-wing political beliefs and his allegiance to the High Church tendency of the Church of England. Winston Churchill, who died in 1965, had said of him, "Tom Driberg is the sort of person who gives sodomy a bad name."<ref>[http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-5316833.html A.N. Wilson in the (London) ''Evening Standard'']</ref> Driberg's will insisted that at his memorial service, the reader excoriate him for his sins rather than praise him for his virtues. Driberg set the crosswords for Private Eye for some years, under the pseudonym " Tiresias". Peter Cook, who provided financial backing to Private Eye, refers to him in a Derek and Clive recording from 1977 as "Lord Driberg, or Lord Bradwell I think he's called", and has him wearing "fine fishnet stockings" and accompanied by a " chicken".<ref>''[[Derek and Clive Come Again]]'', 'Back of the Cab' (Track 8).</ref>
On the various issues raised above
I have moved the article title to "Tom Driberg" (from "Tom Driberg, Baron Bradwell). This is the normal practice in Wikipedia for articles where the subject received a peerage late in life, having been known by their true names through their main years of achievement and noteworthiness. See, for example, Benjamin Britten, Harold Wilson, James Callaghan, Laurence Olivier, Harold Macmillan and many others. The references to Driberg's title in the text and infobox remain unchanged. Brianboulton ( talk) 22:29, 12 March 2011 (UTC)
Pearl Harbor was attacked on Sunday 7 December 1941; President Roosevelt's famous speech asking Congress for a declaration of war against Japan and beginning "Yesterday — December 7th, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy — the United States was wantonly and deliberately attacked ...", was on Monday 8 December 1941. The regular (non-special edition) morning newspapers that reported the Dec. 8 speech and declaration of war were dated Tuesday, December 9, 1941; for example a facsimile of The New York Times front page that I have before me. Now it's possible that Tom Driberg was in Washington on Tuesday the 9th but not Monday the 8th; it's also possible that the source cited (Tom Driberg) confused the days of the week (his report of Monday's events was no doubt published on the 9th). But the anomaly needs to be resolved somehow, because to anyone who knows anything about the attack on Pearl Harbor, one of the memorable elements (with a dramatic contrast, used in countless later portrayals, of sudden war with innocent weekend relaxation or worship) is that it happened on a Sunday (U.S. and Hawaiian time). The Sunday newspapers had already been printed and delivered, so Americans first got the startling news either by word of mouth or from radio reports while expecting to hear athletic, religious or musical programming. [The only afternoon paper that day, and thus the only U.S. newspaper to report Pearl Harbor on December 7th, was The Westerly Sun in Rhode Island, published by Seventh-Day Adventists who took Saturday for their Sabbath and treated Sunday as a weekday.] —— Shakescene ( talk) 07:40, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
jeez I have read some booring articles on here, but this one takes the biscuit as the first choice for the main page. I mean just out of interest I went back to 2009. That short article then told me everything I needed to know. He was a labour MP who was a shameless homosexual who probably betrayed his country for some "rough trade". This article on the other hand is the work of an apologist. The old article hits the tone immediately whereas this one drowns out his scurrilous reputation with narrative that is both verbose and boorish. Very clever! Who ever thinks this is a good article needs their head examined?!!!
As noted above, someone said he was a well-known gay man who did not care that homosexuality was illegal. Churchill even said Driberg gave sodomy a bad name (whatever that meant!). The bottom line is this that this article far from accurate. Imagine the uproar if an article about Adolf Hitler was written in the same self-serving manner, there would be little room for any mention of anti-Semitism then!
From the intro down, there is little but dull narrative prose about he did this and he did that, yeah he did plenty of this and that with little care for the consequences, too! This article is piss poor with capitals. There should be tags that could be added to these articles warning all those college plagiarists that they would not be getting an a good grade if they copied this drivel. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.169.90.201 ( talk) 15:42, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
I am surprised by your comments,I came here because I wanted to say that I think this is actually one of the very best Wiki articles I have ever read. It gets to the heart of the man and shows that he was much loved by his friends and even fondly loathed by his enemies. A truly remarkable,unique and very individual character and this article does him great justice. Frglee ( talk) 20:25, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
"to get off later charges" should be replaced with something NPOV. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.86.117.208 ( talk) 09:51, 30 March 2014 (UTC)
I suggest that the reference to "Ena Mary Binfield, née Lyttelton, the common law widow of Joe Binfield" should be changed to "Ena Mary Binfield, née Lyttelton, the former mistress of Joe Binfield". There is no such thing as a common law widow. Royalcourtier ( talk) 01:57, 18 April 2015 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified one external link on Tom Driberg. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
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have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
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(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 16:31, 21 September 2017 (UTC)
@ Vodka lemon lime: Please explain why "gay sexual orientation" is better than "homosexuality", why "Oxford" (the city) is synonymous to the university in that city and most of all what on earth you mean by "given the retrograde social and political context of the times" and what exactly are the sources for that claim. Thanks. Kleuske ( talk) 18:57, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
The longstanding lead image, under a fair use rationale, was recently replaced by an image which purported to be "free". If that image is to be used it needs to be demonstrated that it is free in the US, not just in the UK. I have restored the original image until the US copyright status of the proposed replacement is established. Brianboulton ( talk) 20:03, 12 July 2018 (UTC)
The main caption reads "Chairman of the Labour Party", as though this was some form of high dignified public office. It isn't and wasn't: the party chairmanship was awarded yearly, on the basis of Buggins' turn, to whoever had sat on the National Executive the longest. No honour whatever - about 90% of the holders were nonentities, and Driberg was unusual in that many people had actually heard of him. Of course, the pompous jackass tried to pretend to his foreign friends that it was an importsnt office, and some of the Soviets might have believed him... I'm not sure what if anything ought to be done to clarify the position, but it looks annoyingly misleading at the moment. Brianboulton ( talk) 20:20, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for speedy deletion:
You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. — Community Tech bot ( talk) 12:55, 29 July 2019 (UTC)
One of Driberg's main political activities in 1943-1945 was opposing the abuse of Jews in the
Polish army in the UK. This led to hearings in parliament, inquiries, and was a factor in the dissolution of the Polish army in the west. This page should at least mention this.
[1]
[2] — Preceding
unsigned comment added by
Semper honestus (
talk •
contribs)
03:55, 22 May 2020 (UTC) - (ArbCom banned user)
{{
cite news}}
: Check date values in: |date=
(
help)
More sources:
SarahSV (talk) 21:39, 22 May 2020 (UTC)
Am in the process of working up an article on Bradwell Lodge. A, quite nice, 21st-century image of the lodge can be found there. We could replace the 1960s image currently here with that one. However, it may be felt that the current image is more suitable, particularly as it purports to show Driberg, although he’s close to unrecognisable! I’d be interested in others’ thoughts. KJP1 ( talk) 10:40, 11 September 2022 (UTC)
You’re very kind. I also personally prefer the more recent image of the lodge, and think it gives a clearer view of what the building actually looks like. That said, the older image does have some nice detailing, although not of Driberg! Let’s see whether anyone else has a view. KJP1 ( talk) 16:22, 11 September 2022 (UTC)