Talk:The Way of All Flesh

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Did he "dare not publish it" or feel that its tone was "too contentious?" The article on the novel and the article on the author are at odds on this point.

Roy Harmon 18:37, 13 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The review link appears to be broken. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.165.53.242 (talk) 15:44, 6 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm reading through this plot summary, and it's wildly conversational and sensationalist. I'd clean it up myself, but I haven't read the book and wouldn't want to cut something important. Maybe another kind soul could, though? AdjectiveAnimal (talk) 18:42, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:The Way of All Flesh/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

Comment(s)

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The below comment starting at "Do not trust..." is pure drivel. I am the person writing The Way of All Flesh (novel) section. I have read the book 3 times. I am disabled and cannot work full time on completing this commentary, however I do intend to complete it before the end of June 2007. I have never seen the movie version so I don't know where the idiot who wrote the below gets off. He is full of crap and I doubt he or she has ever read the book or they would know that my commentary is a precise review of the plot. Given that there were ZERO summaries before, I decided to expend the labor to give Wikipedia users a decent summary. If this is a sample of how the morons who "review the reviews" treat people making the effort to bring FACTUAL knowledge to this site, then I surely won't bother making any further effort. I challenge whoever wrote the below to specifically tell me where and how I am not being factual or, indeed, rambling. David Hill, Murrieta CA I hold an MA in English Literature and have written several novellas.

Do not trust this summary. Not only does the author of this write a rambling, confusing recap, most of the information is wrong. This is most likely a summary of the movie and not of the actual novel. Having only read the novel myself, I can assume (and hope) that's what this is. Otherwise, its an extremely innacurate description.

Substituted at 22:01, 26 June 2016 (UTC)

Purpose?

What is the function of saying that the book can be found in hardback and paperback? Isn't this a bit pedantic? And it also neglects digital copies online, audiobooks, etc. Moreover, what is the function of telling the page numbers of the book? It certainly doesn't agree with either copy of the novel I have. Even if it were true of one edition (even the first), what information is conveyed by including it? AnthroMimus (talk) 02:58, 18 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Biblical source: query

We say it's from the Douay-Rheims Bible, and the footnote shows us the exact location in 1 Kings. That's fine as far as it goes, but there's no source for the assertion that that was exactly where Butler found the quote.

How do we know, for example, that it wasn't from John Webster's play Westward Hoe [sic], which was published in 1607, two years before the Douay-Rheims Old Testament was published? The quote is:

I saw him even now going the way of all flesh, that is to say towards the kitchen.

-- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 23:45, 3 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Further to this, I asked a related question @ Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Humanities#September 4 ("The way of all flesh: origin"), and the answers are very enlightening. The expression, in varying forms, had been around for centuries before either Webster or the Douay-Rheims Bible. It was a well-known expression. The footnote we had at the sentence in the article does not support our claim that Butler found it in the DRB. It's very likely he had heard it many times throughout his life in other contexts, and I, for one, would be very surprised to learn he had ever read the DRB. So, we either need a source that explicitly ties Butler's use of the words to the DRB, or find a source that says something else, or remove the sentence entirely. I've added a 'citation required' tag. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:24, 4 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Further yet, my esteemed Ref Desk colleague MinorProphet has posted this:

So, I found Michael J. Lewis "Unearthing the Entitled: 1 Kings, Douay-Rheims, and Samuel Butler's THE WAY OF ALL FLESH", doi: 10.1080/00144940.2014.962451, pub. Taylor and Francis Online, available through WP Library. Lewis cites Shaheen, Naseeb. “Butler’s Use of Scripture in The Way of All Flesh.” Essays in Literature vol 5 No. 1 (1976), which is also available through WP Library. Shaheen (p. 42 [pdf 4]) shows that Butler tended to consistently use the KJV - his dad was a CoE vicar, and Butler was especially familiar with the Psalter and the BCP. His note 9 mentions the Dekker/Webster quote you give in your OP, also the title could be patterned after Congreve's The Way of the World. Shaheen doesn't mention the Douai-Rheims at all, but mentions a list of 500 quotes from the Bible found in TWOAF. Lewis says "...the title’s biblical allusion is notable in that it references a verse found in only one English translation of the Christian Bible: the 1609 Douay-Rheims Old Testament." Lewis (p. 267, [pdf 2]) says "It is from within this Catholic context, wherein the impossibility of error is guaranteed despite multiple instances of institutionally approved translations, that Butler drew the ironic title for his Anglican-focused, “Authorized Version”–infused novel.[4] - n4: See Tyndale." So there is no agreement on the exact source of the title, but plenty of refs and reading. Personally I would be expect Butler to have been familiar with Douai, he was very erudite: but like Butler I lost any faith I once had and am now an Olympian. HTH, MinorProphet (talk) 16:19, 10 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I've highlighted their essential point. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 19:26, 12 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, an enjoyable search. The Lewis is here, Shaheen is here, but you have to be logged in through Wikipedia Library (or other institution) to read/download them. MinorProphet (talk) 14:49, 13 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]