Talk:War and Beauty

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Hi all, To start with I was just going to do a few minor edits to make the prose to be less gushing , to put everything in the past tense and to provide some context for readers unfamiliar with the show , my aim being to let the majority of the article stand .

However on attempting this I have a problem with the following :-

"The show was set in Qing Dynasty China in the late years of Emperor Jiaqing's rule. This was a time of peace and stability, as China was in the firm grasp of the Manchu’s, evil and corrupt officials such as Ho Shen was executed, political uprising were under control, and the economy is prosperous. However, this is not the case inside the Forbidden City. The constant war between the emperor's wives and concubines for the emperor's praise has never been more rampant. This is a story of the empress (Rebecca Chan) and the conflicts between the concubines (Sheh, Lai, Cheung, and Tang) for the emperor’s praise and authority in the Forbidden City."

Reading this the inference is that the Empire is running smoothly , and the internal bickering in the Forbidden City is at odds with this. My recollection of the show is that the country was collapsing . Remember that Moses's character became an Imperial courier because the alternative was to starve , that bandits were kidnapping and robbing at will and in the end (with the connivance of the Empress) entered the Palace to burn and loot .

My take on this , is that individuals bent on personal power , revenge , pleasure , fortune or hubris were willing to bicker , feud and squabble to the detriment of the wider picture . If no one objects to this I'll rewrite this section to reflect this .

On another note unless a synopsis is provided its just confusing to to stick in random plot elements .

"The show was set in Qing Dynasty China in the late years of Emperor Jiaqing's rule. The show portrayed this period as one of fading peace and stability, as China was slipping out of the grasp of the Manchu dynasty. Famine and banditry going untendend as decadent and corrupt officials squabbled for personal wealth and power." -That's giving the outside world far too much emphasis. The show focuses on the events inside the Forbidden City, rarely mentioning the outside world and only heavily involving it in the very last episodes. "The weakness of the Emperor allows these officials whether high born aristocrats or low born eunuchs to use the Royal women as puppets." -The series doesn't show it like this at all. The Emperor isn't necessarily weak, just mostly absent and otherwise occupied. More importantly, with the exception of Elder Tsu all of the prime manipulators are Royal women. It's the men that get used as puppets.

Rewritten the entire alinea, adding titles and including a synopsis of sorts as well.

Should they be Hanyu pinyinized? They were not people from Guangdong and I think that it is strange to write their names in Cantonese.--HeiChon~XiJun 05:18, 5 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I did the name translations. I translated the names according to their Cantonese pronounciations because this Drama series was made in Hong Kong. Arbiteroftruth 07:58, 22 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Although this Drama series was made in Hong Kong, the names of the characters should use Hanyu pinyin or in the language of Manchuria.--HeiChon~XiJun 09:50, 22 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed, but I believe this isn't the place to do that. Let the Chinese version take care of that. Also, I doubt Mainlanders would be able to read this entry anyways. Arbiteroftruth 01:55, 30 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It is a widely accepted convention that the names of historical Chinese people are transliterated into English and many other Latin-alphabet languages by Hanyu Pinyin. This is probably the most common practice around the world. It is the standard way of transliteration in China, and is also adopted in academia. Furthermore, those historical figures in the drama were not from Cantonese speaking areas. Therefore, Mandarin Chinese - the national language of China - should be use as the basis of transliteration. It is unprofessional and, to a certain extent, uncomprehensible for most English speakers to transliterate base on Cantonese.

Besiders that, although I am not a mainlander, I would still like to ask: why do you say that mainlanders unable to read this entry? It seems that you are trying to make a point that "Hanyu Pinyin is a mainland thing, and mainland culture should not be brought to Hong Kong." This is not true. Hanyu Pinyin is not only used for mainlanders to understand the article. I am sorry to say that your comment seems to have some despise on mainlanders and is a little bit Hong Kong-centric. - Alanmak 05:26, 12 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Alanmak, when I mean that Mainlanders are not able to read the entry, I mean that due to censorship in China, people from that country are most likely not able to access the page (I am not lying about this, go to any Chinese Wikipedia pages and read the lines on the top of the page, if you are able to read Chinese). There is nothing despicable or racial about my statement, I am simply stating that censorship makes access to Wikipedia for Mainland Chinese a bit difficult.

Also, when you take a look at how to transliterate the pages, you have got to realize the focus of the page. This page is about a Hong Kong television production, not a Mainland production. It is the same for English pages. When a certain English page is talking about British figures, they use the Commonwealth way of spelling certain words ("Honour" instead of "honor", "realise" instead of "realize"). It should be no different for this, I believe.

I can say, in all sense of the word, that I am not being biased against the Mainlanders in this subject matter. I admit that in private, I do have some misgivings about certain way that Chinese do things, but I do not carry them into Wikipedia. To say so otherwise does not do justice to what I stand for.

So, I would suggest to you, Alanmak, to please take a look at this in a way that does not involve me being biased or racist against the Mainlanders. Arbiteroftruth 04:00, 14 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have added the Han Yu Pin Yin translations as a sidenote. Makthemutant 09:02, 15 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Good, good. The problem is now solved. Thanks Makthemutant. Arbiteroftruth 15:34, 15 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am strongly discouraging the use of Simplified characters, the Mainland China way of writing, on this page about a Hong Kong television production. Traditional characters, the way of writing for Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, and overseas Chinese communities, should be used instead. Arbiteroftruth 08:32, 28 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]