Talk:The Ringworld Engineers

Publication History Issue

Untitled

I have removed the following two items from the "[publication history]".

• 1970, USA, Ballantine Books ISBN-13: 9780345020468, Hardcover
• 1979, USA, Phantasia Press ISBN-13: 9780932096036, Hardcover

The first paragraph states that the book was first published in 1980. Therefore, these two references must be false. It also casts a dubious light on the remaining items in the publication history.

-- pedant (talk) 11:48, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Could this possibly be the origin of popular game series 'Halo'??? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 118.93.54.76 (talk) 08:21, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Teela

how coy, lets not say what happened to her. folks, always read the novel or see the movie before reading the article here, as the plot summary should reveal all significant plot points. I would add it, but i dont quite recall exactly what happened to her.99.23.83.211 (talk) 03:04, 3 June 2013 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:The Ringworld Engineers/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 The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

Just curious, what sources would you expect this article to cite? It's about one specific book, whose ISBN is given. Do you want page numbers? 24.196.88.156 04:51, 9 July 2007 (UTC) Paul

Last edited at 04:51, 9 July 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 08:22, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

mistakes

the article on the first novel has a section for mistakes; this one does not, & should. couple I've found on re-reading- there is mention of mining, which would be pretty much impractical on the ringworld, & of trading tooled leather-goods, without mention of the (presumably) herd animals from which the 'leather' would be derived. while louis is exploring the map-room, the puppeteer tells him to expect the lander at dusk. but the lander has been commandeered by the kzin; niven means a stepping disc here, as mentioned earlier in the same chapter, & not the lander. there are others.... & many uses of earth-related comparisons for scale or cultural reference. it's not as carefully constructed, generally, as the first novel.

duncanrmi (talk) 09:20, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

You can't include a "mistake" that you have decided is a mistake from reading the book, that would be original research. You need to find a published reliable source that mentions the mistake - e.g., a magazine article or another book. MarcGarver (talk) 08:24, 15 July 2024 (UTC)

yeah, so I could write an article about the whole series of ringworld/wu/nessus books, get it published in a magazine about speculative fiction, & then cite that?

wikipedia is full of these frustrations now- relying on increasingly scarce publications or peer reviewed journals for citations on rarified subjects, when there are well-meaning contributors trying to improve articles by dint of their own research & analysis.

in scifi circles (no pun intended) this is a significant series of books, but where are we going to find anything with sufficient credentials & detail to meet wp's standards?

I get it- rules are rules- that's why I'm here on the talk page & not poking about at the article. so here's a record of something unresolved- plot errors & shortcomings not (yet) addressed by the author, when he's got form when it comes to retrospectively polishing his works.

while we're at it, in the succession of puppeteer rulers, all of the "hindmosts", are clearly identified by their chosen names, apart from this one. in light of the events in the prequel series, it makes sense for the reader to try to identify this one- is it baedeker?

---- duncanrmi (talk) 00:10, 31 August 2024 (UTC)