Talk:Donald Grant Mitchell

Article title

@GordonGlottal: Can you clarify why you think this article should be located at Donald Grant Mitchell rather than Ik Marvel? Your edit summary notes, correctly, that Mitchell was his real name, but article titles don't always need to be real names; instead, we use the name that is most commonly used. It's not a perfect measure, but "Donald Grant Mitchell" gives me 35,400 Google hits while "Ik Marvel" gives me 234,000. It's conceivable though that "Mitchell" is more commonly used in reliable sources. Also pinging DragonflySixtyseven who moved the page in the other direction last August. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 19:41, 9 February 2022 (UTC)

For me "Donald Grant Mitchell" gives 101k, "Donald G. Mitchell" gives 90K, and "Donald G Mitchell" (75k) compared to "Ik Marvel" (97k). Obviously there's overlap between all of these. Britannica has him under "Donald Grant Mitchell," Google Books lists all of his books under that name, the one biography I found has "Donald G. Mitchell" in the title. I changed it because I came across one of his books, bylined Donald G. Mitchell. GordonGlottal (talk) 19:51, 9 February 2022 (UTC)

"Eric Blair" redirects to "George Orwell" rather than vice versa. George Eliot... George Sand... George Bellairs... George Bagby... (I'm sure that there multiple non-George examples). DS (talk) 19:53, 9 February 2022 (UTC)

NY Times obit as "Ik Marvell". Also, do you realize how many different people are named "Donald G. Mitchell", etc? DS (talk) 19:56, 9 February 2022 (UTC)

Actually very few ... I scrolled through several pages of results and every one referred to our man. Anyway his full name gets more results by itself. It's obviously OK to have the title be a pseudonym when that's much more famous, but in our case he's better known by his own name. BTW an archive search turned up a mix for obits, plenty of papers headlined his real name. GordonGlottal (talk) 03:54, 10 February 2022 (UTC)

I get 88 hits for "Donald G. Mitchell", including a tax lawyer, a professor of radiology, an obituary from 2003, an obituary from 2010, an obituary from 2015, an obituary from 2018, a retired security guard, a gravestone from 1982, and a phone listing for someone in South Dakota. All on the first page. DS (talk) 04:46, 10 February 2022 (UTC)

It does look as though there are good arguments for each. @GordonGlottal: Britannica using "Mitchell" is good evidence in its favour. Is the biography you mention the 1922 one by Waldo Hilary Dunn mentioned in the article, or a more recent one? Regarding bylines/title pages, it looks as though he used "Marvel" earlier in his career and "Mitchell" later on (e.g. the titles page of The Battle Summer, 1850; English Lands, Letters and Kings, 1889). If, as the article says, he was best known for Reveries of a Bachelor and other works of that earlier period, then that would suggest using "Marvel". – Arms & Hearts (talk) 17:35, 12 February 2022 (UTC)

I think we say that because of the Times obit and 1911 Britannica? In any case I believe it's true. Nonetheless that was a hundred years ago -- worth nothing that if you search "reveries of a bachelor" on Amazon today, almost all the listings use his real name instead (for me, the first three and 9/12 on the first page). GordonGlottal (talk) 01:48, 13 February 2022 (UTC)