Wikipedia's first sentence called it “american writer”. Today it says “american novelist and journalist who wrote the magicians trilogy”.
Measured, not asserted. Every count, date and revision on this page was taken from Wikipedia's own history and checked against the live article. The words quoted are theirs.
Machine-checked against the full current article on 2026-08-03.
We saved snapshots of this article over twenty years; you are reading the 2005 one. Red dashes: removed from Wikipedia since.Pale dots: rewritten; the numbered note shows what it says now.Red text: written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot.1 tap a number or a side note to jump between them
The opening as it read in 2005
Lev Grossman is an American writer, notably the author of Codex .1Grossman regularly writes for Time Magazine where his contributions consist primarily of book and other media reviews. He is the twin brother of video game writer Austin Grossman and brother of sculptor Bathsheba Grossman . v t e2
This is Wikipedia's own text, saved in our repository. Their copy of it is revision 17677061.
The opening as it stood in 2010 2 passages from the previous snapshot no longer appear
Lev Grossman (born June 26, 1969 ) is an American writer, notably the author of the novels Warp , Codex , and The Magicians , the latter of which was published in hardcover by Viking /Penguin in 2009, and in paperback by Plume/Penguin in May 2010."Lev Grossman" in Marquis' Who's Who on the Web [database online] Marquis Who's Who .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 370546262.
The opening as it stood in 2015 1 passage from the previous snapshot no longer appear
Lev Grossman (born June 26, 1969) is an American novelist and journalist, notably the author of the novels Warp (1997), Codex (2004), The Magicians (2009), The Magician King (2011), and The Magician's Land (2014).He is a senior writer and book critic for TIME . "Lev Grossman" in Marquis' Who's Who on the Web [database online] Marquis Who's Who .
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 664861273.
The opening as it stood in 2020 2 passages from the previous snapshot no longer appear
Lev Grossman (born June 26, 1969 in Concord, Massachusetts ) is an American novelist and journalist, who wrote The Magicians Trilogy : The Magicians (2009), The Magician King (2011), and The Magician's Land (2014).He was the book critic and lead technology writer at Time magazine from 2002 to 2016.
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 963806685.
The opening as it stood on October 6, 2023
American novelist and journalist Lev Grossman (born June 26, 1969) is an American novelist and journalist who wrote The Magicians Trilogy : The Magicians (2009), The Magician King (2011), and The Magician's Land (2014). He was the book critic and lead technology writer at Time magazine from 2002 to 2016. His recent work includes the children's book The Silver Arrow , and the screenplay for the film The Map of Tiny Perfect Things , based on his short story.
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 1170612312.
The opening as it stood in 2025
American novelist and journalist (born 1969) Lev Grossman (born June 26, 1969) is an American novelist and journalist who wrote The Magicians Trilogy : The Magicians (2009), The Magician King (2011), and The Magician's Land (2014). He was the book critic and lead technology writer at Time magazine from 2002 to 2016. His recent work includes the children's book The Silver Arrow and the screenplay for the film The Map of Tiny Perfect Things , based on his short story.
Red text was written in or rewritten since the previous snapshot. Their copy is revision 1288766401. This is our newest snapshot; the live article may have moved again since.
Today
Wikipedia's first sentence called it “american writer”. Today it says “american novelist and journalist who wrote the magicians trilogy”. Read the current article and compare.
2005
2010
2015
2020
Oct '23
2025
Counts in the opening at each snapshot. Green: the word gained ground. Red: it was cut. Grey: no change.
What Wikipedia says this is
Every article opens by defining its subject. This one was redefined since 2005, and today's defining sentence is their current revision.
Then
american writer
Now
american novelist and journalist who wrote the magicians trilogy
Struck red text is no longer in the article; dotted amber text was rewritten. Every revision id links to Wikipedia's copy; the text shown is our own saved copy. Data: /data. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA; quoted for the record; not affiliated with Wikipedia.
