Talk:Gertrude Barrows Bennett

GA nomination

I am going to put this page on hold briefly for two reasons.

• You need to include a fair use rationale for your use of the book cover (click on image for an explanation).
• Is that list of short stories complete or not? Please indicate "Partial list" if not.

I have now passed the article. Awadewit 23:33, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

If you want to flesh out this page a bit more for a possible A rating, you might think about contextualizing Bennett within early twentieth-century science fiction. Also, I wonder if there is some actual scholarship on her or at least women science fiction writers of the time? I know that scholars within that field are fast publishing articles and books; research on this topic might allow you to include a "writing style" section and a "women in science fiction" section. Also, it would be good to expand the lead a bit so that it truly summarizes the article and doesn't repeat word for word statements that come later in the article. Awadewit 22:21, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestions. I've now made your first two suggestions regarding the fair use rationale and making sure the list of short stories is complete (it is). I also like your other suggestions and will work on them in the coming weeks. I've requested some scholarly articles which should fill in a writing style section. I do wonder, though, if a "Women in science fiction" section wouldn't be repetitive of Women in science fiction and Feminist science fiction. For now, I've included these links as a See Also section in the article. If you feel that the article needs any more work to reach Good Article standards, please let me know.--Alabamaboy 23:27, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

One of the reasons I suggested a "women in science fiction" section is because you state in the lead that she was the first major female writer of fantasy and sci-fi in the US. It would seem, then, that something should be said about that - why weren't there any women before? Did she inspire any other women? Why was it so difficult for women to publish science fiction? Why were they forced to publish under "masculine" or androgynous names? Did she write about any topics differently than other male writers of sci-fi and fantasy at the time and might that have been because of her experiences as a woman in early twentieth-century America? Answers to these questions would help contextualize Bennett for the reader unfamiliar with the genre, the writer and the history of the period. Awadewit 23:33, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Excellent point. I'll see if I can work up that section. Unfortunately, it'll take me a while to do so b/c I'll have to track down some good sources. Thanks for listing the article as a good article. Best, --Alabamaboy 00:05, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

The list is not complete--missing at least "Elf Trap" (I think it is). Also, Serapion and Possessed! are the probably the same story. And what evidence is there that the cover portrait portrays the authoress? I own the book and can find no indication that the cover is modeled on her--in fact, have never seen a photo of her.

Nice to see this enigmatic lady represented. --M-K, 31-05-07

Further improvements

I stumbled across this article a few weeks ago while following spamlinks by a NN publisher whose article was delete by a CSD-A7 ... I noticed beau coup duplications in the references (the first one appeared six times!), and didn't want to risk an edit conflict at that time, so I made a clone in my sandbox to work on ... then I forgot all about it until a bot tagged/zapped the image, and Some Other Editor zapped the Categories so that my sandbox page would not be incorrectly listed in all of them. <My bad!>

Anywho, I've replaced the main body of text with the new version ... all I did was add {{cite web}} and {{cite book}} (with ISBNs found on Amazon.com), and with the use of <ref name=WhatEver /> tags, the number of references was reduced from 15 to 6 ... so if anyone is wondering, that's why the References list is so much smaller.

BTW, I ain't researching any more ISBNs to this one ... and if Some Other Editor chooses to summarily UNDO this edit as vandalism simply because (a) I'm just an anon-IP editor, (b) they eschew the use of "cite" templates, and/or (c) this is already a Good Article, well, I figure I've put enough lipstick on this pig, so it's time for me to delete my sandbox copy and MOVE ON.

Happy Editing! —68.239.79.82 (talk · contribs) 02:53, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing up the references.--Alabamaboy 20:15, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Picture

I removed the picture following an email to OTRS from a family member claiming that this image is not Bennett but an anonymous girl. Please provide independent sources if you wish to reinsert the claim. VRTS ticket # 2008032610017002 Guy (Help!) 14:59, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

GA Reassessment

This discussion is transcluded from Talk:Gertrude Barrows Bennett/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the reassessment.

Unfortunately, i don't think this article meets the GA criteria anymore, as standards have changed a lot since it was promoted.

• There are multiple uncited paragrpahs,
• only 6 references,
• The main source (scifipedia) no longer exists.
• the lead is insufficent in length,
• the coverage of her work is insufficient to be called "broad",
• very little content about her critical reception or influence.
• Also many MoS fixes needed.

Unless someone plans to do major improvments ASAP, i think it should be delisted.YobMod 20:09, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

I just received the message about this. As the author of the article, I disagree with this assessment. All of the information in the article is cited. Please state what information is uncited, because everything in the article has a citation. In addition, while scifipedia may no longer exist, that doesn't mean it wasn't a valid reference at the time. And while there are only six references, different information from those references are cited numerous times.

As for the lead, it is appropriate to the length of the article. A lead is supposed to summarize an entire article, and that is what happens here. This is an article about a rather obscure author, so naturally it can't be as detailed as an article about Shakespeare. As such, the content about her critical reception and influence is as detailed as it can be. Finally, if there are MoS issues, please list them and I will fix them. --SouthernNights (talk) 22:38, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

While I'm still not sure what uncited information you refer to, I went back and added more citations and information. I did see one unreferenced statement that another editor inserted a few weeks back; I rewrote this and inserted a reference. I also added a little more about her critical impact. As I previously stated, this is an article about an obscure author, so there are limits to how much more information I can provide. But for such an obscure subject, this article is well researched, fully cited, and meets all the good article standards. If there are any specific issues you have, please list them and I will address them. --SouthernNights (talk) 22:58, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Everything cited to Scifipedia is no longer cited, as the site no longer exists (maybe there is an archive?). ISFDB is user-written, so is it a reliable source - i think generally notYobMod 07:54, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

As I stated, just because Scifipedia is no longer available online doesn't make it no longer a valid reference. Please look at Wikipedia guidelines on this. It is similar to the case of citing a book which can no longer be found--losing the book doesn't mean the info you accessed is no longer valid. But because you are so concerned about this, I will replace that citation with another one. As for ISFDB, if that is a concern I can also change it (it was only being used as a reference for the names of her short stories and, as such is easily replaced). I'll fix these items over the next day or two.

May I assume those are the only issues you have at this point, since you didn't raise any other specific problem?--SouthernNights (talk) 11:13, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

I have replaced the Scifipedia and ISFDB citations and also added more info, including an expansion of the influence section. I also corrected some style problems other editors had inserted into the article over the last year.--SouthernNights (talk) 22:36, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Vital data

• Does no one else notice the article gives two very different dates for the death of her father? 1892 and "near the end of World War One" which certainly did not end anywhere near 1892.

I tagged this page with the hidden categories DoB missing (Date of birth missing), DoD missing, PoD missing.

• French Wikipedia gives birthdate 1883-09-18 fr:Gertrude Barrows Bennett.
• ISFDB gives 1884-09-18 [1]
• The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction 3rd, online ed. --or SFE-- gives 1883-09-18; also deathplace California [2]

--P64 (talk) 02:10, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Influence on, praise by Lovecraft

A previous editor tagged for more info one of the Further reading:

• Bryce J. Stevens. "Into the Abyss: Did Francis Stevens' 1920 Novel Claimed Influence H.P. Lovecraft?". Presents textual evidence that Claimed may have influenced "The Call of Cthulhu".

B. J. Stevens at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database does not list that essay by B.J./Bryce Stevens. Both of the essays it does list were published in Australian magazines: one 1988 contents, one 1992 contents.

August T. Swift does not belong in the lead. I did not remove him entirely but rewrote the lead mess about Swift/Lovecraft, an improvement i hope, and relegated it to a Note. (The code remains in the lead for sake of compare versions; above line 37 but that placement should be temporary.) Probably the remaining lead mention of Swift, the material in section Influence, and that in my Note should be unified.

--P64 (talk) 02:58, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

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External links modified

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GA status

Not merited IMO. Her father dies twice as it stands, 25 years apart. Spicemix (talk) 21:04, 25 June 2020 (UTC)