Talk:Mary Renault/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Tim riley (talk · contribs) 08:59, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Starting first read-through. Comments to follow shortly. Tim riley talk 08:59, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

First comments

This nomination is heading for a quick fail unless the four "citation needed" tags – all of which are justified – are attended to. The second para of "Nursing and early writing" is also lacking a citation at the end. That apart, the prose could do with a bit of work. Some of the following points are just suggestions, but there are a few where I think improvement is definitely required if the article is to pass for GA. Citations done --Srsval (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2022 (UTC) One preliminary remark: we are not told why Challans chose the pen-name Renault. It would be good to be told – if, of course, the answer is known – though I must emphasise that this is merely my comment and not in the least a requirement. Done --Srsval (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

• duplicate links: in the main text we have duplicate blue links to University of Oxford, Latin, lesbian, apartheid, Daniel Mendelssohn and The King Must Die. Only one link apiece, please.
• possessive apostrophes: for names ending in "s" you are inconsistent between ess-apostrophe (more common in AmE) and ess-apostrophe-ess (the standard BrE form). We have Challans' but Bagoas's. Done --Srsval (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

• Afterthought: Having taken my copy of The Persian Boy down from my shelves, I see the author used the possessive Bagoas' and though my own preference is for ess-apostrophe-ess, it must be admitted that she would clearly have gone for just ess-apostrophe here. Tim riley talk 19:14, 28 March 2022 (UTC) Done, again --Srsval (talk) 11:39, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

• "graduating St. Hugh's" – looks strange without a preposition. In BrE one graduates from a college. And why the superfluous full stop, particularly as you do not use one at the previous mention of the college? Done --Srsval (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "most well known" – "most well" is an odd construction: perhaps "best known", as you have written in the previous paragraph? Done --Srsval (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "Her work has had a continuously positive reception" – really?. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography says "Mary Renault's reception has been unfairly mixed", the previous edition of the DNB says "There has been some dispute, especially among Classical scholars, over the validity of Mary Renault's reconstructions", and I've just dug out this, by Noël Coward, from my shelves:

I have also read The Charioteer by Miss Mary Renault. Oh dear, I do, do wish well-intentioned ladies would not write books about homosexuality. This one is turgid, unreal and so ghastly earnest. It takes the hero – soi-disant – three hundred pages to reconcile himself to being queer as a coot, and his soul-searching and deep, deep introspection is truly awful. There are 'queer' parties in which everyone calls everyone 'my dear' a good deal, and over the whole book is a shimmering lack of understanding of the subject. I'm sure the poor woman meant well but I wish she'd stick to recreating the glory that was Greece and not fuck about with dear old modern homos.

I think your "continuously" might perhaps be more accurately rendered as "generally" or some such. Done - where is the quotation from Coward from? It would be great to include it --Srsval (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

I say! I thought you might boggle at Sir Noël's rude remark, but if you want to quote him it's from Coward, Noël (1983) [1982]. Graham Payn; Sheridan Morley (eds.). The Noel Coward Diaries. London: Macmillan. p. 445. ISBN 978-0-333-34883-3. (Coward's comment reads to me as though he didn't know Renault was as homosexual as he was, though at least two of his inner "family" circle of friends were lesbian, and perhaps he ought to have known.) – Tim riley talk 20:56, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, that's great Tim riley, I've added the quotation in

• "the eldest daughter of physician Frank Challans" – this use of a false title is, I know, acceptable in AmE but it is not appropriate in formal BrE. Fine in The Sun but too tabloidese for a good-quality encyclopedia article. Similarly for "novelist Patrick O'Brian", "Historian Tom Holland" and "English historian Bettany Hughes" later. Done --Srsval (talk) 20:34, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "whom Mary always felt was the favourite daughter" – "whom" is a hypercorrection here: the pronoun is grammatically the subject of the clause rather than the object of "felt" and should be "who". Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "struggled to catch up in Mathematics" – why a capital letter? Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "to support herself, trained as a nurse. In 1933 she began training as a nurse" – rather jarring repetition Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "They snuck into each other's rooms" – unexpected Americanism in a BrE article. The current (2015) edition of Fowler advises against using it in formal English. Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "when a matron burst in" – would a hospital of that period have more than one matron? One might expect a definite article, but I may be quite wrong. Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "driving exam" – I have never heard the British driving test called the "driving exam": this strikes an incongruous note. Done --Srsval (talk) 11:49, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
• "a driver's license" – in BrE the noun is "licence" Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "after the couple’s arrival" – here (and elsewhere, possibly – you need to check) you need straight rather than curly inverted commas to comply with Wikipedia's manual of style. I'm not sure where this problem is --Srsval (talk) 11:53, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
• "when it refused to protest the implementation of anti-homosexuality laws" – this is an American construction. In BrE the verb when used in this sense needs a preposition such as "against". Done --Srsval (talk) 11:54, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
• "Fire from Heaven centers" – spelling error: this is the American spelling. Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "Although not a classicist by training, Challans' was admired" – why the possessive apostrophe? Done --Srsval (talk) 11:58, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
• "Challans' mischaracterise[d]" – Ditto. Done --Srsval (talk) 11:58, 29 March 2022 (UTC)
• "natural part of life. rather than a problem" – punctuation has gone awry here. Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• "English historian Bettany Hughes" – is her nationality of any relevance? Done --Srsval (talk) 20:37, 28 March 2022 (UTC)
• References and sources

• Where the originals are in all capitals, such as refs 20 and 46, they should be rendered in title case (MoS).
• You give ISBNs for some books but not for others. Consistency of referencing is not a requirement for GA, but would be good nonetheless.
• Dashes, as in ref 50, should not be hyphens but either spaced en-dashes – like that, or unspaced em-dashes—like that.
• I cannot work out why the four citations of Sweetman's two books are, very sensibly, given in the "References" list as just Name, date and page number (with bibliographical details in "Sources") but for Zilboorg's book you give the bibliographical details four times in the References and then a fifth time under Sources. (You get the capitalisation of the title right the first four times but wrong in the fifth.) I can't see the capitalisation or dash issue, and I'm not sure how to edit the reference list to give the ISBNs or change last point on citations --Srsval (talk) 12:02, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

I'll put the review on hold for a week to allow time for these points to be addressed – most particularly the four "citation needed" tags. – Tim riley talk 10:18, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Thanks very much Tim riley for your work and time on this review. Phew this is a fair old list! I'll see what I can do...Srsval (talk) 18:21, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

I ought to have said already - graceless of me to have omitted to do so - that I think this is an admirable and highly enjoyable article, and I hope we can get it up to GA all right. I look forward to your responses. Tim riley talk 19:06, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Excellent! I'm glad you enoyed the article Tim riley. I have made nearly all of the changes you suggested, addressing particularly the missing citations. Thank you for your eagle-eye in spotting lots of small mistakes and infelicities I hadn't noticed. Do you think that the article is ready to progress now? Many thanks, Srsval (talk) 12:04, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Looking good. I can deal with the ulc, ISBNs and dashes, and I can't see anything else left to be attended to.

Overall summary

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it reasonably well written?

   A. Prose quality:

   B. MoS compliance for lead, layout, words to watch, fiction, and lists:

2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?

   A. References to sources:

   Well referenced.

   B. Citation of reliable sources where necessary:

   Well referenced.

   C. No original research:

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. Major aspects:

   B. Focused:

4. Is it neutral?

   Fair representation without bias:

5. Is it stable?

   No edit wars, etc:

6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?

   A. Images are copyright tagged, and non-free images have fair use rationales:

   Well illustrated.

   B. Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:

   Well illustrated.

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail: