Wikipedia:Peer review/Farthest South/archive1

Farthest South

• A script has been used to generate a semi-automated review of the article for issues relating to grammar and house style; it can be found on the automated peer review page for August 2008.

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review. It has recently passed GA with the observation that it perhaps had too many images. I've deleted one, and shifted the positions of others. I'd like further comments on choice and positioning of images, also on the prose generally, and any other suggestions for improvement.

Thanks, Brianboulton (talk) 16:51, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

FactotEm comments...

General...

• Any reason why the images from Robert Falcon Scott onwards can't be staggered per Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Images?
  • Only lack of imagination on my part. I've now shifted the Shackleton expedition over to the left. Brianboulton (talk) 23:15, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Ferdinand Magellan...

• "...in quest search of a western route..."? Quest sounds somehow wrong.
  • Yes, search is better
• "...otherwise known as the East Indies...". In it's current form it reads like he was questing for a route to the Spice islands, but he would have settled for the East Indies.
  • My wording was lazy and wrong. The Spice Islands were (indeed are, under their current name, the Moluccas), a part of, not an alternative name for, the East Indies, and I've altered accordingly.
• "His success depended on his finding...". Unnecessary 2nd his there.
  • Agreed

Garcia de Nodal expedition...

• "...,the islands remaining. The islands remained the most southerly confirmed known land on earth until Captain Cook's discovery...". I think it reads better as a new sentence, allowing the active voice to be used, and "most southerly confirmed" seems a little clunky.
  • Your suggestion led me to make various tweaks to this rather unsatisfactory paragraph. I'm beginning to wonder about this article.... Brianboulton (talk) 23:15, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

What are you beginning to wonder? Is it serious enough for me to suspend the PR? It's a fascinating subject, amongst my favourites on wikipedia, and I hope you continue with it. --FactotEm (talk) 09:17, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Please continue the review. I was just wondering whether I have put enough work into the article - it's a new approach for me, the broad brush of exploration rather than the minutae of individual expeditions. Now that SNAE is out of the way, I will be able to give more attention to it. Disregard my private musings Brianboulton (talk) 09:46, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

It's obvious that you are an accomplished editor of articles to FA, or near-FA standard, and my review seems only able to find very minor issues with prose. If it's OK with you, rather than the laborious process of identifying them here for you to address, I'd like to just make the changes as I find them. You can obviously revert those you don't like, and I would still comment here on issues that are more than just small re-arrangements in wording. Sound OK? --FactotEm (talk) 11:53, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. On past experience, your edits have almost always improved the prose, so it's unlikely I will revert. What I would value most, when you're through, is some brief overall assessment of the article's worth. Its GA promotion was fast-tracked, without a detailed review report, so I haven't had a proper critique of it yet. As I said above, it's a different type of article from my usual expedition histories, so an outside perspective on it will be specially welcome. Brianboulton (talk) 15:34, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

More tomorrow. --FactotEm (talk) 19:43, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Robert Falcon Scott...

• "...difficulties caused by the party’s lack of ice travelling experience and the failure of its dogs through inappropriate food." This makes it sound like the dogs broke down because Scott was trying to feed them kitty food. What happened to the dogs? Did they die ("...losses amongst the dogs...")? What was inappropriate about their food, or do you mean inadequate? --FactotEm (talk) 18:25, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

• • Your first surmise is actually quite near the truth. The story is this: On the advice of Nansen, Scott took with him to Antarctica a large supply of stockfish, to use as basic dog fodder in place of the more usual biscuit. Unfortunately, on its long sea journey south, with inadequate refrigeration, the fish went a bit "off", and by the time of the southern journey it was enough to sicken and weaken the dogs, who all eventually died of a combination of poor diet and overwork. I can't put that much detail into this brief summary, so I chose simply to say that their food was "inappropriate". Would it work better if I said "tainted" instead of "inappropriate", and added a referenced footnote by way of explanation? Brianboulton (talk) 19:33, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

"...loss of all its dogs through poor diet and overwork." seems to me to be a perfectly valid way to summarise this. --FactotEm (talk) 20:26, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Agreed and done. Brianboulton (talk) 22:59, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Lead...

• Having finished a copyedit of the main body, I turned my attention to the lead, but this reads to me as if it is from a subtlely different article. Some of the concepts introduced in the lead that do not get explored in any detail in the main article include...

• The matter of pride in gaining the record;

I have added further details into the Scott and Shackleton expeditions, to illustrate this point. Brianboulton (talk) 22:59, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

• The (up to 18th century) belief in a fertile continent hidden in the south;

The Captain Cook section mentions that one of the primary purposes of his expedition was to discover the Great Southern Continent (the other purpose, not mentioned, was to observe the transit of Venus). Cook's journey, and his high latitude circumnavigation, killed off all hopes of a fertile continent, and I have added Cook's own words to this effect, at the end of the section.Brianboulton (talk) 22:59, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

• The sighting of Bouvet Island (which is mentioned only in the lead);

Bouvet Island wasn't sighted on a voyage that led to a Farthest South. Its discovery is only relevant in that its bleak nature should have warned explorers that any land south of 60° was likely to be equally inhospitable. I have briefly made this point in the Cook section. Brianboulton (talk) 22:59, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

• The stormy nature of the southern seas (the dangers from ice are regularly mentioned, but the stormy seas are not).

Storms are mentioned in relation to the Hoces and Drake expeditions. The Cook and Weddell expeditions also experienced rough weather, and I have added afew words in each case.

• Conversely, much of the salient points in the main body do not seem to be summarised in the lead. I suspect this is simply a case of re-casting the lead once you are happy with the main content though.
  • I will have to give some thought to this. I cannot summarise ten or eleven expeditions in the lead, only the general motivations that successively drove them on (first trade, then discovery, then adventure). I will work on it. Brianboulton (talk) 22:59, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

In general, I really like this article. To this layman, who's own Farthest South mark is 65°15’S, its a succinct, accessible, eminently readable skip through man's gradual approach to the south pole. The only point at which I felt something was missing was Borchgrevink's 1900 return to the continent. Please tell me he picked up his shore party that was left there the previous year. The only substantive thing that I think would improve this article would be a map image showing each explorer's farthest south record (and their routes if at all possible).

My review is based on what you have included. You know better than I what, if anything, is missing, but it does not read like there is anything substantial lacking. --FactotEm (talk) 19:22, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

• I am most grateful for this review, which has been of great assistance. My inclination is not to take it anywhere further for the moment, but to work on it with a view perhaps, in the autumn or maybe later, of giving it a punt. For the record, my own Farthest South is 31°15'North (Beersheba), but I am going on an Arctic voyage in September that will take me to 73°. Brianboulton (talk) 22:59, 6 August 2008 (UTC)