Talk:James Thackara

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TJIC edits vs. Jayen466, Youreally can reversions on 12 Jan 2012[edit]

On 12 Jan 2012 I made three edits (471016943, 471016944, 471016945) that addressed the major problems with the article:

  • self promotion
  • written like an advertisement
  • poor use of English
  • writer of article had a connection to the subject

In short order user Jayen466 reverted these changes with a quick "nope, worse than before" edit log message.

In fact, the edits were quite useful and created a short readable page that was free of self promotion yet had all of the key information from the earlier article.

Please do not revert edits when another editor follows the Be Bold guideline ** AND ** creates a much better article.

TJIC (talk) 20:54, 12 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

User Youreallycan reverted the edits because the shorter version made Thackara appear "not notable".

The edits did not remove any text that suggested Thackara's notability - they removed self-advertising cruft that had every appearance of being written by Thackara himself.

Cruft like "The vast landscapes and range of themes and character in his most recent novel The Book of Kings have frequently been compared to works of the definitive Russian ..." is just self promotion. Flowery language does not document Thackara as being notable - links to articles noting Thackara's impact on other writers, his accomplishments, etc., make him notable.

WRT removing some references - there really isn't much here that needs referencing. To leave even 20 or so references for an author who has published three novels is quite a lot.

Please do not revert a massive improvement in the article just to restore a few footnotes. Feel free to add important ones back in.

TJIC (talk) 21:48, 12 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Critique: Can't even make it past the first sentence[edit]

James Thackara was born on December 7, 1944 in Los Angeles and since Viet Nam, working in London, is a novelist in the great tradition.

Since Vietnam is a place, not a time, the sentence makes no sense to the uninformed reader. Vietnam is spelled as a single word on English Wikipedia. Please wikilink the lede to the concepts addressed in it. I would do it myself, but being uninformed about the author have no clue whether "Viet Nam" refers to Vietnam, the Vietnam war, or some third possibility. Los Angeles is ambiguous on English Wikipedia. I take it that "London" is a reference to London, Texas. "Novelist" is a wikilinkable concept. I can't figure out what the "great tradition" is; I have no reference and English Wikipedia provides none that seem relevant and apparent, which would be odd for 3 million articles, not a few of which are about traditions, and literary traditions, even. I therefor take it that's some sort of WP:WEASEL or WP:PEACOCK. It's pretty easy to clear up ambiguities on Wikipedia with a simple wikilink to what you mean, but I'm in way over my head trying to fix just the first sentence so that an uninformed reader, like myself, could figure it out. It doesn't strike me as the best possible form for editors that are editing an article about a writer. —Aladdin Sane (talk) 15:39, 11 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Thanks for your comments. I realise I should have been more meticulous about my geography as well as referecing some other comments. All comments were referenced in the body of the article, however since there were challenges in the first paragraph, I can see that you were not able to get to them. I have made some changes and hope this helps matters. One thing though, I notice that Joseph Conrad is also called a "novelist". I would have called Thackara an American novelist but Thackara though born American has lived so long away from the States that it is difficult to call him only an American author (which is used and yes is wikified as a descriptors of Thomas Pynchon). Thanks for any other comments you may have lumenlitt Lumenlitt (talk) 19:11, 15 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well, overall, it looks a lot better now. One hint: I tend to use a lot of wikilinks in the lead, that way I can be specific without being wordy. For example, I can say "[[London]]" (and verify the wikilink does in fact go to the right article) and no other editor can then argue to me "you're being ambiguous".
The recent category addition points out that a BLP banner is needed for the talk page here, I think. —Aladdin Sane (talk) 19:50, 24 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Revision: Enhanced neutrality, grammar and style[edit]

Subsequent to comments, this article has been substantially edited. Several new references have been added to corroborate assertions; unreferenced statments have been eliminated; competing points of view have been included and language has been subdued. In addition, grammar and spelling have been corrected. LumenlittLumenlitt (talk) 21:56, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Half original research, half advertising[edit]

This is a dreadful article, or pseudo-article; it's a torrent of original research at best and a heap of advertising at worst. It ought to be scrapped and rewritten from scratch. 86.172.84.189 (talk) 10:35, 17 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Agree. Perhaps User:Lumenlitt would like to confirm whether or not s/he is James Thackara himself? Ariehkovler (talk) 15:30, 10 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Conflict of Interest[edit]

According to the public edit logs, User:Lumenlitt is one "Ghislaine de Give" (I assume that as this information is public it's not WP:OUTing them). A quick google of the names gives a single hit, in which Ms GHISLAINE DE GIVE is a "Senior Researcher, Accenture" as well as a "Guest of Mr Thackara". I would accordingly caution User:Lumenlitt to tread very carefully with respect to WP:COI, up to and including recusing yourself from further editing. WikiScrubber (talk) 16:09, 10 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

BLPN[edit]

Please see Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#James_Thackara. --JN466 20:51, 12 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Balance needed[edit]

Disclosure: I was Thackara's publisher for his first two books, but not BOOK OF KINGS; by the time it was published I was working somewhere I was no use to him. I have been following this discussion with interest. Despite what might be thought to be my parti pris status I think any fair-minded person would find that the account of the critical reaction to BOOK OF KINGS lacks balance, with reference in particular to Hensher's toxic hatchet job, which threatens to dog Thackara throughout the rest of his career. Although Malcolm Bradbury's enthusiastic review is cited, it is not quoted, and Bradbury knew a thing or two about American literature. While it contained some caveats, the review discussed the book at some length, made a serious attempt to engage with its concerns, and included such favourable comments as: "...strikingly powerful, in some ways wonderfully old-fashioned but none the worse for that...The brilliance of the novel lies in its sense of place and scene, its geographical and historical reach, its capacity to present the citadels and bunkers of power and, above all, its scenes of war." Unless it is thought that I am disqualified, I propose to add some or all of this quote in the interests of fairness.Penpontman (talk) 13:55, 21 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The Missing Voice[edit]

I have only just discovered and wish immediately to address, critiques of the James Thackara article and accusations directed at me. There appears to have been a protracted debate over both and a fresh look may be useful. My silence was coincidental and not agreement or acceptance.

Opinions expressed in the original entry do not come from James Thackara; they come from numerous positive, negative and mixed reviews published in the US, UK, Spanish language countries and Italy. The entry did not quote any reviewer at length, including Alan Cheuse’s praise that the author “has no peer among American novelists working today” a judgment that any contributor wishing to promote a favourable impression would have inserted. Rather, all comments, whether positive or negative were summarised and supported by the published 46 references. That my identity was so easily found and that there was no attempt to disguise either it or a remote connection with the subject is because they are immaterial to an entry based on published opinion and numerous reviews.

The current Thackara submission has eliminated the three précis of Thackara’s books. It has reduced to one sentence, information about the substantially reviewed first book, AMERICA’S CHILDREN and includes as a central comment about the third book, THE BOOK OF KINGS a criticism that could verge on ad hominum. Twenty-seven references, largely positive, have been removed, including every non-English language article, and virtually all reviews of one book, AMERICA’S CHILDREN, with no challenge to their content but on the basis of an interesting logic; they were too numerous for a writer considered not notable.

These edits raise questions about lack of impartiality and might look like a distortion of public record. The resulting truncated and at times disconnected entry, with a damaging quotation, which has been given such preeminence that its reprinting is mentioned, would be a better target for the alleged COI. Could this treatment not be seen as an intentional attempt to destroy an author’s opus and reputation?

Concern that the author is not mentioned in a current article, reflects only the lack of a recent publication – the author seems to publish intermittently - and does not justify ignoring or questioning praise that still exists on the web for earlier work. On record, and open to the public is the history of the creation of this entry with commentary about all matters raised here as well as others, all of which occasioned a change or deletion in the text as befitting an attempt to abide with Wiki policies and ethos. Worth noting is that the entry was not approved for inclusion in Wikipedia until all objections had in fact been addressed to the reviewers’ satisfaction.

The author’s importance appears to be unusally difficult to judge and my rebalancing some elements of the entry will be undertaken with the intent of more fully complying with Wikipedia’s criterion for impartiality. (Lumenlitt)(Usertalk:Lumenlitt) 10:22, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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