Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Mary Martha Sherwood

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 01:10, 7 July 2007.

Mary Martha Sherwood[edit]

This is another article in my series on important but often overlooked early British children's writers. I believe that this article is as comprehensive as it can be with the available scholarly material, well-written and well-sourced. Here is a recent peer review. Awadewit | talk 05:24, 18 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support My (minor) concerns from the peer review having been addressed, I think this article meets the criteria. Carom 17:07, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Well-writen and comprehensive. Strikes a good balance between bio and analysis. Ceoil 13:15, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support A wonderfully encyclopedic article for an interesting woman, covering all significant facets of her life. Well-written with good flow and summary style; I wish that the Fairchilds section were one paragraph shorter, but I don't really see how it could be. The link to the complete List of works by Mary Martha Sherwood is a nice touch. Willow 21:43, 25 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Perhaps someday I will write an entire article on The Fairchild Family. Then I can cut this article down. Awadewit | talk 09:03, 26 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose: This is a good and interesting page, and I would like to support. I think the info box is unnecessary - but that is just a personal gripe which won't stop me supporting. I have given parts a copyedit.. but there are still too many "for example"s and "even"s please consider removing some of them for alternative words. I think the text could be tighter there are too many small words used when one word would do. I see a lot of the copyedits I made have been reverted - before even an opportunity to run spell check. Fine. However, please do consider giving it a thorough copy-edit. The prose is not brilliant Giano 11:08, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sorry, I thought you had finished editing (it looked like an hour had gone by, but perhaps I misinterpreted the time stamp). I only reverted what didn't make sense or what removed/changed the meaning of the sentence. Awadewit | talk 12:13, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I can remove the infobox if you want - I am not wedded to it. Awadewit | talk 12:13, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have removed all extraneous information from the infobox. I would like to keep it because I am slowly working on an "Eighteenth-century children's literature" featured topic. Apparently it is recommended to have consistent infoboxes across the series of articles. If you still want it removed, I will do so. Awadewit | talk 21:15, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • There is now only one "for example" and "even" per section (except for the "Legacy" section which as two "even's" and they are justified. Awadewit | talk 12:13, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I will give the article another copy edit tomorrow. I have never claimed to be able to write "brilliant prose" (I've never seen a wikipedia article with brilliant prose, frankly), but I do not feel that the prose in this article is substandard for an FA. Awadewit | talk 12:13, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • [1] 3 minutes. and [2] and 8 minutes. You conflicted me running the spell and typo check. No matter. I look forward to sseing the article improved.
  • Sorry, I was looking at my computer clock, not wikitime. I have given the article a good once-over in the copy editing department. Let me know if I am fixing the problems you saw. I will do another pass either later today or tomorrow. Awadewit | talk 22:59, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have given the article a second copy edit. Please let me know if you still think that it needs attention. Awadewit | talk 08:23, 30 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Do you have a source for why marriage between cousins was any more common before the 20th century? </ref>
  • Fauve-Chamoux, Antoinette. "Marriage, Widowhood, and Divorce." Family Life in Early Modern Times: 1500-1789. Eds. David I. Kertzer and Marzio Barbagli. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001. Awadewit | talk 20:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Well cite it in e the page then not here. Giano 21:10, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I was going to do that - hadn't gotten around to it yet. I thought you might be interested in reading it, so I put it here as well. Awadewit | talk 21:17, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Following the death of her son, Henry (not Henry Martyn), Sherwood ..." was the son named after Henry Martyn was he he born before or after she became taken with Henry Martyn.
  • "Sherwood's life became more painful" I read nothing that is particularly painful, although I would like an explanation of the "stocks" - what is all that about?
  • Well, I am following what the autobiography says; since there are so few biographical sources on Sherwood and the ones that do exist seem to rely on her autobiography anyway, I included this idea. Your idea of pain may be different from Sherwood's. Her years in India, for example, are described as one long trial. Awadewit | talk 20:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • You talk a lot about the Victorian era, yet two of the books listed as most famous were published before the Victorian era began, in fact in an altogether more morally lax period. In fact one could say the ear of Victorian morality period did not truly begin until Victoria was producing her own children in the 1840s and 50s are you saying that Sherwood pioneered the Victorian era and its morality. I think there is a lot more that could be written here about her influence and the times in which she was writing.
  • The early nineteenth century was not a morally lax period for everyone (such generalizations almost always turn out to be wrong for some group, as you know). See Lawrence Stone, The Family, Sex and Marriage in England 1500-1800. Chapter 9. Awadewit | talk 20:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree that much more could be written about Sherwood's influence. Find me the published work on it and I will add it in. I believe that I have read almost everything (if not everything) published on Sherwood. There is very little material and I am therefore restricted to the information in those articles. When I publish my article on Sherwood from my dissertation, I will add more. :) Awadewit | talk 20:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'd be interested to know with all her moralising etc how her own children turned out. Giano 12:50, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have not seen anything of real interest published on this. Awadewit | talk 20:53, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral: I am very undecided on this, the prose could still be tightened, strengthened and tidied considerably so I'm hovering between "nothing" and "support". The info box still looks, to me, plain daft, especially as the information therein is (as it should be) right next to it in the lead. Loose the info-box and my hovering will be easier. Giano 18:23, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I have removed the infobox just for you. I'm afraid that I don't see the problems that you see with the text. Please give me some examples so that I can improve it still further. Awadewit | talk 21:56, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: Giano 13:01, 5 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: The four images on the article are all public domain. Move to commons, delete locally. --Durin 13:26, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have moved the three that I uploaded and requested their speedy deletion on wikipedia. I feel less comfortable moving someone else's image, especially when there is no artist listed. Let me know what you think about the ethics and copyright issues involved in that. Awadewit | talk 21:15, 28 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong support , with comments. (Will probably support even if you don't fix all the below, but it would be nice.) Well done!
    • Three red links for books in the header - if they're individually famous, make at least one of them blue, even as a stub with all info copy/pasting from this article. I do believe that red links encourage article creation, but if at least one of them is blue, it will be a good model for the others.
      • I have created a page for The History of the Fairchild Family. I will work on it a bit more today and try to condense the information in this article as Willow suggested. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • I have condensed the material on the Sherwood page. More could probably be done, but waiting until the newly created article is more complete might be wise. Awadewit | talk 08:23, 30 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • "She even makes the best of the "stocks" that she was forced to stand in while she did her lessons." - My God! This is so unassuming, I could have missed it without Giano's comment. Don't gloss this over like this, surely even for that time this was extreme, and I don't doubt it strongly influenced her life. I suggest rephrasing for emphasis, something like: "She was forced to stand in iron stocks while doing her lessons, but ..." The Wikilink is crucial, underscoring that yes, you do mean real stocks, not some kind of figure of speech. Wow. In what way did she make the best of it? Make light of it, joke? Appreciate that it focused her mind? Accept her mother's failings, and best intentions?
      • I thought that emphasizing the stocks bit might be considered sensationalizing. I have added Sherwood's own description of the stocks. I do not think that wikilinking is appropriate since the stocks that Sherwood describes sound slightly different from the kind of public stocks described in the article. Let me know what you think after seeing the quotation. Awadewit | talk 19:24, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • The quote covers it better than a few words could, thank you. But now I notice "Sherwood's childhood was uneventful, although she recalled it as the happiest part of her life." from the header. I'd change "uneventful" to "difficult" or "strict" or whatever. My gosh. No wonder she ran away for half an hour every time she was released from the stocks. By the way, I'd never read about this writer before, but notice [3] also supports the idea that locking her in stocks regularly just might have had a bit of an influence on her outlook. --AnonEMouse (squeak) 14:05, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • This is precisely why I did not want to include that quotation - it leads to incorrect conclusions on the part of the reader. If you read the whole of the autobiography, you will discover that Sherwood did not consider her childhood difficult or strict at all (that is why I had that sentence at the end of the "Earl life" section emphasizing that point). Moreover, as such teaching practices were common in the early nineteenth century, they would not have appeared particularly strict at the time - they only appear so to our eyes. (By the way, that site does not seem to be very scholarly - note its use of an exclamation mark. It suggests that Sherwood's evangelical stories are "macabre" because of her experience in the stocks. This is a highly questionable conclusion for many reasons. One of the most obvious is that there is a lot of evangelical literature written in exactly this style, from the seventeenth century onwards; were all of the authors forced to stand in stocks? We need to know that before we could make the association between stocks and death-filled literature. To me, it seems far more likely that Sherwood is continuing a literary tradition of "macabre" evangelical literature.) Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • Accepted.
    • Sherwood's life became more painful as she matured. - Strike the sentence, let the facts that she was tall, ungainly, and hid in the woods speak for themselves. Otherwise my immediate reaction was that while nearly everybody is shy during puberty, it's highly debatable whether moral turmoil can be considered more painful than regular confinement in stocks.
      • I like having these generalizations; it is a courtesy to the reader. Moreover, readers are strikingly unable to draw conclusions, in my experience. (Teaching freshmen composition for several years now has probably jaded me.) But, I have removed it anyway. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • She admits in her autobiography - just writes, or if that's too weak for the personal issue, relates or discloses. Admits implies it's something she was accused of.
      • I thought "admit" here connoted "saying something she may not have wanted to reveal." Anyway, I have changed it to "writes." Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • school at Reading Abbey - needs wikilink. We have Reading Abbey, Reading School, I'll let you choose whether you want one, both, or something completely different.
      • After reviewing the articles, both pages seem incorrect links to me. Do you have some reason to believe that Reading School ever educated girls? Awadewit | talk 19:24, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Jane Austen links to Reading Abbey, if they're the same school...
          • So? The Jane Austen page is terrible. Who's to say they have it right? Like I said, I read both pages you suggested, but I am not convinced that either of them is the correct link. I would rather err on the side of caution here so that readers aren't given incorrect information. Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • Accepted.
    • It is evident from Sherwood's memories that her childhood was the happiest part of her life; over half of her autobiography is devoted to nostalgically reflecting on those years. - needs a citation to a reviewer of the autobiography saying that, otherwise it's drawing a conclusion, original research.
      • This is no big leap. In fact, I would say it is pretty much a fact, based as it is on countable pages. The actual rules for citation on wikipedia state that "material that is challenged or likely to be challenged needs a reliable source, which should be cited in the article" (emphasis in original). This statement is hardly likely to be challenged. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • While I won't oppose over this, I do believe it is drawing a conclusion from primary sources, one of the classic marks of Wikipedia:original research. Just rephrase to something like "Over half of her autobiography..." and that should be a sufficient implication without crossing that line.
          • Please let me know if the rephrase is an improvement. Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • Excellent, thank you.
    • had six children in India, but only four survived infancy; death of her son Henry (not Henry Martyn), - rather than that awkward parenthetical, just name the two who died earlier. It'll give more information (birth order, etc.), and clear up the awkwardness. Make the second "death of her first son" (or second, third, whatever)
      • See what you think now. Awadewit | talk 20:38, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Much better, thank you!
    • The deaths of the two infants and of some of her young children - even more children died? Who and when? Give the names and dates, this is important.
      • I have listed what information I could quickly find. Awadewit | talk 20:38, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Henry Martyn (for whom she named her son Henry Martyn) - I think (for whom she named her son) is clear enough, or (for whom she named her second son).
      • See if you like the new way it is worded. Awadewit | talk 08:23, 30 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • too much medicinal gin - explain and/or specify the specific problem, possibly just by giving a wikilink to the article: fetal alcohol syndrome? alcohol dementia? If the sources don't specify, at least Effects_of_alcohol_on_the_body#Excessive_doses
      • I think it would be inappropriate to link to modern medical conditions since I know only what I put in the article. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • and in 1808 she rescued a malnourished two-year-old Sally Pownal - did she adopt her? If so, say so. If not, why single out Sally, among the many she gave over to others?
      • I thought that it was clear she adopted Sally (I didn't want to use the word "adopt" three times in that little paragraph). I have altered the sentence so hopefully it is now more explicit that she adopted both. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • By the 1830s, the Sherwoods had become more prosperous - due mainly to her writing, or other causes?
    • [[|Jean-Jacques Rousseau|Rousseauvian]] - fix by removing the first |
    • 1 Timothy - wikilink (yes, just like that 1 Timothy)
    • literati - wikilink uncommon term
      • Wikilinked. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • I disagree. I know full well what "literati" means; and so, I venture to suggest, do the overwhelming majority of likely readers of an article such as this. Now, if the word "literati" were to pop up in an article on this or that celebrity, it might need a link; but here it contributes to making WP look a bit of a joke; it's rather an insult to the readers' literacy. -- Hoary 06:21, 1 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • I tend to agree with that statement, but I usually just wikilink terms that others identify as "difficult" or "unfamiliar" in order to avoid spats over tiny issues. You guys can fight it out. :) Awadewit | talk 06:55, 1 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
            • Thanks. For the love of Pete, this is an article about a writer of children's stories, not Kant. Surely it is not completely out of the question that actual children might be interested (not Brittany Spears fans, but still). I'm not asking the term be taken out, merely linked.
    • General note - many quotes have a [] in them, indicating rephrasing to fit the context of this article; isn't there any way to minimize their number? For example, "the gusto with which [Sherwood] dwells on new dolls", and "though [Sherwood's] books are no longer widely read," - I don't know what the original was, but if they were "she" or "the writer" or "her", I would think they would be understandable without needing a [].
      • I only found one that could be changed. The others require the brackets for sense or grammar. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Selected works - is there a reason why the books that have been reprinted (apparently mostly by Kessinger 2004-2007) are generally the ones not on this list? I would have thought that the more important ones would be reprinted... Barnes & Noble, Amazon
      • That company reprints books that consumers ask them to reprint, so their publications are not representative of the fame or importance of an author's oeuvre. I have not seen any references to several of those texts in the scholarship on Sherwood. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • by mrs. Sherwood - Capital M, surely
    • There is no good biography of Sherwood. - Ahem, cough, cough, cough. If you must, "there is no stand-alone, complete biography" or something, but not just "good", please, otherwise it's too much like one biographer taking a blatant shot at all his rivals and peers. In fact, since there do seem to be several books dedicated to her biography, consider leaving this sentence out even if you can rephrase it to be less blatant.
      • Changed to "no complete scholarly biography." Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • The life of Mrs Sherwood - the Google books link needs a comment that this is a Google books link, and probably whether it's complete or to a limited number of pages; the target capitalizes Life, so the link probably should too.

** Consider combining the Selected works and Online full-text resources sections, with a leading (with links to online versions at Google books where available) section comment. It makes for less text, and a more useful Selected works section. --AnonEMouse (squeak) 14:19, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

      • I am not comfortable doing this for any of the texts except the first editions (there is no extant copy of the first edition of The Infant's Progress, so I have linked to the second edition). I don't know what changes may have been made for later editions. Awadewit | talk 20:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Grievously underinformed question: The article tells us in the introduction: a different style of children's literature came into fashion during the late nineteenth century, one exemplified by Lewis Carroll's playful and nonsensical Alice in Wonderland. To me, it seems the reverse of nonsensical; it's logic gone mad, or askew: not nonsensical but absurd. (To me, "playful and nonsensical" suggests Lear rather than Carroll.) Do you perhaps mean to say something about fantasy worlds (whether nonsensical, absurd, or somewhere in between)? -- Hoary 06:08, 1 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I understand your point (the mad tea party has its own rules of logic, for example), but other parts of the book are truly nonsensical, such as the Duchess' baby turning into a pig or the Cheshire cat. Also, I was specifically trying to avoid a debate over the style of Alice (a debate which has filled many pages of many books) and instead use the terms that most people think of when they think of Alice. It is a foil which means that, inevitably, it is going to be misrepresented to some extent. The word I really want to avoid, though, is "imaginative." There is a false assumption among some critics and many readers that children's literature before Alice wasn't "imaginative." The best word to use would probably be "absurdist," but I think that would have to be wikinked and I wanted to avoid that - I wanted readers to understand something about the difference without reading another page. Let me know what you think. Awadewit | talk 06:55, 1 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose—Criterion 2 (MOS). En dashes required for chronological ranges. Except here: "(1810–c.1830)", where it would be nicer to use "to about". For interruption, the MOS says that "Em dashes are normally unspaced"; it's inconsistent in the article, anyway. "(1823-9)"—most people use a minimum of two digits in the closing unit. Try unspaced, or, if you must, spaced en dashes.
    Heh. Tony opposes over dashes -- because it's a MOS issue -- after rejection of datelinks in another review :-) --AnonEMouse (squeak) 14:05, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I rejected not date links, but the linking of simple years. No autoformatting function, so why on earth do it? MOS dates and numbers lends some support to this. Tony 14:23, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I fixed the dates. The sources all say (1810–c.1830), so I'm not going to change that. In literary studies no one says "to about," they almost always write "c." Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
MOS says space the en dash if either unit has an internal space. the c. 1839 should have a space between the dot and the 1. Tony 14:23, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
There was only one missing the space. It is now fixed. Awadewit | talk 21:56, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I don't see any unspaced m-dashes. Where did you see them? Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I have added a second number to the dates you requested. Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Return to death?
      • Suggestion: join the first 3 sections as subsections of an overriding "Biography" or "Life" section. That would parallel the way "Literary analysis" is laid out, and it would be more clear that the end of that would naturally end with, well, death. Then you could remove "death" from the title of the third subsection without losing anything. --AnonEMouse (squeak) 14:05, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • I do not think that the title "Return to Britain and death" is unclear; I think that it is good to mention where in the article the "death" happens. It is a good reference point. I have joined the first three sections as suggested. Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Again: Return to death? It's a poorly structured phrase. At the very least, a comma is required after "Britain". Or make it "Return and death". What is there now doesn't work. Tony 14:23, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It may be technically ungrammatical, but very few readers know that (you and I are among those few). The meaning of "Returning to Britain" and "Dying" is much more clearly expressed this way than "Return and death" (return to where?) or "Return to Britain, and death" (odd comma for a heading). It is not all about grammar in headings - it is partially about readability. Awadewit | talk 21:56, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • "37" but "nineteenth"? Spell out if one digit, normally, unless starting a sentence, where numbers are always spelt out.
      • Tony, Tony, Tony. You know better than that! Good writers do not rigidly adhere to rules, they create useful pattern. I have used Arabic numerals where I want to emphasize a large quantity (400 books, 37 editions) and I have spelled out the numbers in other cases. I never write 19th century because it is so unprofessional. Please do not ask me to do so. Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"19th century" is unprofessional? Hello? I think your "useful" rationale will be lost on the readers; it just looks plain inconsistent. Tony 14:23, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Funny how very wrong and unprofessional that is. Perhaps because both the MLA (6th edition) (Section 3.5.5) and Chicago (6th edition) (Section 2.53) state unequivocally to spell out numbered centuries. Awadewit | talk 22:04, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
We're talking about entirely different Chicagoes, your copy is an antique, or there's been a typo. -- Hoary 22:44, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"References to particular centuries should be spelled out, in lower. Hyphenate references only when they serve as adjectives". Here are some of the examples they give: "seventeenth-century literature" and "the eighteenth century." The MLA, which is from 2003, says exactly the same thing. I believe that I am on very firm ground here in addition to the fact that my article is consistent, which is usually wikipedia's default position since they have not instituted a real style manual. Awadewit | talk 23:01, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • I think I've read that the latest edition of Chicago recommends "19th century" (which if true may suggest that Chicago is going to pot), so you might be fighting a losing battle here. -- Hoary 08:42, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • Actually, there have been several reviews of the latest Chicago manual of style claiming just that. Again, I would emphasize consistency. Unfortunately, I think there is no hope for a wikipedia-wide consensus on this issue unless Jimbo just says "We are using MLA" or "We are using Chicago." Awadewit | talk 08:59, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Quite well written. Tony 05:43, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • For interruption, the MOS says that "Em dashes are normally unspaced" Pfft. In dead-trees typography, I believe that em dashes are usually surrounded by very thin (or, according to taste, not so very thin) spaces. In principle, Unicode and UTF-8 allow for thin spaces; in practice, fonts in common use do not (resulting in boxes, question marks, or other horrors). If there's no space at all, the result is arguably ugly even within the line, and none of the browsers that I use knows that one can break a line before or after an em dash, resulting in some extremely ragged right margins. -- Hoary 07:38, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Where were you when this was discussed at MOS? You have the choice of spaced en dashes in place of unspaced em dashes. Not good enough? Tony 14:23, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I must have been somewhere else. A very short answer to the simple question: spaced en dashes are fine with me. And if we're going to discuss this further, perhaps we should do so elsewhere. -- Hoary 16:07, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • If you want to change all of the m-dashes and fight it out with Tony that is fine with me. I do not want another of my FACs to descend into a dash discussion. Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: bizarre footnotes. For example, Fauve-Chamoux, Antoinette. "Marriage, Widowhood, and Divorce." Family Life in Early Modern Times: 1500-1789. Eds. David I. Kertzer and Marzio Barbagli. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001. I'd instead write Antoinette Fauve-Chamoux, "Marriage, Widowhood, and Divorce", in Family Life in Early Modern Times: 1500–1789, ed. David I. Kertzer and Marzio Barbagli (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001). (Or similar: let's not quibble over "Chicago" vs whatever.) Any reason for the name-reversal, etc.? -- Hoary 10:12, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • I agree with you that using the last name first is totally bizarre in a footnote, but the copy editors for the very first article I worked on for wikipedia insisted on that style, so I just kept using it. I have not had any problems until now. See if you will accept the revision. I am aiming for some sort of consistency across the articles I edit, by the way. Awadewit | talk 21:57, 2 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • But as you will have realized, some self-appointed copyeditors of others' articles are pretty clueless, though dismayingly confident of the rightness of their "improvements". And what I read now is Chaney, Lois E. "Pip and the Fairchild Family." Dickensian 79.3 (1983): 162-3.: doesn't look like a footnote to me. -- Hoary 01:09, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
        • Well, the copy editors who helped me out on Mary Wollstonecraft, namely Kaldari, were not clueless at all. Look, I don't really care which style is used. I once tried to argue on a policy page somewhere that wikipedia should have a uniform citation style - that way debates like this would never erupt. I was almost immediately shot down. Therefore, as wikipedia does not in fact have an in-house citation style, I have tried to use a consistent citation style throughout all of the articles I have written. The Chaney is a totally legitimate footnote - it has all of the necessary information and the citation style is consistent across the article (all two notes not covered by the bibliography). Let's not haggle over something so insignificant, shall we? Awadewit | talk 01:48, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
          • I don't mean to haggle, and you'll have noticed that I haven't written "oppose". (Indeed, it never occurred to me to oppose.) I've nothing against Kaldari, and my characterization of "some" copyeditors may apply to myself. The bibliographic information is all there, which as you say is the important thing. I'm just surprised that you think using the last name first is totally bizarre in a footnote but stand for this anyway. -- Hoary 08:42, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps because I feel that the footnote style is not as important as having consistent footnotes in the first place. Besides, I have other battles to fight, such as making the sure the "List of works" guidelines aren't ravaged. :) Awadewit | talk 08:59, 3 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support. -- Hoary 14:34, 3 July 2007 (UTC) ....... PS now with added enthusiasm. -- Hoary 21:50, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment This FAC has convinced me to stop submitting FACs for a while. There is no reason to spend inordinate amounts of my time on dashes, dates and spaces. I have far better things to do. Awadewit | talk 23:01, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I wonder whether it's worth suggesting that some kind of 'stylistic task force' is set up - Writers can then go about their business, you know writing, and then submit their articles to the (naturally retentive) task force who will put citations immediately after full stops without spaces and use the correct type of dash etc. Past a certain level of professionalism - spelling grammar etc, objecting on the basis of 'style' always seemed odd to me, but so much easier than having to consider content. My condolences Awadewit. --Joopercoopers 12:30, 5 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
There is one. It's called Wikipedia:WikiProject League of Copyeditors, and it's always looking for members. --AnonEMouse (squeak) 13:35, 5 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As far as I know the LoCE doesn't concentrate on MOS issues like that - they concentrate on prose. I did suggest an "FAC style task force" specifically for articles heading for FAC just in the manner Joopercoopers outlined, but, like I said above, that idea was rejected at the time. Awadewit | talk 23:41, 5 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well I've suggested it here. Sit back and watch it die on its feet.
  • Support literature isn't my field, but this is a lucid and interesting article, which kept me interested. --Joopercoopers 13:59, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
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