Wikipedia:Peer review/She: A History of Adventure/archive1

She: A History of Adventure

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because…

• I hope to take this article soon to FA nominations
• Most of the work on the article was done by a single editor (myself) and therefore I would appreciate the viewpoints of disinterested editors regarding readibility, clarity of prose and subject matter, and referencing.

Thanks, ✽ Juniper§ Liege ^(TALK) 10:04, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Comments by H1nkles

I'll take a little while to go through the article and the review will be done in waves so to speak. Thank you for your work on this article, the book is probably one of the best selling books I've never heard of so it is an interesting subject and I'm enjoying the article a lot. Here are some suggestions for improvement:

Lead

• The lead seems a bit short for the length of the article. I haven't finished it so I can't tell for sure if anything specific is missing, but you may want to evaluate if the lead meets WP:LEAD requirements, especially about summarizing all parts of the article.
• I've finished the article and the lead is actually pretty comprehensive. I would perhaps add a note about the book's legacy and film adaptations. One could make an argument for inclusion of more about the modern feminist interpretation of the book but I think you cover this at least in part.
• Consider this sentence:

"She was extraordinarily popular upon its release and has never been out of print since it was first published."

I think you can remove, "...since it was first published." You say it has never been out of print so there is no need to specify that it hasn't been out of print since it was first published, the "never" clarifies this.

• Please link fin de siècle in the Lead.  Done

Synopsis

• This sentence needs to be in the active voice:

"Ayesha was born over two thousand years ago amongst the Arabs, mastering the lore of the ancients and becoming a great sorceress."

I would recommend rewriting thus: "Ayesha was born over two thousand years ago amongst the Arabs. During her time with them She mastered the lore of the ancients and became a great sorceress."

• Watch for consistency in capitalizing "She". You'll need to decide if She is always going to be capitalized when referring to Ayesha.
• I'm not sure about this phrase:

"...remain in the thrall of She."

Isn't it "remain enthralled with She"? I could be wrong here but I thought I'd bring it up.

Background

• "In his memoirs Haggard wrote of the aspirations he held at this time of becoming a colonial governor himself..."

Consider removing "at this time" as redundant wording. The context implies what time his aspirations were at.  Done

• "...Haggard remained committed to this belief, believing that the British...."

belief/believing - consider rewording one of those two, perhaps instead of belief use ideology?  Done

• I changed Time Murray to Tim Murray.
• In the Return to Britain section you have the start of a quote from Haggard in the body of a paragraph then immediately followed by a block quote, it seems a bit odd, I'm not sure the formatting is entirely consistent with WP:QUOTE though I couldn't site a specific guideline. I'll leave that to you.  Done Removed lead-in section of quote to just leave block quote. ✽ Juniper§ Liege ^(TALK) 08:09, 16 October 2010 (UTC)
• This sentence has two time identifiers:

"Late-Victorian debates regarding "The Woman Question", as well as anxieties over the increasing position and independence of the "New Woman", dominated Britain during the fin de siècle"

There is Late-Victorian and during the fin de siècle. Probably want to remove one of the identifiers as duplicative.  Done removed Late-Victorian qualifier. ✽ Juniper§ Liege ^(TALK) 08:11, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

• "...and gained more political and legal independence - free from men."

This is more a matter of taste but I don't think "free from men" is necessary, I think that the context implies who women were gaining freedom from.  Done Agree - removed. ✽ Juniper§ Liege ^(TALK) 08:14, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

• Watch consistency in italicizing She-who-must-be-obeyed. Sometimes it's italicized and other times it isn't.  Done Italicised = character as it is italicised in the actual text; non-italics = phrase. ✽ Juniper§ Liege ^(TALK) 08:21, 16 October 2010 (UTC)
• Overall this section goes into a fair bit of detail on late Victorian concepts of race, feminism, imperialism, and British sentimentality regarding Africa. I assume that this will tie in later to the themes expressed in the book. I do feel as though there is a lot of detail here though and one criticism at WP:FAC will be a lack of summary style writing here. Consider trimming this section a bit. For example, you talk about racial purity in both the last paragraph in the South Africa sub-section and after the block quote in the Return to Great Britain sub-section. Could one of these references be trimmed out as duplicative?

 Done I have removed 2 superflous quotes and some material. I have also tried to relate points more specifically to the concerns of the novel. But there may still be some more room for trimming. ✽ Juniper§ Liege ^(TALK) 08:34, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

Conception and creation

• The format of this sentence is a bit odd and inconsistent:

"The period was an intensely creative process, with Haggard maintaining that the text "was never rewritten, and the manuscript carries but few corrections", going on to declare: "The fact is that it was written at white heat, almost without rest, and that is the best way to compose."

First off, "with Haggard maintaining" is in the passive voice, consider rewriting as, "in which Haggard claimed..." Also you use a colon after "declare" but not after "text". I'm not an expert but usually a comma is used prior to quotes (could be wrong here though). I would end the sentence after "corrections". Start the new sentence with, "Haggard went on to declare..."  Done ✽ Juniper§ Liege ^(TALK) 08:42, 16 October 2010 (UTC)

• "Similarly, the name of the underground civilisation itself in She, known as Kôr...."

I'd remove "itself" here, no need for it that I can see.

• There are a couple of two-sentence paragraphs in this section. Consider combining or expanding.
• I'm not sure about the tense in this sentence:

"In the original serialisation of She, the cannibal Amahagger place a large heated pot over the head of Mahomed, enacting out the hotpotting ritual in preparation for eating him."

Amahagger "place", I think "placed" is better but I want to be sure. Also I think "enacting" should be replaced with "acting".

• In the same paragraph you refer to it as hotpot and hot-pot.

Genre

• "Indeed, Haggard's story is one of the first in modern literature to feature "a slight intrusion of something unreal" into a very real world - a hallmark of the fantasy genre."

"Indeed" here isn't necessary.

• "Indeed, Rider Haggard is credited with inventing the romance of archaeological exploration which began in King Solomon's Mines and crystallised in She."

Watch weasel wording here, there is no in-line citation for this sentence, is it covered with either cite 44 or 45? Also "Indeed" isn't needed here as well.

• "and recently Alan Moore's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2000)."

"Recently" isn't really necessary here.

• "Many late-Victorian authors during the fin de siècle..."

Another example of duplicating time references.

• Perhaps also in the adventure subgenre are the English stories of adventures in Africa. I can't think of specific fictional books right off the top of my head though. Sorry, if I come up with examples I'll throw them in here.
• I don't think you need a non-free use image rationale on the images from the book since the copyright expired, I'm no image expert but I think the images are now free-use and in the public domain.

Style

• Again there may be issues with quotes and especially the use of block quotes:

"The passage concludes with a wry remark from Holly, "I at last managed to get to sleep, a fact for which anybody who reads this narrative, if anybody ever does, may very probably be thankful".

Why is the last portion of the quote from the book not in the preceding block quote? It seems odd to have it pushed into a paragraph a part from the rest of the quote.

Themes

• "Indeed, She is preoccupied with stressing quintessential British qualities through the "adventure" of empire, usually in contrast to foreign barbarism."

Another "indeed" that can be removed. I found a couple more following this one that I won't bring up but can be removed.

• Why use the word "however" in the following sentence:

"However, the notion of imperialism is further compounded by the figure of She, who is herself a foreign colonising force."

It seems that this sentence builds on the previous one, so "however" seems out of place. Am I missing something?

• Here is a quote with no attribution to whomever is saying it,

"Racial hybridisation of any kind "entailed degeneration" to Victorians, a "decline from the pure blood" of the initial races, and thus "an aspect of their degeneration is the idea that the Amahagger have lost whatever elements of civilization their Kôr ancestors may have imparted to them."

Reception

• Can the block quote be better clarified? What newspaper or journal was it written in? I see from the citation that it was in a letter written to Haggard, perhaps this could be specified in the quote.
• So I'm thinking that this section should be moved up to connect with the Style section. There are critiques there to his writing style which seem to bridge to a discussion about the reception of the book. The themes section could then follow. I think the Themes section also is more closely related to the Modern interpretations section and those two would fit well together. Those are just suggestions to help with the cohesion of the article.

Modern interpretations

• "Ayesha declares this to be the "first most holy hour of completed womanhood".

This quote appears to be attributed to Ayesha, I think there is an errant quotation mark after "lord" that makes the quote appear to be done. Also I think "...first most holy hour of completed womanhood" should have single quotation marks (' ') around it since Ayesha is speaking it within a quote. Does this make sense?

• Have you come across other modern interpretations other than the feminist one? If not I wonder if it is even necessary to create a Feminist sub-section since this is the only subject of the section?

References

• I see several books in the Footnotes section and other books located in the References section. Why this inconsistency?
• Be prepared for a WP:PSTS-based objection since you rely somewhat on Haggard's autobiography. I think you are ok given the items from this source in the article, but those who look blindly at guidelines, thinking they should apply unilaterally to all situations, may find cause to raise the issue here.

Conclusion

• Overall I think the article is very developed, well written and comprehensive. I've made some suggestions above and greatly enjoyed reading about this novel. I look forward to seeing it at FAC soon. This concludes my review, if you have specific questions or concerns please contact me on my talk page as I don't routinely watch my reviews. If you found the review helpful consider reviewing another article here or at WP:GAC so as to help with the backlog. Thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia. H1nkles (talk) _{citius altius fortius} 20:59, 26 April 2010 (UTC)