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Brothers Poem

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Discovered in 2014, the Brothers Poem was the subject of international media attention; I brought the article to WP:GA status last December. Having come back to it recently, I'm looking to bring it up to Featured status.

Thanks, Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 20:51, 14 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

First things first, this is a very well-written article. I can easily seeing it go to FAN one day (I assume that's the goal?) and it rightfully should! Here are a few things I noticed upon a read-through. I'll try to pop back in and offer some more comments later one—perhaps do a deeper review of the notes and sources, etc.

  • I know that Sappho is an archaic poet, but the lede (while mentioning this fact) also notes that the poem was first published in 2014. This too is true, but for the lay reader, this might be a little confusing, since it could come across as saying the poem is only 3 years old. Is there a better way of expressing what I know you mean?
  • Several of the lettered footnotes don’t have sources. I feel like you might want to add some since they aren’t really expressing “Paris is the capital of France”-style facts.
  • Is the Brothers Poem on the Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 2289? If so, does that mean that parts of the pome was published in 1951?
  • It might be a good idea to explain who certain people are in the analyses sections. Why, for instance, should we trust André Lardinois or Camillo Neri? (I was told something similar during either the FAN or a peer-review for the ‘’Astronomica’’. If you think it would be clunky, feel free to ignore)
  • Herodotus should be linked when his name first appears (second paragraph of “Content”) and the link in the second paragraph of “Characters” should be removed
  • “Despite Bär's arguments, most authors accept that the Brother's Poem is missing at least one stanza.” This effectively repeats the first line of the previous paragraph.
  • Should you link the papers in the “Reception” section?
  • It might be nice to archive all of the web-based citations, as well as provide JSTOR numbers etc.

That's all for now.--Gen. Quon (Talk) 21:25, 18 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks for this, Gen. Quon! I will have to think carefully about some of these points, but I've fixed the linking for Herodotus. I don't really want to link the newspapers, as that's not really relevant to the article, nor do I like explaining who the scholars cited are (generally, if they aren't otherwise described in the text, they are a classicist who focuses on Greek lyric poetry or papyrology; there are only so many ways you can say that before the reader starts thinking "okay, I get it already!"), but in both cases I shall bear it in mind, and if I get more feedback along the same lines I might change it. I probably should archive all of the web-based citations; I seem to recall that there's a way of automating that (perhaps with InternetArchiveBot).

I went ahead and archived the links for you; I hope that's OK. I used a mix of the Internet Archive and Archive.is.--Gen. Quon (Talk) 14:30, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Re. Brothers Poem and P. Oxy. 2289: yes, part of the poem was technically published in 1951. (At least, unless you are Silvio Bär, and believe that the overlap is a coincidence.) It didn't contain a single complete word, though, and so didn't make it into the Lobel-Page or Voigt editions of Sappho. Possibly this should be made clearer, but reliable sources do generally call the poem newly discovered...

That makes sense. I'm trying to think as a layperson, and so the line seemed a little confusing, suggesting that it had been published prior to its 2014 re-publishing! But I get what you mean now.--Gen. Quon (Talk) 14:34, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Reworking the lead is something which needs careful thinking about. I might find time to have a look tonight or tomorrow.

It reads a lot better now. The "Lost since antiquity, it was rediscovered in 2014 on a papyrus from a private collection by Dirk Obbink..." line is really solid and does a good job of explaining when it was written and when it was discovered (which was my minor quibble above).--Gen. Quon (Talk) 14:34, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for all the useful comments! Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 07:43, 19 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Tim riley

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Looking in, as requested. It is a pleasure to read an article so well researched and beautifully written. The following comments are minor indeed, but are the best I can come up with.

  • Lead
    • At two paragraphs it is on the short side. To round it out, giving the requisite summary of the main text, you might add a couple of sentences about the content of the poem.
      • I have been worried that the lead is slightly too short; I shall have to redraft it at some point. That I haven't given much on the content of the poem is a good point.
  • Preservation
  • Content
    • "It is possible that the text is an ancient forgery, though the Brothers Song was included in at least some Hellenistic editions of Sappho; a classical imitation of Sappho is still possible." By all means ignore the following comment, but it seemed to me that the sentence would hang together better if re-punctuated thus: "It is possible that the text is an ancient forgery; though the Brothers Song was included in at least some Hellenistic editions of Sappho, a classical imitation of Sappho is still possible."
  • Characters
    • "neither of whom are" – I wonder if "neither" calls for a singular verb rather than plural, as here.
      •  Done
    • "many suggestions have been made as to their identity" – I reluctantly admit that the singular "they" saves a lot of verbiage here, but I flag up that you'll probably need to defend it against foaming pedants at FAC. The current edition of Fowler says that though the point is still contentious, the singular "they" goes back centuries and is now pretty well established.
      • Getting rid of singular they would require even more uses of the phrase "the addressee", or a whole bunch of ugly "he or she"-ing. Anyone who still objects to singular they is never going to be convinced, but I'm not changing it unless someone can come up with something better. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:52, 22 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    • "This is not universally agreed upon, however" – A "however" that adds nothing and breaks the flow, I think.
    • "In contrast, Mueller and Leslie Kurke" – Marginal, but I think this might be adversely criticised as WP:Editorial
      • If people really push, I can probably come up with a source which contrasts different views on the addressee's identity. But I'll have to dig around in the sources again to find it. Leaving it as it is for now, but if more people object I'll try to track down a source, and change it if really necessary. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:52, 22 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Context
    • Image: This is about as ultra vires a comment as one could imagine, and of course ignore it ad lib, but I think the image is insipid to a degree.
    • "privileging the fraternal relationship" – unexpected verb. Does it mean favouring? (I see it explained in the OED, but it is nonetheless an unfamiliar use of the word.)
  • Missing stanzas
    • "The Brothers Poem is generally thought to be incomplete, missing at least one stanza at its beginning" – This is at least the fourth time you've told us this. By this stage I think you want to be assuming the reader knows it, and so begin something like: The degree to which The Brothers Poem is thought to be incomplete is a matter of debate among scholars…
    • "However, Kurke has argued" – another however we could manage very well without
  • Reception
  • Notes
    • "people who Herodotus confused" – am I being impossibly fuddy-duddy when I suggest the accusative pronoun here?
  • While
    • I have noticed before that classicists seem addicted to the use of "while" to mean "and", "whereas" or "although". Fowler cautions against it, rightly predicting that sooner or later it will lead you into temporally impossible disasters ("The Dean read the Lessons while the Bishop preached the sermon"). You haven"t fallen into that trap here, but there are nonetheless seven "whiles":
      • while Obbink's paper announcing the discovery of the poem 2014
      • while Kurke argues that the addressee is likely to be in a position of authority over Sappho
      • while Anton Bierl suggests that fragment 17
      • while in the Odyssey, Penelope awaits Odysseus' return
      • while Kurke argues that it is likely that only one stanza is missing
      • while Tom Payne in The Daily Telegraph said
      • While Loukas Papadimitropoulos said
and I'd recommend changing some of them to buts ands or semicolons.
Changed all of the "while"s. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:52, 22 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

That's all from me, I think. Please ping me when you go to FAC. – Tim riley talk 14:58, 22 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for such comprehensive comments, Tim! I've addressed most of them; a couple I have left as-is with a mental note that someone else might object and I will have to change it. Still need to do something about the lead, though. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 16:52, 22 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I think your expanded lead section will do very nicely. Tim riley talk 19:38, 29 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
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