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Wikipedia:Featured article review/Rebecca Helferich Clarke/archive1

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

The article was kept by Dana boomer 13:23, 13 July 2011 [1].

Rebecca Helferich Clarke

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Review commentary

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Rebecca Helferich Clarke (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

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Notified: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Biography, Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Composers, User talk:Mindspillage, User talk:Huntdw, User talk:Missmarple.

FA from 2005, has some referencing issues throughout, including 1c issues. Notice posted to talk page over one month ago diff link, but no response. Pictures in article could use image review. There are some short paragraphs, one or two-sentence-long paragraphs. The lede/intro could be expanded a bit more. Could use overall copyediting throughout. -- Cirt (talk) 21:04, 1 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Good efforts so far, thanks. Good still use a significant bit of improvements. -- Cirt (talk) 04:34, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Okay. Could you be a bit more specific? Nikkimaria (talk) 04:50, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Problems with inadequate sourcing that fails WP:RS
  1. Liane Curtis - these sources are inadequate and fail WP:RS.
  2. The information sourced to these references should be removed.
  3. In certain places, this even violates WP:NOR, see for example the cite that says, "Liane Curtis, personal correspondence, May 2005." ???
  4. In multiple instances, these cites also fail WP:V.

-- Cirt (talk) 19:29, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

To clarify: all sources by Liane Curtis, or only certain ones? It would seem to me that the Grove entry and the Musical Times article obviously meet WP:RS, and that the program notes may be acceptable. Also, regarding the fact tag added here: one cannot prove (or likely cite) a negative, despite its veracity. I'll look for a source supporting the other disputed fact. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:00, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly, if one cannot prove a negative, that is a violation of WP:NOR to include it in the article. Especially so, for the high standards of FA articles. -- Cirt (talk) 20:03, 2 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Comments from Voceditenore
  • Referencing. I see that all previous cites to "personal correspondance" have been removed. I'm not sure what the problem is with the other works by Liane Curtis as reliable sources. They seem fine to me, especially the Grove article which is extensive. However, the citation style needs improvement in my view. Firstly, it should be consistently "last name first" for the authors and when printed sources are cited, the exact page number should be given, not simply a cite to the entire book or article. Also, the entire Rebecca Clarke Reader is available in full view at Google Books [2], which probably wasn't available when the WP article was first written . It has articles by three other musicologists besides Curtis, as well as other previously published interviews and articles by Clarke herself. This would considerably help the referencing. This book by a fifth musicologist also has a lot of material. As for the two remaining statements with {{fact}} tags. The bilingual assertion can simply be removed, it's a very minor point. The other about "...large-scale pieces such as symphonies, which she never attempted to write." can be revised to something like:

    "There are no large scale works such as symphonies in her total output of compositions (52 songs, 11 choral works, 21 chamber pieces, the Piano Trio, and the Viola Sonata)." (verifiable via the Grove or here (p. 91).

  • Writing style. I haven't looked at the rest yet, but the section on the Rebecca Clarke Society needs a major copyedit. It reads a bit to much like a blurb, and "put out" instead of "published" or "made available" is infelicitous, as is:

    "Due to copyright clearance problems, the book was withdrawn from circulation by the press due to the author's belief in her freedom to use music examples against the complaints of the copyright holders."

    There are other places in the article with weasel words which need addressing (see also Lede below), e.g. "her father's disapproval of her musical ambitions as well as his harsh treatment of her and her three siblings are speculated to have influenced her compositional career." Speculated by whom? This needs rewording to reflect who speculates this or has reported the speculation—not simply a footnote. Another instance is "Perhaps the greatest barrier to composition was..."

  • Lede. Needs considerable expansion to include the essential facts of her life, not just her importance. Also, expressions like "is considered by one commentator to be" should be avoided. Better to state in in the article itself who said it, e.g.
"Described by musicologist Liane Curtis in the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians as one of the most important British composers in the period between World War I and World War II, Clarke...."
  • Images. Need review. I'm concerned at the documentation for them on Commons, e.g. "Personal correspondence with the Rebecca Clarke Society asserts that the copyright holder of this image no longer exercises those rights." For one thing, there is no indication who the copyright holder is or was, and the personal correspondance really needs to be on record via an OTRS ticket. Another one which is copyright 1919, doesn't qualify unless there is proof it was actually published before 1923, not simply taken or copyrighted before then. I suggest asking User:Elcobbola or User:Jappalang to review them. In any case, the article could use a greater variety of images instead of three of her. You could get away with just one, under "fair use" if necessary. Also, the images need alt text.
  • Recordings. This would be useful to include, since her music has been rarely recorded until recently. There are a lot of reviews from Gramophone available: [3]

Voceditenore (talk) 14:34, 10 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Quick note - per WP:WIAFA, featured articles no longer need alt text. Editors are welcome to provide it if they wish, but it is not a criteria for featured article status. Dana boomer (talk) 14:32, 12 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've been copy-editing and working on referencing. I think I've fixed the image issues too. Nikkimaria (talk) 23:09, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Nikki, I'm not sure from this comment if you feel that you've finished your work on the article or not. If so, please feel free to ping the editors who commented above to come back and take another look (or let me know and I will). Thanks for all your work on this, Dana boomer (talk) 14:49, 13 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Followup, problems with sourcing
  1. I have tagged some additional problems with sourcing with {{fact}} tags.
  2. Newsletter of the Rebecca Clarke Society = this seems to be a primary source, how can one obtain it? Is it verifiable? Is this straying too close to WP:NOR violation for a Featured Article?
  3. The same problem could be said for program notes to Clarke's Sonata for Viola and Piano.

Thank you for your time, -- Cirt (talk) 20:08, 14 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Cirt. I've removed one of the fact-tagged assertions. I will disagree with you on the NOR/primary source issue, as I don't believe either of the sources you mention are problematic in the way that they are used. Both were written by Clarke scholars. The newsletter is a publication put out by the Rebecca Clarke Society, which as the article mentions is concerned with studying Clarke's music. One subscribes to it in the same way that one would a traditional print journal. Both sources are IMO verifiable and not OR; can you expand on your reasons for believing otherwise? Nikkimaria (talk) 20:20, 14 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Do libraries subscribe to these? Or does one have to pay individually to obtain back issues? -- Cirt (talk) 20:24, 14 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Some libraries subscribe to this newsletter, although given that it's fairly specialized there aren't many that do. As for the program notes, there's no such thing as "back issues" - it's not a serial source. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:32, 14 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to hear further thoughts on these issues by Voceditenore. -- Cirt (talk) 20:34, 14 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Please note that WP:VERIFY says nothing about sources being easily verifiable, just that they be verifiable. If the newsletters are available to the public in any form (through purchase from the society, held in even one library, etc), then they are verifiable sources. Same with the program notes. Dana boomer (talk) 01:05, 17 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment re sources At the moment, I'm just commenting on the sourcing issues raised by Cirt, with which I disagree quite strongly. The Newsletters are available online for free here, including the article cited "When Virginia Woolf met Rebecca Clarke". The Newsletters are also held in the New York Public Library and the Brandeis University Library. [4]. As per Dana boomer, subscription access or requirement to physically visit a library is not at all an impediment to something being a reliable source, or the material it contains adequately verifying facts in an article. But this is not even the case here, and I cannot see how this would remotely approach original research. These articles (and program/liner notes) are public third party sources by respected musicologists and musicians. See for example Schleifer, Martha Furman at WorldCat and Liane Curtis (who wrote the Clarke entry in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians) here and [5]. Likewise the recording Rebecca Clarke: Midsummer Moon with liner notes by Michael Ponder (who also wrote her entry in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography) is held in 53 libraries [6] and the program notes by Schleifer which accompany the score for Sonata for Viola and Piano are held in 138 libraries [7]. Voceditenore (talk) 09:28, 18 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Image review: File:ClarkeViola.jpg is okay. File:1917Program.jpg has the wrong template for copyright, and is incorrectly dated (1918, not 1917). I have corrected the copyright template, sourced the date, and put in a request to rename the file to some more useful title. Jappalang (talk) 12:46, 16 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment - Can the reviewing editors (Cirt, Voceditenore, etc), please comment on whether they think the article should retain featured status as it stands now? If so, we don't need to move to the FARC stage. Dana boomer (talk) 22:26, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  1. I still see a paragraph that is one-sentence-long.
  2. I see another paragraph that is two-sentences-long.
  3. There is still one remaining citation needed tag that is unaddressed.

-- Cirt (talk) 03:40, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Should now all be addressed. Thanks, Nikkimaria (talk) 14:35, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Better, thanks. -- Cirt (talk) 20:38, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Some general review comments, as requested

Lead
  • This in my view falls short of the requirements of lead sections as determined by WP:LEAD. In particular:-
    • The lead is not a complete summary of the main text of the article.
    • It contains material that is not covered in the body of the article, namely (1) the description by Liane Curtis ("one of the most important composers..." etc and (2) "Clarke has also been called the most distinguished British female composer of her generation".
    • "See below" directives are unnecessary in the lead; it is assumed that lead statements are amplified in the text.
    • Statements which are cited in the text do not need to be cited in the lead (the revival of interest after Clarke's 90th birthday)
Early life section

The section is rather superficial, e.g. no mention of any compositions before 1916, yet the List of compositions shows that before 1914 she had written several dozen songs, choral pieces, a couple of violin sonatas and numerous viola pieces. And the first paragraph of the section lacks any date information. When did Clarke go to the RAM? When was she at RCM? When did she study with Tertis, and when did she join the Queen's Hall orchestra? Without any dates we cannot get any clear indication of the progress of her life. Far too much space is given to a single piece, the 1919 viola sonata. The section is headed "Early life", yet it ends with her apparently past her peak as a composer.

Later life and marriage

The previous section ended in 1923, and now we jump forward nearly 20 years. The List of compositions shows at least 20 more pieces composed in this period, so Clarke was not as inactive as the text implies. In all, this section is far too brief a summary of nearly 40 years of life. It is very hard, on this basis, to sustain the view that Clarke was indeed "one of the most important British composers in the period between World War I and World War II".

Music

This section is much stronger than those that precede it. I don't know Clarke's music, so I can't comment on the substance. The tone at times is weaselly ("a striking example") and phrasing such as "the very next year" is somewhat non-encyclopedic. I don't have time for a copyedit, but there is some clumsy phrasing, e.g. "she has begun coming back into public awareness"

I appreciate that a difficulty with the biographical sections is lack of source material, but I feel more could be done with what is available. By comparison with other composer articles, I don't think that this is of featured standard at present.

Brianboulton (talk) 23:41, 24 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]


FARC commentary

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The criteria mentioned in the original nomination focused mainly on referencing and prose. Although much work has been completed on the article, the reviewing editors seem wary of stating that the article should be kept without a FARC. Due to this, I am moving the article into the FARC section, to hopefully spur more reviewers to add commentary and come to a final consensus. Dana boomer (talk) 15:56, 27 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment - a nice succinct little article. Prose is good. I removed one POV adjective, "abusive" father is mentioned early on without any supporting material (until right at the end). I am in two minds here - personally I'd be more inclusive of some early biographical material on this issue, especially if in the biography Clarke reports that it shaped her composing or performing in some way, but others might have a different view and I can see there is latitude for personal preference here. I am not knowledgeable enough on the subject to comment authoritatively on the comprehensiveness, and will defer to others, but I am leaning towards keeping this. Casliber (talk · contribs) 18:38, 29 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment There is a reliable source for much of the missing material that Brian noted. The Rebecca Clark Reader is available in full view at Google books here, with multiple articles by musicologists and several annotated interviews, and much more biographical information than is currently in the article. I pointed out this source in my comments above during the FAR, and I'm suprised that it hasn't been used yet. Voceditenore (talk) 19:15, 29 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've added many of the details Brian requested using that source. However, it's not available in full view in my geographic location. Nikkimaria (talk) 15:56, 11 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment The article is in better shape than it was, largely due to Nikki's editing, but I would still say it is short of FA standard. For instance:-
  • Unexplained paranthetical Friskin looks odd in the lead. If she was professionally known as Clarke there is no need for this
  • Was she literally "kicked out of the house"? The language seems a little informal.
  • A concern I expressed previously was about the length of the period covered in the so-called "Early life" section. My point remains; the section runs to 1931 when Clarke was 45. This is not early life. The section should be split after the second paragraph
  • A biog of a British person should have uniform British spelling. ("criticized", "neighbor" etc)
  • the formulation "patron of the arts Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge..." is poor style and should not be used; a person's description is not their title. You would not normally say, for example, "Grocer Jim Brown" or "Painter and decorator Bob Smith". I suggest something like: "sponsored by Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge, a patron of the arts who was Clarke's neighbour".
  • Was "Helferich" her middle name? It seems to have neen dropped.

Brianboulton (talk) 00:01, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Helferich was her middle name and Friskin was her married name, but she was known professionally almost exclusively as Rebecca Clarke. I think I've addressed your other points. Nikkimaria (talk) 12:49, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My points have I think been fully addressed, and other than nitpicks there seems little else to be done. Well done, those who worked to rescue this article and bring it up to standard; I am happy to register a keep. Brianboulton (talk) 15:32, 6 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I'm commenting here in response to this request. I'm not sure that this is up to today's FA criteria, even now. I have limited experience with the FA process, but am basing this on other FAs on similar topics. My overall impression is that the prose is still clumsy in places, some of the coverage is skimpy and/or confusing, and there's an awful lot of overlinking. I've given some examples/suggestions below. However, the improvements to the article have been piecemeal and done in reaction to various previous comments from reviewers rather than with an overall plan and vision. It's much improved, but it still lacks flow and consistency because of this.
    • "Examples of recent publications include two string quartets and one composition published in 2002, a short, lyrical piece for viola and piano entitled Morpheus, the latter composed under the pseudonym of "Anthony Trent". Reviews of the concert praised the "Trent", largely ignoring the works credited to Clarke."

      What concert? When? I was only able to figure this out from the caption under the image of the 1918 programme. And shouldn't this, with more about the use of this pseudonym, go in the Early life section, rather than an aside in the discusion of recent publication of her works?

    • Re the Early life section. Shouldn't we be told that her father was from Boston and her mother was German. It might make more sense out of "She made the first of many visits to the United States shortly after leaving the Royal Academy.". A 19 year-old English girl bopping off to the US in 1905 (on her own?) is somewhat unusual unless she had family connections there. There needs to be more of narrative in this section.
    • "Having been put out of the family home without funds by her father for criticising his extramarital affairs, Clarke supported herself through her viola playing after leaving the Royal College, and moved to the United States in 1916 to perform."

      Apart from being overly long, this is confusing and leaves out the fact that her father refused to fund her tuition at the Royal College. Is that why she "left" without finishing? Or did she in fact finish by supporting herself and paying her own tuition? According to this source, it was the former. Break that sentence up and clarify. Also avoid the passive, e.g. "Having been put out of the house...". Suggest, "Following her criticism of his extra-marital affairs, Clarke's father turned her out of the house and cut off her funds. She had to leave the Royal College in 1910 and supported herself through her viola playing. In 1916 she moved to the United States to continue her performing career."

    • Surely there must be more to say about her husband, James Friskin, and their relationship than one short sentence, plus allusions elsewhere to her views on a married woman's role? How did they meet? How long was the "courtship"? Was the marriage a happy one? When did he die? Again, the Later life section lacks a narrative
    • "Clarke's views on the social role of women—herself in particular—were incompatible with any ambition to compose music in the larger forms. There are no large scale works such as symphonies in her total output..."

      According to whom? There could be other reasons for the lack of large scale works. Unless this is a musicologist's considered opinion (which should be credited), it's a fudge.

    • There's way too much linking of common words, a minor point perhaps but it really detracts from the article, e.g. birthday, printed, heirs, cremated. And how relevant is it that she was cremated without any further information as to where her ashes were placed or whether it was her specific wish that she be cremated?
    • "The Rebecca Clarke Society was established in September 2000 to promote performance, scholarship, and awareness of the works of Rebecca Clarke. Founded by musicologists Liane Curtis and Jessie Ann Owens and based out of the Women's Studies Research Center at Brandeis, the Society has pushed forward recording and scholarship of her work, including several world premiere performances and recordings of unpublished material as well as numerous journal publications."

      This whole bit needs a re-write. It's clumsy and repetitious, and "pushed forward" is a rather odd turn of phrase.

    • "The head of the Rebecca Clarke Society, Liane Curtis, is the editor of A Rebecca Clarke Reader, published by Indiana University Press in 2004. The book was withdrawn from circulation by the press due to the author's belief in her freedom to use music examples against the complaints of the copyright holders."

      This doesn't make sense. The publishers ("press" is ambiguous) withdrew the book not because of Curtis's belief but because of the copyright holder's complaints.

    • The coverage about recordings of her music could use some elaboration since her music has been rarely recorded until recently. There are reviews from Gramophone available: [8] and they can give an insight into modern reception of her work. I would have thought this would be pretty important to this article, but it's lacking at the moment.Voceditenore (talk) 16:50, 6 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Sorry, I also forgot the lede. It's still way too short and lacks the essential facts about her life. i.e. that she lived in the US for a large part of her life, who she married, and where she died.

– Voceditenore (talk) 16:31, 6 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Most of these points have now been addressed. Changes have been made in response to the review because I'm not the original author of the article, and had never heard of Clarke before this review started, so any further suggestions you have would be helpful. Very little information about her relationship with Friskin is available, or about her wishes for her body (though I would argue that the cremation is relevant). Nikkimaria (talk) 17:38, 11 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've done some further copyediting thoughout, expanded the lede, and expanded her biography with more information, i.e., her affair with John Goss, how she met her husband (James Friskin), and the nature of their relationship. Curtis's 1996 article "A Case of Identity" was actually crucial for this and is freely available online. This also involved some changes in the "direction" of content. Curtis makes it clear that her husband had actually encouraged Clarke to continue composing and to try more large scale works. Also, the quote "I can't do it unless it's the first thing I think of every morning when I wake and the last thing I think of every night before I go to sleep." referred to a period several years before she was married, and as such does not support the inference that "Clarke did not consider herself able to balance family life and composition." She was referring in general to her life-long difficulty in balancing a personal life and a composer's life. Anyhow, I'd support a Keep now, although the it might be a good idea to make one last pass through the references to check for formatting consistency. Voceditenore (talk) 13:45, 12 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]


The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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