Talk:Jo Clifford

GA Review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

This review is transcluded from Talk:Jo Clifford/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Chiswick Chap (talk · contribs) 09:37, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Comments

• into various languages: would be interesting to know how many languages she's been translated into. Maybe pick one play that's been much/most translated and give the figure for that?

• 80 plays: 'Works' lists 17: are they at random, or are they known to be the most popular, or what?

• Unfortunately I can't seem to find a total list of languages or works, and don't want to engage in too much original research, so I've removed this. Evidently we won't be able to list all 80 in the article if this were the case, so I have added citations to third-party sources (per request below). If there are any others which I have missed, or others which are worthy of inclusion, please let me know. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• Anna Karena evidently has an allusive title, but it seems to be a mistake as Clifford's actual play is titled Anna Karenina. Suggest a) fix b) add this source c) use source in 'Reception' (or maybe 'Analysis' if going into that sort of detail) as per items below.

• Argh, I should have spotted that! I think I've fixed this now. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• Only 7 of the 17 are cited; one of them, Gospel has a remarkable 4 sources, and Tree of Knowledge has 2, not sure why. It would be much nicer to have a source for each one.

• I've trimmed away some of the excess sources now, and included more analysis (see below). If anyone wishes to re-add content from some of the deleted sources I will not object. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• It would also be much nicer to have a 'Reception' section with comments, favourable or not, (from sources [21] and following) on the quality and importance of her playwriting.

• Not sure what you mean by from sources [21] and following; as far as I can tell they don't tend to go into too much detail about the reception? I've added a section with comments and analysis, I hope this is an improvement. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• As well as original works Clifford has also written - too much 'As well as' and 'also', in fact neither of these is necessary here.

• Thanks, this has been reworded. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• with Ferdy Woodward. - what does this mean, and why is it encyclopedic? It's unusual to make an account of early life and education anything other than simply factual (X studied at school S, graduated from uni U).

• Not sure why this was included; removed. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• for 33 yrs - please spell this out.

•  Done GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• a modern version of the medieval play, Everyman ... Great Expectations: it seems there's a thread of adaptation and modernisation here, maybe with The Leopard and Faust etc, too: I think we should have some sort of section about these themes. Could be in 'Reception' or might be a more scholarly and critical 'Analysis'.

• I agree and understand with what you're saying here – I can find a number of sources talking about the universal themes within her plays, but I cannot seem to find anything specifically on the theme of adaptation and modernisation. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• I can't help noticing that Gospel, Eve, Tree of Knowledge, and maybe Faust have a Christian ring to them. Is this accidental or a key element of Clifford's writing? Clearly it could be either pro- or -anti, or some third way position, but whichever it is, it sounds as if it might be rather important? It seems to me that we are definitely missing an 'Analysis' section, which might cover this or other themes in Clifford's work. The throwaway line in 'Career' The play features Jesus as a trans woman. sounds to me as if it is not even scratching the surface of a major theme, for example.

• I've expounded a little more on Clifford's religious views in the Reception and analysis section; I hope this is an improvement. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• 'Awards and honours' makes use of three different formats within the list of three items! Please pick one and stick with it.

•  Done GnocchiFan (talk) 22:13, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

Images

• The only image seems to be suitably licensed, with the caveat noted on the Commons page.

Sources

• The sources I see are fine and relevant, but what they say about Clifford is scarcely mentioned in the article.

• @Chiswick Chap: I have added some more content per the sources and suggestions you have made above. As it stands, is there any particular source or aspect mentioned in them (not covered above) that you think would be helpful to improve this article? Thank you for your patience in reviewing this. --GnocchiFan (talk) 22:16, 11 March 2024 (UTC)

• [23], [29], [31] are primary and are provided presumably only to establish the fact of publication. This isn't necessary (is simply duplication) in a list of 'Works', which is already a list of (abbreviated) citations; it would be better to provide brief bibliographic details (publisher, at least) for every work in the list.

Summary

This article looks promising, but it seems to me to be rather incomplete. In particular, while the Awards and honours establish notability, the article says almost nothing about why Clifford is notable. The trans aspect is obviously important, and it looks as if the Christianity aspect is too. It is certainly discussed in reliable sources (e.g. 'I want to be a threat': Jo Clifford on her transgender Christ and overcoming fear (The Guardian) (already in article, but barely used to date), Jo Clifford: 'I see writing as a way of resisting prejudice' (British Council) ... there are many other good sources), so to clear GAN the article will need to add at least "the main points" in an 'Analysis' or 'Reception' section (probably both, as these will be at different levels - the Reception detailing how much people liked or disliked the plays, the Analysis exploring scholarly and other discussion of the significance of Clifford's work). Currently the only 'analysis' is a few remarks in the second paragraph of 'Career', where they do not fit well: they should be migrated to one of the new sections. The effect will be quite a major addition to what is rather a skimpy article at the moment, so we will likely have to have a second pass through the review criteria when the article has been extended. Review is On hold until this is actioned. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:14, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Well, second time around, the article is plainly much improved by the increased depth of coverage. I'm certain that more could be said, but the main themes are now at least mentioned, which is the GA criterion. It is likely that as Clifford's career progresses, more will be needed, but for now, this is a GA. Chiswick Chap (talk) 05:35, 12 March 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Hilst talk 14:00, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

• ... that The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven, Jo Clifford's 2009 play featuring Jesus as a trans woman, was criticised by the Archbishop of Glasgow (who had not seen the play)? Source: https://www.theguardian.com/stage/theatreblog/2014/aug/07/edinburgh-festival-2014-gospel-according-to-jesus-domino-effect
  • Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Alda Milner-Barry
  • Comment: Open to re-wording or alternative hooks.

Created by GnocchiFan (talk). Self-nominated at 20:29, 14 March 2024 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/Jo Clifford; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.

• Not a review, and I review oldest first so wouldn't get to this for ages anyway (but would not object to any other editor reviewing this in the meantime); hooks must not contain parentheses per WP:DYKMOS, and it's a crying shame "that Jo Clifford's The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven depicts Jesus as a trans woman" probably won't fly per WP:DYKFICTION.--Launchballer 13:36, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Ah, thanks for letting me know! Happy to propose the below as an alt. If anyone has a better way of wording this let me know:

ALT1: ... that The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven, Jo Clifford's 2009 play featuring Jesus as a trans woman, was called an "affront to the Christian faith" by the Archbishop of Glasgow?

GnocchiFan (talk) 17:30, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

Fine by me. Full review needed.--Launchballer 17:36, 15 March 2024 (UTC)

General: Article is new enough and long enough
New enough: Long enough:

Policy compliance:

• Adequate sourcing: - Mostly fine, except: Newsweek is a source of marginal reliability, and so it shouldn't be used for a politically-sensitive, BLP-sensitive claim. I see that the Guardian cite verifies everything except the archbishop's name... Presumably there is some coverage from back in 2009, when he said this?
• Neutral:
• Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:
• Other problems: - Going to be a little picky here on overquoting: I don't have a problem with the amount of quoting used for Clifford's personal experiences etc., but the statement about Jahwism seems like something that we could easily say in our own voice.

Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
Cited: Interesting:

QPQ: - So, you've nominated 6 articles before, and on 2 of those 6 you submitted QPQs voluntarily even though you were exempt. This is a kind thing to have done, and it would sort of make sense if you got to keep those exemptions for a rainy day, and I'm guessing that's how the reviewer on your last nomination thought it works too (courtesy ping Just-a-can-of-beans). But, for better or for worse, that's not how it works. Once you hit 5 nominations, QPQs are required, even if you didn't use all 5 exemptions. So, please do submit a QPQ for this article when you have a moment.
Overall: Hi, GnocchiFan! Great to run into you again. We keep bouncing around the same parts of the project, including the LGBT Jesus topic area. Glad to see you got this article to GA! Overall, this is mostly ready. There's three Xs above but they're all pretty easy fixes. Let me know if you have any questions. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe) 20:56, 16 March 2024 (UTC)

Hello again! Thank you for taking your time out to review this article, very pleased to meet you again. Finding the name of the archbishop who said this was surprisingly difficult; I've removed the Newsweek source and his name as it doesn't make a big difference in the grand scheme of things. I've tried to re-word the comments on Jahwism but to be honest I'm not sure how else to phrase it - if you have any suggestions on improvement I appreciate it. Submitted a QPQ now, thank you for letting me know! –GnocchiFan (talk) 14:20, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

Changes look good to me. QPQ is satisfactory. I also took a stab at finding an RS clearly naming the archbishop, and also came up empty. But the fact that such a simple thing isn't said explicitly anywhere is a good indication that there might be some sourcing issue here, so I think it's a good call to just cut the name entirely. But at that point, I'm hesitant to put this statement in a hook, if the most proximate source we have verifying the quote is from 5 years after the fact, refers to him only by his title, and does not give the context he said this in. Like, [1] is pretty alarming, and it makes me wonder if this is actually a paraphrase of Clifford's own paraphrase of something. (Note [2].) Having it in the article is one thing (The Guardian is generally reliable and there's no "smoking gun" that they did something wrong here), but putting it in a hook on the Main Page.... I don't know. Again, I'm hesitant. So you have a few options here, @GnocchiFan:

1. Somehow find whatever source neither of us can find.
2. Convince me I'm wrong. (It's been known to happen!)
3. Pick a hook that doesn't mention this fact.
4. Request a second reviewer. This would be a totally reasonable course of action. If a second reviewer doesn't have an issue with this going into a hook, I'll defer to them.

-- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe) 17:41, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

Interesting. I can seem to find other generally reliable sources which use this quote, but they all seem to date after the 2014 interview – perhaps you are right. For the avoidance of doubt, I have removed this quote from the article and added one from the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Glasgow Mario Conti, who does have contemporaneous sourcing for his claims – perhaps this is where the mix-up has happened?

ALT2: ... that The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven, Jo Clifford's 2009 play featuring Jesus as a trans woman, was called an "offensive abuse of Christian beliefs" by Archbishop Mario Conti?

Hopefully I'll be third time lucky on my hook; let me know if there are any other issues, and thank you for your patience throughout the DYK process. − GnocchiFan (talk) 18:14, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

Ah! Looking at that source, this definitely does look like a case of a paraphrase being mistaken for a quote, combined with some less-reliable sources incorrectly guessing which Archbishop of Glasgow other sources were referring to. Perhaps someone overly relying on Clifford's own press kit; perhaps just a game of telephone. Either way, that clears that up. Thanks for getting to the bottom of it. Good to go! -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (they|xe) 21:42, 17 March 2024 (UTC)