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I am listing this article for peer review because I want to see what changes I need to make to this article to get it good enough to nominate for Good Article status.
Thanks, JC7V (talk) 21:01, 25 November 2018 (UTC)
- Hi JC7V7DC5768. I've done a few GA reviews so I'll throw out some thoughts based on a first impression. By and large, in my opinion, this would automatically fail the WP:GAC in its current state. Some of the most noticeable issues:
- The lead is very short. It would definitely need to be expanded and rewritten in accordance with WP:MOSLEAD.
- Your references are scanty - only seven footnotes for the whole article is far below what's expected.
- In addition, the references that do exist lack page numbers or direct links, which would be an immediate failure of GAC 2.a in my opinion (information can't be verified if it isn't clear where it is).
- Quotes should be in quotation marks, not in italics.
- There should be far fewer quotes in general - many of them are not needed, particularly the ones from his autobiography. We should be writing in an encyclopedic tone, not restating his own words.
- Per MOS:WE, no first-person pronouns like "we" or "us".
- Overall style and grammar is somewhat archaic/stiff, often all twisted up in commas. "Through his business, he became acquainted with a Mr Murdoch, a hearth-money collector, whose house he visited in order to paint" is one really egregious example. I would recommend asking for a copy-edit from the Guild of Copy Editors once you're farther along in the revising process.
- I'm happy to give it another look in the future if you keep working on it. Just ping me and I'll wander by; I don't have this on my watchlist. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 16:39, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
- Premeditated Chaos Hi, thanks for the feedback. I went ahead and made the changes to the article as you suggested. Tell me if the changes were good enough and if not, what further changes need to be made? JC7V (talk) 21:15, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
- It's a good start, but it still feels like the prose is structured in a way that makes it feel really archaic. As an example, "practising every species of it" is an unnecessarily elaborate description of getting into trouble. You could probably lose that whole sentence and just say "as a child, he was prone to misbehavior" or something similar to that. Another example: "was aged seventeen" is kind of an old-fashioned way of saying "was seventeen". Parts of the article feel more editorial than encyclopedic ("coolly admits", "which he enjoyed for the next two years").
- I recommend rewriting the article significantly to put it in simpler, more modern English. If you don't feel confident doing that, Guild of Copy Editors is a good place to look for help. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 21:52, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
- Premeditated Chaos I've rewritten the article to sound better. I also enlisted the help of the Guild of Copy Editors to help out further. Thanks for the feedback. JC7V (talk) 23:11, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
- No problem, good luck! ♠PMC♠ (talk) 03:42, 4 December 2018 (UTC)
- Premeditated Chaos I've rewritten the article to sound better. I also enlisted the help of the Guild of Copy Editors to help out further. Thanks for the feedback. JC7V (talk) 23:11, 1 December 2018 (UTC)
- Premeditated Chaos Hi, thanks for the feedback. I went ahead and made the changes to the article as you suggested. Tell me if the changes were good enough and if not, what further changes need to be made? JC7V (talk) 21:15, 1 December 2018 (UTC)