Wikipedia:Peer review/The Woman's Bible/archive1

The Woman's Bible

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because it recently passed GAN and I wish to take the article to FAC. My close connection to the article may be preventing me from seeing a problem that would affect its ability to move forward.

Thanks, Binksternet (talk) 05:26, 17 February 2010 (UTC)

Comments Article looks pretty good; interesting on a subject I knew nothing about. However, I do feel that there's a great deal more about the response to the book in the article than material that tells us what was actually in the book. I realise it's hard to summarise an entire book, but I'm keen to know more of its contents. That's my criticism of the article as it stands. --bodnotbod (talk) 14:07, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

That's a fair criticism. Binksternet (talk) 15:40, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Initial brief comment: My first impression of the article was that it was rather dominated by its images which were over-large for the text. As an experiment I have reduced all the image sizes, and think this improves the overall appearance. I have also absorbed the shorter blockquotes into the text, to reduce the amount of unsightly white space that otherwise disrupts the article. You are of course free to revert these changes, but I'd ask you to consider them before you do. More detailed comments on the text will follow. Brianboulton (talk) 23:08, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Detailed comments: A most interesting subject, and a generally absorbing article.

• Lead
  • The opening sentence has three "ands", and needs to be split. Thus: "The Woman's Bible is a two-part book, written by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and a committee of 26 women. It was published in 1895 and 1898 to challenge the traditional position of religious orthodoxy that woman should be subservient to man."
  • "By producing the book, Stanton wished to promote a radical liberating theology..." Slightly cumbersome wording; could be simplified to: "Stanton's objective was to promote..." etc
  • Overlinking: Bible
  • I recommend reorganising and slightly shortening the first two sentences in the second paragraph as follows: "Many women's rights activists who worked with Stanton within the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) were opposed to the publication of The Woman's Bible; they felt it would harm the drive for women's suffrage. Although it was never accepted by Bible scholars as a major work, it became a popular best-seller, much to the dismay of Stanton's fellow suffragists."
  • "Because of the widespread negative reaction, including suffragists who had been close to her,..." Not quite grammatical as it stands. Needs to say "including that of suffragists".
• Background
  • "Independently from Mott, Lucy Stone determined for herself..." As you have said "Independently from Mott", you don't need "for herself"
  • I'm not sure that "disarming", in the context you use it, is the best word. It carries a connotation of winning over by charm. Perhaps "combatting", or simply "answering"?
• Revising committee
  • Date confusion: can you clarify what the first sentence means? Does it mean that the Revised version was produced in instalments in the years that you mention, or that it was produced as a draft in 1881, revised in 1885 and further revised in 1894? There is further confusion by the mention of "the revised edition of 1888" in Stanton's subsequent quote.
  • You might mention earlier that the committee was international in character, and indicate in the list of names the non-American countries.
  • "Clark questioned whether Stanton's liberal views had shocked some in attendance" Odd wording, which doesn't really make sense. Should it be "Clark wondered whether..."? That would be consistent with what follows.
  • "Gage determined that the Church had acted against women's interests in important ways: from Roman Catholic canon law, to Scripture, to its advocacy of celibacy and more." I can't discern a clear "from...to" range here. Needs revision/clarification.
  • "Especially troubling to Gage was the story of Adam and Eve." This is rather left dangling. Why was this myth particularly troubling? (presumably because it specifically associates woman with original sin, but you should say so.)
  • "It included a Preface written by Stanton..." Does "it" refer to Part 1 or Part 2?
• Missing section: as with all book articles, we need a section that summarises the contents of the book. This need not be particularly long, but it is necessary to the coherence of the whole article. It's on Gutenberg so this should not be a problem.
• Reaction
  • "At its introduction" is awkward-sounding. "On its publication" would be better.
  • "Some were put off just by its prejudicial, sacrilegious title, especially those who did not take the time to read the book."[15] There are problems with this statement. First, it isn't clear whether "Some" refers to the clergy, from the previous sentence, or to readers generally. Secondly, who is describing the title as prejudicial and sacriligious? Most important, however, is the fact that the statement is not backed up by the citation. This NYT letter, by the "female reader" mentioned later, is an attack on the book written "on behalf of those who have not the time nor the inclination to read the book", which is quite different from what the statement implies. For there reasons I would omit the statement altogether.
  • "Others countered the book's more extreme conclusions one by one in public fora such as letters to the editor." Again, problematic; whose judgement is "the book's more extreme conclusions"? The sentence tells us very little beyond that people wrote letters to newspapers, which we can deduce anyway from the next few sentences, so I suggest this is omitted, too.
  • "One female reader..." Since her name is known, why is she left anonymous?
  • "Stanton's best and most faithful collaborator..." POV?
  • First two sentences of this paragraph look in need of citation.
  • I may be wrong, but phrasing such as "Anthony was unhappy at the futility of the effort, a harmful digression from the focused path which led to woman suffrage" sounds like either quoted material or a very close paraphrase, and perhaps should be attributed.
  • "Led the battle" is a little too forceful for a neutral article. Bland phrasing: "led the efforts" or "led the moves"?
  • "Avery's opening report of January 23 was adopted with the part about The Woman's Bible expunged.[26]" I'm curious to know why, given that her resolution was passed, the meat of her opening comments should then be expunged. Any explanation?
• Legacy: awkward repetition of "place of honor" in final short paragraph. Suggest rephrase.
• References and sources
  • Why use this to quote from the book when you can refer to the text itself?
  • Sandra M Gilbert's book is not listed in the bibliography
  • Kern's book is in the bibliography but does not apear to have been used as a reference.

If you have any questions relating to this review, please contact me on my talk page. Thanks, Brianboulton (talk) 11:30, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Excellent observations. I will use your critique in improving the article, when I get the chance. This article is in fifth place on my "To Do" list, so my work on it will not begin immediately. Binksternet (talk) 00:53, 4 March 2010 (UTC)