I would like to nominate George H.D. Gossip for A-class. Philchapreviously wrote on the WikiProject Chess discussion page that the article "is well above a typical B-class article ... Given that Gossip was not one of the giants and therefore the range of WP:RS about him is probably limited, I think the article is quite close to GA." (Of course, Philcha can and no doubt will speak for himself as to whether the current iteration warrants A-class.) I have done a lot of work on the article since then, addressing the (limited) issues he raised, and think it is in very good shape. I hope you all agree! Please let me know your thoughts. Thanks! Krakatoa (talk) 21:33, 12 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support As most of my concerns have been addressed below and the remaining ones are not that significant, I support the A-class for this article, based on this version. SyG (talk) 19:17, 6 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done "There, he was brought up at Barlborough Hall, Derbyshire, the seat of his aunt, Mrs. Reaston Rodes, and at Hatfield, in Yorkshire." That makes six commas in just one sentence; I find the formulation heavy. SyG (talk) 13:40, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done "Gossip could have taken a scholarship at Oxford University, but was unable to do so because..." Could he or could he not ? Maybe a formulation like "Gossip had the required scolar results to take a scholarship at Oxford University, but..." would be clearer for the reader. SyG (talk) 13:40, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done "As a result, Gossip had to support himself through his own labors". Does that mean he eventually attended to Oxford, but had to work in the same time to finance his studies ? Or does that mean he did not attended to Oxford at all, but still had to work to survive ? SyG (talk) 13:40, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As I read the source, he was unable to accept the scholarship to Oxford, and had to begin working immediately. I have revised this to make this clearer. Krakatoa (talk) 06:46, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No. Gossip is a pretty minor figure and there is very little written on him: there is an 1888 Columbia Chess Chronicle piece (Winter cites it; I don't have a copy of the original), Diggle's 1969 article, a shorter article by Diggle in 1983, a pretty nasty little article in The Oxford Companion to Chess, Winter's 2004 article, and that's about it. Gossip isn't in the chess encyclopedias by Golombek, Sunnucks, or Divinsky. He is mentioned only in passing in Fred Reinfeld's A Treasury of British Chess Masterpieces (for the Showalter game), America's Chess Heritage by Walter Korn, and Arthur Bisguier and Andrew Soltis, American Chess Masters from Morphy to Fischer. Krakatoa (talk) 06:46, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done I am not sure this section is compliant with MOS:NUM regarding to the notation of scores. Unless I am mistaken I will change that directly. SyG (talk) 14:30, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Curt von Bardeleben won with 21.5 points; Isidor Gunsberg, who would narrowly lose an 1890-91 World Championship match to Steinitz, finished fourth with 19" Here and in the next paragraphs, I am not sure to understand what the point of mentioning the winners is. What is the link with Gossip ? SyG (talk) 14:30, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It is hard to understand the significance of Gossip's performance without looking at the performance of other significant players in the tournament. Just saying "Gossip scored 17.5/25, tying for 5th-6th" would be almost meaningless. For all we know, the tournament could be composed of near-beginners. The fact that Gossip was only one place and 1.5 points behind Gunsberg, who within the decade was playing Steinitz for the world championship, places Gossip's score in context, showing it to be a significant achievement. Krakatoa (talk) 06:46, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I see. The problem is, in this paragraph dedicated to the 1883 London Vizayanagaram minor tournament, there is only one sentence about Gossip's performance (the first one) for two sentences giving the context, without a clear flow. That seems a bit unbalanced to me. I would propose to put the last sentence (the one about the major tournament) into footnotes, or maybe to rewrite the paragraph a bit to place more clearly Gossip's result as a good performance. Here is a possible example:
Gossip had his first significant competitive success in the 1883 London Vizayanagaram minor tournament. Although this tournament was weaker than the main 1883 London master tournament that took place at the same time (won by Zukertort ahead of Steinitz), it was still a tournament of master class with such chess champions as Curt von Bardeleben and Isidor Gunsberg. Hence Gossip's 5th-6th place out of 26 players is seen as a very good result.
I have rewritten the paragraph and, as per your suggestion, relegated discussion of the main tournament to a footnote. See what you think. Krakatoa (talk) 10:05, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I am still in doubt about the correct level of detail to give for each tournament, but I will strike it out for now. SyG (talk) 19:06, 6 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done "In 1884, Gossip emigrated from England to Melbourne, Australia" I would propose to move this sentence to the "Non-chess career" section. SyG (talk) 14:30, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done The last paragraph about his strength is good, but I am not sure it belongs to the section "Chess career". We could imagine to merge it into a section "Chess strength" with the notable games ? SyG (talk) 14:30, 22 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't fit in perfectly anyplace, but IMO it is best left where it is. The paragraph places Gossip's chess career in context, showing that (at least according to Chessmetrics) he was a fairly strong player. Without that, the reader is apt to just think, "he finished last in a bunch of tournaments, he must have been a really weak player." To my mind, the discussion of his strength wouldn't fit in at all well with the notable games. I suppose we could just have a section "Chess strength" with only the Elo/Chessmetrics assessments, but I'm not wild about a section with just one paragraph. Krakatoa (talk) 06:46, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On further reflection, I think the paragraph about Gossip's chess strength (per Elo and Chessmetrics) fits in best toward the end of the "Manner and reputation" section, after talking about whether Gossip is a "grandpatzer" or something stronger than that. I've accordingly moved it there. Krakatoa (talk) 04:29, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done "The book became the subject of biting criticism, largely because Gossip had included 27 illustrative games that he had (atypically) won against leading players of the day" Maybe it would be interesting to explain why including one's own games was viewed as inappropriate ? Did Gossip fail to include any of his losses ? SyG (talk) 19:26, 29 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Gossip had 12 of his losses. I have added a block quote by Steinitz explaining why this was considered improper: in brief, Gossip didn't mention that these were skittles games, and that he had typically lost far more games to these players than he won; his presentation gave the misimpression that he was at least equal to, if not superior to, players who were far stronger than he was. I was a bit terse before, perhaps too long-winded now. See what you think. Krakatoa (talk) 06:46, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have no idea how that would be possible. Diggle in his 1983 Newflash article (now quoted at the end of Winter 2004) says it "failed utterly" (I have added this), but I don't know how that translates to volumes sold, nor what would be a good number of sales of a chess book in those days. Krakatoa (talk) 06:46, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Does the Diggle quotation targets only the 1874 edition, or all editions together ? Because there seems to be a contradiction between the book "failing utterly" (Diggle) and the book being "one of the standard opening books of the time" (Hooper & Whyld). If the book was first a commercial disaster but then became a classic (and commercial success ?) thanks to latter edition, maybe that should be highlighted in the article. On that matter, the role of Lipschütz is mentioned but not emphasised. SyG (talk) 10:42, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Diggle referred specifically to the 1874 edition, and didn't mention the 1888 edition. Diggle wrote, "His 900-page Chess Player’s Manual, 1874, into which he put a tremendous amount of work, failed utterly . . . ." Hooper and Whyld, on the other hand, in the passage I cited, referred only to the 1888 edition, writing of Lipschütz, "His 122-page addendum to Gossip's Chess-Player's Manual helped to make this one of the standard opening books of the time." The two statements refer to different editions, and thus are not inconsistent.
Responding to your point about Lipschütz's appendix perhaps not being emphasized enough, I have added a sentence to this section about it, mentioning the praise the New York Times reviewer gave it, and also to the lead, mentioning the appendix and that it was partly responsible for the success of the second (1888) edition. Krakatoa (talk) 05:23, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Having read again the various references, I understand we cannot really say that the success of the book was only thanks to Lipschütz's appendix (which was my original suspicion, I admit). So the treatment of Lipschütz reads good as it is. SyG (talk) 16:55, 6 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done "The June 1888 issue of the International Chess Magazine contained an article by Gossip that Robert John McCrary calls a very illuminating, important, and detailed account of the state of San Francisco chess." Is that really notable ?
Done The second game has a problem of layout at the end, as the last sentence is somewhat crudely cut. I have tried to fix it but unsatisfactorily. SyG (talk) 19:26, 29 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have revised this, eliminating the last sentence and mentioning the double check in the previous sentence. Doing so isn't strictly necessary, but I thought that otherwise a lot of players would look at the position, not realize that Black is in check by two pieces, and think that simply ...Bxd6 would save Black in the final position. Krakatoa (talk) 06:46, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I have no idea how to solve that, but the format of the last line is still weird, starting on the left while all others are put between the two diagrams. SyG (talk) 10:42, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have now (I think) solved the formatting problem (the dreaded "sandwiching text between two diagrams", frowned on by WP:MOS, as I recall) as we did in First-move advantage in chess, by having two diagrams at left or two diagrams at right, not two diagrams at left and right with text sandwiched in between them. Krakatoa (talk) 06:00, 1 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I just noticed "Philcha can and no doubt will speak for himself ..." - God, you're hard taskmaster, Krakatoa! I'll assume the the eagle-eyed SyG has spotted any problems with refs.
Response And here I thought you were just snubbing me! :-) Thanks for your thorough and thoughtful comments, which I will respond to below. Krakatoa (talk) 20:28, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done Any info on the unusual name "Hatfeild", which looks like a misprint (especially as he was raised in Hatfield) but was apparently traditional in the family? OTOH The Aussie air ace and presumed grandson was named George Hatfield Dingley Gossip (or is the latter a misprint, as Winter's source says this info is from "an Australian website about World War One aces"). Diggle in G.H. Diggle in the April 1983 Newsflashhad doubts about the spelling.
Yes, "Hatfeild" screams out "typo", but it's not. See Chess Note 5100 Whyld's May 2001 BCM piece, referenced there, has a copy of Gossip's signature, which clearly reads "G. Hatfeild D. Gossip". Whyld says that Gossip's father was "George Hatfeild Gossip". My guess is that Gossip's son (presumably Gossip's grandson, bearing the surname "Gossip", would be fathered by one of his sons, not a daughter) went with "Hatfield" to spare the kid from having to correct people's misspelling of his middle name 1,000 times. Or it could be that the Australian aces website (I put a link to it in the article) used "Hatfield" thinking that "Hatfeild" must be wrong - or simply misreading "Hatfeild" as the more normal "Hatfield". Or the kid could have been named "Hatfeild", but started using "Hatfield" because he was tired of having a weird middle name and/or of having to correct people's constant misspelling of it. Note that the sources regarding "The Jew of Chamant" all list the real name of the pseudonymous author as "Hatfield", not the correct "Hatfeild". Krakatoa (talk) 22:04, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done "the seat of his aunt" is correct but old-fashioned. "ancestral home of the family into which his aunt had married"?
These Briticisms confuse me. I didn't know exactly what "seat of his aunt" meant, so I just copied it. Similarly, "the King of Wooden Spoonists", which is apparently a real thigh-slapper to you Brits, mystified me. (I just now looked up "wooden spoon" in the Compact Oxford English Dictionary.) Krakatoa (talk) 20:28, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"seat of his aunt" could be material for another "bit of fun". Or you could just link to Family seat. BTW in Britain only pantomime heroes (traditionally played by young women!) slap their thighs :-) --Philcha (talk) 21:47, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Gad, I just can't avoid these faux pas! Yes, the "seat of his aunt" double entendre occurred to me, but I let it pass. I have rewritten the "seat of his aunt" thing along the lines you suggested. Krakatoa (talk) 22:04, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"vanishing for 12 years in 1895 and finally returning to this country (UK) to die at Liphook, Hants in 1907" (Winter)
I agree that the chronology is very unclear. Gossip traveled an extraordinary amount (especially for those pre-air travel days) and it's hard to figure out when he was where. Diggle also mentions in the Newsflash article that Gossip lived in Germany at one point, but doesn't say when. Krakatoa (talk) 20:28, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Trying to address your concern, I've moved all the stuff about his travels to the Non-chess career/Family section, which I've renamed "Non-chess career, family, and world travels". See how it reads now. Krakatoa (talk) 23:04, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
A lot better. But it still omits the fact that he apparently moved to London by 1864, mentioned in "Chess career". I don't think it would hurt to mention that in "... world travels". If you don't like that, perhaps you could move "Chess career" before "Non-chess career, family, and world travels", since chess is what makes him notable. --Philcha (talk) 16:23, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, I don't know whether he was living in London in 1864. He was "appearing" there, but he may have traveled there from elsewhere, as he did when he lived in East Bergholt (see below). Gossip's travels even within England were pretty extensive. I have avoided getting into them, since I daresay they would bore the s*** out of every non-British reader. To wit:
As mentioned in the article, he grew up at his aunt's seat in Derbyshire, and at Hatfield, in Yorkshire.
As mentioned in the article, his college education was at Westmorland.
As mentioned in the article, he was appearing in London chess circles by 1864.
In an 1873 letter, he wrote that he had spent "the greater part of my life" in the West Riding of Yorkshire (Diggle, p. 1).
The 1871 census shows that he was living in London at the time of the census.
As mentioned in the article, his child Helen was born in London c. 1872.
But Diggle writes that as of the London 1872 tournament (2nd British Chess Federation Congress, held in July - Di Felice, p. 54) he was living "at East Bergholt, near Colchester" and "making chess-playing visits to London" (Diggle, p. 1).
As mentioned in the article, his next children, Harold and Mabel, were born in East Bergholt (c. 1874 and 1879, respectively).
As of the 1881 census, he was living in Ipswich.
As of the 1891 census, he was back in London.
As mentioned in the article, in 1907 he died in Liphook, Herts, England.
Done I'd include Diggle's "the King of Wooden Spoonists". I like the examples of Gossip's tendency to bigotry given later, as I think WP is far too bloody solemn. There are other opportunities in the Winter page, mostly penned by Diggle. If sources give me an opportunity to lighten up I use them, even in paleontology and biology articles ("Pleistocene periwinkles" at Small shelly fauna, "Swiss Army knives" at Arthropod). One academic even used a couplet from Byron about "pukin' ... in the Euxine" in an article about mid-late Proterozoic atmosphere and ocean chemistry, and if I get a chance ...
Addendum: I have worked "whingeing pom" into the article; I trust that this meets with your approval. btw, you might consider whether you can find a place for pearl necklace in one of your biology articles. :-) Krakatoa (talk) 10:48, 6 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done The details of Gossip's last 12 years and death sit rather oddly at the end of this section. Issues like this make me prefer a straight chronological structure (sub-dived if appropriate) and then separate assessments of playing strength & style, personality, influence on the game, chess and other writings, etc.
I've moved the "last 12 years and death" bit to the aforementioned "Non-chess career, family, and world travels" section. See how it looks. Krakatoa (talk) 23:06, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Mr Gossip had practiced the unfair ruse of carefully preserving stray skittles games which he had happened to win or draw, generally after many defeats, against masters whose public records stood far above his own, ..., thus leading the public to believe that the author stood on a par with them, or was even their superior.
Done I love the story about the ledger! And the Steinitzian invective re the Steinitz gambit - with a little more grandiloquence Staunton could have written it! And "New York 1889, a major tournament where he won 11 games and finished above the bottom"!
Done The mixing and comparing of Elo and Chessmetrics ratings is confusing, as Elo and Chessmetrics numbers don't map on to each other. How about:
By Arpad Elo's calculation, Gossip's strength during his five-year peak was equivalent to an Elo rating of 2310.[1] Today FIDE, the World Chess Federation, often awards the Grandmaster title to players with Elo ratings of 2500 and above.[citation needed]Chessmetrics calculates that his peak was in April 1889, ranking him number 50 in the world at that time with a Chessmetrics score of 2470 (for comparison the top three Chessmetrics scores for April 1889 were over 2700[2]). Chessmetrics also ranks him number 17 in the world during four one-month periods between February and July, 1873. Like Diggle, Chessmetrics regards New York 1889 as Gossip's best individual performance, concluding that he scored 39% against opponents with an average rating of 2595, giving him a performance rating of 2539 for that tournament.[3]
Done Ref needed for "Today FIDE, the World Chess Federation, often awards the Grandmaster title to players with Elo ratings of 2500 and above."
Thanks for adding "FIDE master" as well, that really helps the perspective. Very wise of you to consign "GM / IM norm" to a footnote. We could almost use Gossip as a poster-child for the rise of world chess strength 1875-1900.
Done Need to explain why Chessmetrics says his peak was 1889 but gives him a much higher world ranking for 1873. Could point out that opportunities for top-level competition were still rare around 1873 - {{ cite book | author=Fine, R. | title=The World's Great Chess Games | publisher=Andre Deutsch | date=1952 | chapter=Wilhem Steinitz | page=31 }} Might also be worth pointing out that chess got a lot stronger between 1873 and 1889: Chessmetrics gives Gossip a score of 2352 for Jul 1873 but only Steinitz was over 2700 and only 3 others over 2600 (July 1873 rating list).
I have revised this section along the lines you have suggested. I think it is still likely to be confusing to readers who haven't heard of Elo ratings, GM norms and such. Krakatoa (talk) 20:39, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In "However, Chessmetrics calculates that Gossip's highest rating was 2470 (number 50 in the world) in April 1889" the word "However" makes it look like a disagreement between Elo & Chessmetrics. I'd prefer e.g. "Another assessment system, Chessmetrics, calculates that ...". To keep things as clear as possible I'd suggest for the next sentence e.g. "By comparison, the world's three highest-rated players at that time had Chessmetrics scores exceeding 2700." What do you think? --Philcha (talk) 16:23, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done Dude, I already cited those sites! Apparently not prominently enough, so I've now stated explicitly where the reader can play over the games. Krakatoa (talk) 22:20, 4 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support I finally managed to get around reviewing an article. Without further delay, this article gets my full support for A-class (I think it does not need much or any work for FA actually). It is brilliantly written (reads very fluently, well structured, etc..) It is factual comprehensive, and gives a glimpse in the character Gossip (or how others perceived him). A few very minor points (I am sorry if I am duplicating stuff from other reviewers, I did not have time to go through those reviews):
In the intro, "toward chess critics" does not sound good to me. I would say "towards chess critics" (they are probably both correct?)
Yes, apparently they are both correct: the dictionaries seem to treat the two words as interchangeable. See, e.g., this. Unfortunately, I have the opposite reaction to you: "towards" makes me cringe. I am pretty sure I have actually corrected other people's use of "towards" in Wikipedia articles because I thought it was wrong. Since both are apparently considered correct, and I can't stand "towards", I've left it alone. Krakatoa (talk) 06:57, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
He seems to have written a lot about non-chess related topics too, in a wide variety of magazines. Were these essays on sociology/economy/politics, or did he write as a news reporter? (This was not 100% clear to me as I am not familiar with the publications)
About all I know on that subject is from the Columbia Chess Chronicle article that Winter quotes from. I am also not familiar with them except for the San Francisco Chronicle and San Francisco Examiner, which apparently were then (as now, I believe) the two principal S.F. newspapers. Except for The Advertiser (Adelaide), all of the other publications that Gossip wrote for are apparently out of business (not surprisingly, given the lapse of 120 years or so). The Columbia Chess Chronicle article says, as I recall, that Gossip wrote "lead and other" articles for the various publications. I would guess from this that some were relatively short news items and others more in-depth (the "Chinese question" article, for example). But that's just a guess. Krakatoa (talk) 06:57, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"You can play the game over here" stands a bit out, since it is addressing the reader for the first time, perhaps better put in footnotes.
I am happy to do this whatever way people think is best. I originally (as in First-move advantage in chess) just provided the ChessGames.com links as references, without the direction "You can play over the game here." But then Philcha wrote in his review that I should provide links to the ChessGames.com URLs where people could play over the games. I said that I had, but since I had obviously done so too subtly, I would make it explicit. (See discussion under Notable games above.) As I say, I'm willing to do it either way, but now I kind of like it the current way, which makes it explicit to the reader. Realistically, if one doesn't make it explicit, many readers won't read the footnotes, won't realize that they can play over the games without getting out a board (if Philcha, going over the article with a fine-toothed comb, didn't realize that, the lay reader, who's not going over the article so carefully and has never heard of ChessGames.com, won't), and won't play over the games at all. So I'm inclined to think that the current way is the most user-friendly. Krakatoa (talk) 06:57, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Philcha, apparently having read our exchange, suggested another approach: putting the links in the diagram captions. That seemed like a brilliant idea, but I tried it and it made the captions disappear?! See [1]. I've now reworded the sentence to avoid the "You"/speaking to the reader thing. Now it reads "The game can be played over here." Hope that addresses your issue. Krakatoa (talk) 18:04, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks again! Having lost my job two years ago because I was more concerned with futilely opposing the Bush regime than amassing billable hours, Wikipedia is one of the few pleasures I have left in life these days. :P Krakatoa (talk) 06:57, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I know exactly what you are talking about. I did the same thing when I was without a job, even went as far as learning chinese to write the Chinese Chess Championship :). Thanks as well for the replies to my comments (which I broadly agree with). Voorlandt (talk) 10:38, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
