Template:Did you know nominations/Medieval Japanese literature

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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 Yoninah (talk) 21:29, 24 August 2019 (UTC)

Medieval Japanese literature

  • ... that Noh drama, linked verse, and warrior epics became prominent literary genres in Japan's medieval period? Source: "The interest of medieval Japanese literature lies elsewhere—in the newly created genres, notably the war tales, renga, and the Nō dramas." (Seeds in the Heart : 609)
    • ALT1:... that medieval Japanese literature ceased to be the reserve of the aristocracy and became "national literature"? Source: "さらに末期に至っては、[僧侶(隠遁者)や武家に]町人(都市人)も加わっており、貴族的文学から国民的文学へと広がって行ったのが中世であった。" (Nihon Koten Bungaku Daijiten IV : 258)
    • ALT2:... that Japanese literature of the 12th through 16th centuries ceased to be the reserve of the aristocracy and became "national literature"?Source: (rephrasing of ALT1, so it's the same source; that Japanese literature of the 12th through 16th centuries is synonymous with medieval Japanese literature is verified on the same page of the same source, but see also here for a free online source in English)
  • Comment: My first DYK, so I would ask patience if I've done anything wrong here. This page was promoted to GA a few days ago. Obviously the above hooks are from someone who is not experienced with DYK and would welcome opinions on improving them. The instructions weren't entirely clear on whether the exact title of the article needs to be included in the hook (which for a broad topic with a title like this is kinda difficult), so one has it and the other doesn't but could theoretically be rewritten to include it. Thank you in advance for any advice!

Improved to Good Article status by Hijiri88 (talk). Self-nominated at 14:02, 30 July 2019 (UTC).

General: Article is new enough and long enough
Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
QPQ: None required.

Overall: Source seems legit, but is not accessible. I cannot read Japanese, but I am taking the citations on good faith. So are you saying that the warrior epics are not mentioned in the source? If not, please remove this part from the hook.

  • ALT1 doesn't mention any time period, which makes it a bit vague. Please add this.
  • Please address these two things, and I'll approve the hooks. To asnwer your question, I don't see a problem with the way you have formatted the main wikilink in the main hook. Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 21:45, 31 July 2019 (UTC)
@Farang Bak Tham: Sorry to be a bit unclear. The source does mention warrior epics (軍記物語 gunki monogatari). What I meant is that an alternate quote I could have provided listed linked verse and Noh as new genres that emerged in this period, but instead I chose to string together three separate quotes from three pages of the article. For some reason Google Translate skips over that word if you put the whole quote in, but putting in the first part of the quote (up to the first ellipsis), "新しい文学として登場したのが軍記物語である", gives "It is the military story that appeared as a new literature". Never mind. I found a source in English that handily says everything it needs to in one sentence.
As for ALT1: I thought "medieval" would be enough, but what if it were changed to ... that Japanese literature of the 12th through 16th centuries ceased to be the reserve of the aristocracy and became "national literature"?? As I said above, I worked specifically to shoehorn in the article title; the original draft is here and would read (with the link) ... that Japan's medieval period was when Japanese literature ceased to be the reserve of the aristocracy and became "national literature"?.
Hijiri 88 (やや) 23:00, 31 July 2019 (UTC) edited 23:09, 31 July 2019 (UTC)
I am okay with the format and contents all three hooks, though I prefer the second ALT1 hook (... that Japanese literature of the 12th through 16th centuries ceased to be the reserve of the aristocracy and became "national literature"?) above the first (that medieval Japanese literature ceased to be the reserve of the aristocracy and became "national literature"?). However, I wasn't able to trace the content of the hooks in the article itself. Can you point that out for me, or if it isn't there yet, put the content of the hooks in the article? Thanks.
Oh, and you might want to call the second ALT 1 hook ALT2—so nobody gets confused.--Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 21:42, 1 August 2019 (UTC)
@Farang Rak Tham:
For the first hook: In the 14th and 15th centuries, Kan'ami and his son Zeami, artists in the Yamato sarugaku, tradition created noh [...] Linked verse, or renga, took the place of waka as the dominant poetic form during this period. [...] a new genre that built upon the foundations laid by these emerged in the Kamakura period: the gunki monogatari (warrior tale) It's kinda all over the place in the article proper because of what it is. I have, however, just now edited the lead to say a wider variety of genres and literary forms developed accordingly, such as the gunki monogatari and otogi-zōshi prose narratives, and renga linked verse, as well as various theatrical forms such as noh. (Previously the lead had only mentioned Noh in The performing arts flourished during the late medieval period, the noh theatre and its more informal cousin kyōgen being the best-known genres.)
For ALT1/ALT2: This led Teiji Ichiko [ja], in his article on medieval literature for the Nihon Koten Bungaku Daijiten, to conclude that the medieval period was the time when the literature of the nobility became a truly national Japanese literature.
I'm not sure if using slightly different orthographies ("Noh" vs. "noh") or translated terms as opposed to native ones ("warrior epics" vs. "gunki monogatari", "linked verse" vs. "renga") in the hooks from what actually appears in the article is a problem -- I didn't think it was, but I now suspect the different wording may have been the reason you had trouble tracing the hook contents in the article proper.
Hijiri 88 (やや) 04:52, 2 August 2019 (UTC)
All hooks approved. ALT 1 and 2 on good faith. Congrats!--Farang Rak Tham (Talk) 17:02, 2 August 2019 (UTC)
  • Hi, I came by to promote this, but the part about it becoming "national literature" seems to be the opinion of one scholar. If we say "according to Ichiko", it just adds more characters to the hook and makes it more scholarly. How about saying something a little more colorful:
@Yoninah: Thank you for your comments! To clarify, the inline attribution to Ichiko is the result of (a) my pedantically not wanting to write things in Wikipedia's voice that "feel kinda subjective" without naming the person I'm citing and (b) the fact that other scholars might agree that the middle ages is when Japanese literature became "national" but take different views on the reasons to call it that -- I'm pretty sure Ichiko doesn't say much about the fall of the aristocratic society in Kyoto in the 14th through 16th centuries, but if I recall correctly Keene definitely does, or would if he made this point anywhere in his History. Ichiko also doesn't mention Noh, for instance, but I have to imagine from the title of Ruch's "Medieval Jongleurs and the Making of a National Literature" (see below) that the performing arts formed a key factor in her reasoning.
As fate would have it, I'm in the middle of a two-week trip home at the moment, and so don't have access to most of my books until next Tuesday at the earliest, so I can't actually confirm the above explanation with sources apart from the above quote and the assumption that the paragraph in the article (which is attributed entirely to Ichiko) is a pretty straight representation of what Ichiko says. And FWIW, the above quote doesn't say "I think" or "I would say"; it just says Then toward the end, townsmen were added (to the warriors and hermit-monks), so that it was the Middle Ages when the aristocratic literature spread to become national literature. Plenty of other (apparently) independent sources could be found that say the same or similar, such as this and this -- basically anyone who cites Ruch's apparently very well-known 1977 essay without explicitly disagreeing with its thesis (I actually haven't read it, at least to the best of my recollection, but that's what it says here) is citing such a view because it's in the title.
Technically, ALT3 would be more accurate if we said "14th and 15th centuries", since what the article currently says is that monks and warriors shared with nobles for the first part (roughly 200 years), and then the nobility fell out of prominence (due to largely political circumstances) but it was never the "province" of warriors and monks specifically.
All that being said, if what you mean is that, regardless of what the actual facts of contemporary scholarship are, the hook can't say that as long as the article attributes it to Ichiko as it does, would you mind waiting about two weeks until I get a weekend back in Japan to see if I can re-work the sentence with other sources? I guess I could theoretically just cut the citation of Ichiko altogether and make it say This means that the medieval period was the time when the literature of the nobility became a truly national Japanese literature. That feels like worse writing to me than what's there now, but it would address the problem.
Hijiri 88 (やや) 08:17, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
@Yoninah: I've amended the article text so it no longer implies this is the view of one scholar; technically that was never implied by the cited source, and I only included it there because I was more comfortable not making such subjective claims about "national literature" without attributing them inline. I actually don't think it would be that big a problem even with the original wording. I'm pretty sure I've seen such DYKs in the past -- the "Jesus Christ Is Risen Today" one sparked a controversy because it was a blatant confession of faith not supported by anything in the article proper, but I think if it kinda-sorta said something different from the article but had not been a confession of faith it would have been fine. Hijiri 88 (やや) 14:49, 12 August 2019 (UTC)
  • @Hijiri88: Sorry, I'm afraid I'm not following you. When a DYK reviewer asks you about a hook, they just want a new hook, not a scholarly discussion on the subject matter. Please write below the hook you suggest, naming it ALT4. Thanks, Yoninah (talk) 13:48, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
@Yoninah: What new hook do you want? The reasoning you gave above was apparently based on the overly pedantic wording I had included in the article, but I've now rewritten that wording. The alt wording you suggested would be a misrepresentation of the source, but I don't see why it would even be necessary given the amended wording of the article. As I said above, I can find more sources next week, if the one cited above and in the article is insufficient, but if you could explain how that would change things that would be helpful too. Hijiri 88 (やや) 13:53, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
@Hijiri88: which hook do you want? Yoninah (talk) 13:55, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
I'd be fine with any of them. Honestly, I probably should have ignored the misleading DYK instructions when writing them, and instead looked at what was actually live on the main page, so I think they are all sub-optimal. Indeed, it was implied to me that presenting ALTs proactively was a requirement; if I knew it was my responsibility to choose one then I would have only written one, and included as many links as I thought necessary). But if I had to choose I would say ALT2. Hijiri 88 (やや) 14:03, 15 August 2019 (UTC)
  • OK. Restoring tick for ALT2. Yoninah (talk) 21:27, 24 August 2019 (UTC)