Wikipedia:WikiProject LGBT studies/Peer review/Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson[edit]
The primary author of this article, Yllosubmarine, has listed the page at the big peer review page, but I know there are some talented peer reviewers in this project that may not see it. Working on an article about a subject that everyone seems to know about, like Miss Emily, is difficult. Whatever help you can give her. She's trying to get it to FA. --Moni3 (talk) 16:49, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Comments from Moni3 - If you've already gotten conflicting advice from more experienced editors, take mine with a grain...
- Numbers larger than 13 are spelled out. I find it easier to read them as numerals.
- Do you have any examples of this? I can go either way, but if it's difficult to read, then I have no problems changing them.
- First line has eighteen hundred. I noticed it maybe four or five times throughout the entire article...Dickinson moved his family along with fifty-eight other men and their families just east of Northampton, Aunt Lavinia, who was twenty-one at the time, Emily would eventually send over three hundred letters, are just some I was able to find as I scanned through it once more. --Moni3 (talk) 19:36, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
- This sentence in "Life" is confusing as to who wrote the letter and to whom it refers: Since her mother was not available, she wrote in a letter to a confidante, Emily "always ran Home to Awe [Austin] when a child, if anything befell me. He was an awful Mother, but I liked him better than none.
- I agree, it was too wordy. I've condensed it to: In a letter to a confidante, Emily wrote she "always ran Home to Awe [Austin] when a child, if anything befell me. He was an awful Mother, but I liked him better than none."
- Where did Edward Dickinson go that he had to write home to his children?
- He spent a great deal of time in Boston for the General Courts and also traveled elsewhere for work. The source doesn't say exactly where he was when he sent this letter, but I've added to the previous sentence so that it now says: Edward Dickinson emphasized the value of his children's education and kept track of their studies while he was away on business.
- In "Influence and early writing" after Newton's death, you have "would like" in quotations. It fits without them, and there doesn't seem to be a reason those words are in quotations - it's not really POV, and it rather looks odd with them in.
- Definitely; they're toast.
- Why would her brother have to smuggle a Longfellow book into the house. Was it scandalous?
- This is something I always wanted to expand on, but some of it is speculative since it doesn't come from Emily herself, so I've held back so far. Their father, being a late convert and a religious man, didn't care for many books outside of the Bible. There's one quote in the "is my verse alive" section that although her father bought her books, he begged her "not to read them – because he fears they joggle the Mind". Higginson reported that she told him this story twenty years after the fact and that the smuggling act happened when Emily was young and her older brother, who had already read the book, secretly gave her his copy. Perhaps too much information? The Bible isn't mentioned at all, I don't think, so I could add a little more about her father's protectiveness and her reading material if you think it pertinent.
- Look, I have to say that the biography portion of the article is expertly written. I feel great affection and sadness for her toward the end at her death. I studied Dickinson as much as college sophomores can, back in the day, so I am somewhat familiar with her. To instill a personal connection to her through the article like that means it's quite well-written.
- Thank you so much. :)
- Ok, totally...Gilligan's Island theme song? I laughed out loud for ten minutes.
- YES. This is something I learned in high school, I think, and it's so true. "Because I could not stop for Death" is hilarious if you have the right .wav files and a few drinks. ;)
- Indeed. It is something I will have to try. Perhaps the development of an Emily Dickinson drinking game. I have to admit that I had "The Yellow Rose of Texas" stuck in my head for an hour after reading the article, but of course, with the more interesting lyrics. --Moni3 (talk) 19:36, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
- Is the image of "Wild nights, wild nights!" handwritten by Dickinson, or by someone else? If by Dickinson, it might not be redundant to say it's in her own handwriting. It is quite bold writing if so.
- Yup, that's hers; I've made that more clear in the caption. I've always wanted to add something about her handwriting, which changed drastically throughout her life (compare the two manuscript images, for example), but I thought that would be too quirky and off-topic for most readers. There are dozens of scraps of paper of her practicing her signature and penmanship on the back of recipes, poems, letters, etc. It's really quite amazing.
Most excellent luck on this article. I enjoyed it. --Moni3 (talk) 17:56, 6 January 2008 (UTC)