Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Jack Coggins/archive3

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by SandyGeorgia 08:20, 7 September 2010 [1].

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Jack Coggins

Jack Coggins (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

• Featured article candidates/Jack Coggins/archive1
• Featured article candidates/Jack Coggins/archive2
• Featured article candidates/Jack Coggins/archive3

Nominator(s): Avi (talk) 07:51, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

I am nominating this for featured article because I have just completed the implementation of most of Ottava's excellent suggestions after the last, failed FAC. At this point, I think the combination of the suggestions from the last FAC together with the critical review on the articles talk page, makes this ready once again to brave the rigors of FAC. -- Avi (talk) 07:51, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

• Comment—no dab links, but the external link to http://pastelsocietyofamerica.org/main/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=52 is dead. Also, for an article this size, I think the lead should be more than a single paragraph. Ucucha 11:27, 5 September 2010 (UTC)
  • Interesting, it was two smaller paragraphs that I thought looked better as one. Does anyone else agree with Ucucha? And I have replaced the dead link with a live one, thanks! -- Avi (talk) 12:18, 5 September 2010 (UTC)
    • I think the way to make the lead more than one paragraph is not just splitting the existing paragraph, but adding more text to it. WP:LEAD#Length suggests it should be two or three paragraphs. Ucucha 12:27, 5 September 2010 (UTC)
  • Not counting spaces and references, I get around 11,000 characters for which the WP:LEAD#Length suggestion is one to two paragraphs, so I think one is fine for now, although I am eager to hear more constructive criticism about it. -- Avi (talk) 15:31, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

Comment: If the lead fulfils its required function of providing a concise overview of the whole article, it doesn't really matter how many paragraphs it's got. Does it do the job? is the question. Personally, I'm more concerned about the scrappy nature of the "Biography" section. Such sections need to maintain a continuous chronological or near-chronological narrative. In this case we more or less jump from 1933–34 to his marriage in 1948. The actual biographical information is very thin throughout the section, with significant events such as his loss of an eye reported almost laconically. The sources for information on his early life appear to be two magazine articles, and I can't help doubting the accuracy of some of the information (for example, if he left England in 1923 aged 12, he wouldn't have been old enough to have attended an English public school). There are also prose oddities, such as "Jack was born in the Sydney's barracks". The article's milestone history shows that it hasn't had a peer review since 2006, its GA status dates from 2007 (re-confirmed 2009) and it has failed two FACs. At this stage, in all honestly, it doesn't read like a finished article. Definitely should have had a new peer review before coming here, and maybe that would still be the wiser route. Brianboulton (talk) 00:07, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Please check the talk page. This was subject to a detailed review by User:Ottava Rima in 2009. Whatever one may think of him, he had a fantastic eye for copyediting and prose. As for the articles, they are both well-fleshed out and perhaps the only extant biographical information outside of the obituary. Reliable sources are reliable sources. -- Avi (talk) 00:10, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

I am trying hard not to oppose this, but I find the above reply somewhat complacent. "Reliable sources are reliable sources" is a meaningless phrase; sources can be "reliable" in terms of WP definition but can still give incomplete or even inaccurate information. Sometimes it is necessary to dig deeper than the most conveniently available sources. Ottava's prose review of 2009 is very much weighted to the "Illustrator, author and artist" sections; the biography section comments are little more than nitpicks and don't address any content issues. There are significant matters to deal with in this section, including the accuracy of the information, the filling of lacunae and questions of balance—at present the loss of his eye gets the same degree of attention as the "meaningless" naming of his house. Brianboulton (talk) 09:12, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose. This isn't ready, as BrianBoulton is almost too kind to say above. What's clear is that the sections dealing with Coggins' later work are substantially more developed than the biography and early career material, making the whole article seem uneven. A few specific examples:
  • The lead is to short to adequately summarise the article, but what's worse is rather untidily constructed. For instance: "He is also known for his books on space travel, which were both authored and illustrated by Coggins." Using "both" here makes it look like Coggins only wrote (why "authored"?) two books.
  • "After moving to New York, Coggins enrolled at Roslyn High School in Roslyn Heights". Did he move to New York on his own? What about his parents?
  • "Coggins's interest in sailing and maritime subjects began in London when he would sail model yachts on Round Pond in Kensington Gardens." What is "would sail" meant to convey that the rather more direct "sailed" does not?
  • "During the early years of World War II, Coggins took a sampling of his war illustrations to Worthen Paxton". Why "sampling" instead of "sample"?
  • "Appearing on July 15, 1940, this was the first of many war time illustrations for LIFE. Some of Coggins's works are in the Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection." I just can't see the connection between those two sentences.
  • "Because of the quality of his maritime illustrations, Coggins was invited by publisher Doubleday to provide artwork for a children's book about the U.S. Navy; the author being Fletcher Pratt". Can you see anything wrong with the way that sentence ends? "Being Fletcher Pratt"?
  • "During the late 1940s and early 1950s Coggins' marine art was featured on covers of Yachting Magazine[28] and other publications, as well as on advertising material.[29], and his science-fiction art illustrated covers for pulp science fiction magazines". Not sure what's happening with that sentence, or the punctuation there. I can't quite discern the meaning of "science-fiction art illustrated" either.
  • "Due to reduced interest in his pre-war work, Coggins applied for a position teaching watercolor at Hunter College." Moving swiftly over the misuse of "due to", what has the reduction of interest in his pre-war work got to do with anything? What about his war work, or his post-war work?

Malleus Fatuorum 14:29, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose I agree with the points above, and in addition, when the subject seems mainly notable as a painter, more than one sentence on his artistic style is needed at FA. Johnbod (talk) 00:34, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.