Talk:Alejo Carpentier

Bibliografía
Hey group! It might take me a while to get into the Wikipedia swing of things considering I've never done this, but in the time being here are some articles I found that may be of some use to us.

1) Rae, Caroline. "In Havana and Paris The Musical Activities of Alejo Carpentier" pp. 373-395 Volume 89, Number 3, 2008 Music and Letters.

2) Cohen, Deborah N., "Retracing The Lost Steps The Cuban Revolution, the Cold War, and Publishing Alejo Carpentier in the United States". pp. 81-108 Volume 3, Number 1, Spring 2003 CR: The New Centennial Review.

3) Kaup, Monika. "Becoming-Baroque Folding European Forms into the New World Baroque with Alejo Carpentier". pp. 107-149 Volume 5, Number 2, Fall 2005 CR: The New Centennial Review.

4) Rodriguez, EJ. "Alejo Carpentier's search for Amerindian and African origins". RLC-REVUE DE LITTERATURE COMPAREE 76 (2): 167-177 APR-JUN 2002.

5) Stimson, Frederick. "Alejo Carpentier, Cuban Novelist". Books Abroad, Vol. 33, No. 2 pp. 149-150.

6) Henighan, Stephan. "Two Paths to the Boom: Carpentier, Asturias, and the Performative Split". The Modern Language Review, Vol. 94, No. 4 pp. 1009-1024.

7) Timossi, J. "The marvellous royal man - Alejo Carpentier". CUADERNOS HISPANOAMERICANOS (649-50): 21-27 JUL-AUG 2004.

8) Kefala, Eleni. " The Dialectics of Heresy and Authority in Borges and Carpentier". pp. 342-349 Volume 122, Number 2, March 2007 (Hispanic Issue) MLN.

9) Firmat, GP. "Ese idioma: Alejo Carpentier's tongue-ties". SYMPOSIUM-A QUARTERLY JOURNAL IN MODERN LITERATURES 61 (3): 183-197 FAL 2007. (this one seems to have some interesting facts about Carpentier's birth language which may help clear up a few issues brought up in discussion surrounding where Carpentier was born. exciting stuff!)

And then some books: I know this first book is on the wiki bibliography already, but it seems that if it's given a careful read we could get a lot of information out of it.

1) Shaw, Donald. Alejo Carpentier. Boston : Twayne Publishers, c1985.

2) Rodríguez, Alexis Márquez. Nuevas Lecturas de Alejo Carpentier. Caracas : Fondo Editorial de la Facultad de Humanidades y Educación, Universidad Central de Venezuela, 2004.

3) Navarro, Gabriel. Música y escritura en Alejo Carpentier. Alicante : Universidad de Alicante, 1999.

4) Selma, José. El 'Ultimo' Carpentier. Las Palmas : EXCMA. Mancomunidad de Cabildos, Plan Cultural, 1978.

He seemed to write a lot on music, something the article doesn't go into detail with. We may want to look into that. --Josiemitchell (talk) 07:37, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

Hey here are some more finalized things, maybe? Let me know. article:

(this one seems to have some interesting facts about Carpentier's birth language which may help clear up a few issues brought up in discussion surrounding where Carpentier was born. exciting stuff!)
 * Firmat, GP. "Ese idioma: Alejo Carpentier's tongue-ties". SYMPOSIUM-A QUARTERLY JOURNAL IN MODERN LITERATURES 61 (3): 183-197 FAL 2007.

And then a book: --Josiemitchell (talk) 00:59, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Navarro, Gabriel. Música y escritura en Alejo Carpentier. Alicante : Universidad de Alicante, 1999.

Bibliografía: para el 20 de enero
Libros:

Blanco, Luis. Alejo Carpentier : tientos y differencias, 1970

Gómez Mayo, Edmundo. Construcción y lenguaje en Alejo Carpentier

Gonzalez, Eduardo. "Alejo Carpentier: El Tiempo Del Hombre". Caracas: Monte Avila Editores, 1978(talk) 06:02, 5 February 2010 (UTC)--JordiHUBC (talk) 19:51, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Janney, Frank. Alejo Carpentier and His Early Works. London: Tamesis Books Limited, 1981. (early works)

Martí, José. Un camino de medio siglo. Homenaje nacional al 70 aniversario de Alejo Carpentier, 1974

Martin, Claire Emilie. Alejo Carpentier y las crónicas de Indias: Orígenes de una escritura americana. Hanover, New Hampshire: Ediciones del Norte, 1995. (Style)

Mocega-González, Esther P. Alejo Carpentier: Estudios sobre su narrativa. España: Nova Scholar, 1980. (narrative)

Múller Bergh, Klaus. Asedios a Carpentier, 1972

Navarro, Gabriel. Música y escritura en Alejo Carpentier. Alicante : Universidad de Alicante, 1999. (music and writing)

Pancrazio, James J. The Logic of Fetishism: Alejo Carpentier and the Cuban tradition. Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Press, 2004. (Baroque style/Cuba)

Rodríguez, Alexis Márquez. Nuevas Lecturas de Alejo Carpentier. Caracas : Fondo Editorial de la Facultad de Humanidades y Educación, Universidad Central de Venezuela, 2004.

Rodríguez, Alexis Márquez. "La Obra Narrativa De Alejo Carpentier." Caracas : Fondo Editorial de la Facultad de Humanidades y Educación, Universidad Central De Venezuela, 1970.(talk) 06:02, 5 February 2010 (UTC)--JordiHUBC (talk) 19:51, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Santander, Carlos. Alejo Carpentier : viaje a la Semilla y otros relatos, 1971 --JordiHUBC (talk) 02:26, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Selma, José. El 'Ultimo' Carpentier. Las Palmas : EXCMA. Mancomunidad de Cabildos, Plan Cultural, 1978.

Shaw, Donald. Alejo Carpentier. Boston : Twayne Publishers, c1985

Smith, Verity. "Carpentier: Los pasos perdidos". London : Tamesis Books Ltd., 1983(talk) 06:02, 5 February 2010 (UTC)--JordiHUBC (talk) 19:51, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Tusa, Bobs M. Alchemy of a Hero: A comparative study of the works of Alejo Carpentier and Mario Vargas Llosa. Spain: Albatros Hispanofila Ediciones, 1983. (comparison with Mario Vargas Llosa)

Wakefield, Steve. Carpentier's Baroque Fiction: Returning Medusa's Gaze. Great Britain: The Cromwell Press, 2004 (Baroque style) Katie322 (talk) 02:33, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Webb, Barbara J. Myth & History in Caribbean Fiction: Alejo Carpentier, Wilson Harris & Edouard Glissant. USA: University of Massachusets Press, 1992. (biography, analysis)

González Echevarría, Roberto. Alejo Carpentier: The Pligrim at Home. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1977. (biography) --Tniamath (talk) 04:40, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Artículos:

Carpentier, Alejo; Ethel S. Cohen. "Music in Cuba (1523-1900)". The Music Quarterly, Vol. 33, No. 3 (Jul. 1947), pp. 365-380. [JSTOR] (Music)

Cohen, Deborah N., "Retracing The Lost Steps The Cuban Revolution, the Cold War, and Publishing Alejo Carpentier in the United States". pp. 81-108 Volume 3, Number 1, Spring 2003 CR: The New Centennial Review.

Firmat, GP. "Ese idioma: Alejo Carpentier's tongue-ties". SYMPOSIUM-A QUARTERLY JOURNAL IN MODERN LITERATURES 61 (3): 183-197 FAL 2007.

Henighan, Stephen. "Two Paths to the Boom: Alejo, Asturias, and the Performative Split". The Modern Language Review, Vol. 94, No. 4 (Oct. 1999), pp. 1009-1024. [JSTOR] (Latin boom of literature)

Kaup, Monika. "Becoming-Baroque Folding European Forms into the New World Baroque with Alejo Carpentier". pp. 107-149 Volume 5, Number 2, Fall 2005 CR: The New Centennial Review.

Kefala, Eleni. " The Dialectics of Heresy and Authority in Borges and Carpentier". pp. 342-349 Volume 122, Number 2, March 2007 (Hispanic Issue) MLN.

Labastida, Jaime. "Con Alejo Carpentier". Casa de las Américas, no.87, 1974

Mayo, Roberto Esquenazi. "Review: Música y narración en Alejo Carpentier". Revista Hispánica Moderna, Año 21, No. 2 (Apr. 1995), p. 146. [JSTOR] (Music)

Múller Bergh, Klaus. Alejo Carpentier : Estudio biográfico-critico, 1972 Katie322 (talk) 16:14, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Paravisini-Gebert, Lizabeth. "The Haitian Revolution in Interstices and Shadows: A Re-Reading of Alejo Carpentier's The Kingdom of This World. Research in African Literatures, Vol. 35, No. 2, Haiti, 1804-2004: Literature, Culture, and Art (Summer 2004), pp. 114-127. [JSTOR] (Criticism for The Kingdom of this World)

Rae, Caroline. "In Havana and Paris The Musical Activities of Alejo Carpentier" pp. 373-395 Volume 89, Number 3, 2008 Music and Letters.

Rodriguez, EJ. "Alejo Carpentier's search for Amerindian and African origins". RLC-REVUE DE LITTERATURE COMPAREE 76 (2): 167-177 APR-JUN 2002.

Stimson, Frederick S. "Alejo Carpentier, Cuban Novelist". Books Abroad, Vol. 33, No. 2 (Spring 1959), pp. 149-150. [JSTOR] (Information on Carpentier's life)

Timossi, J. "The marvellous royal man - Alejo Carpentier". CUADERNOS HISPANOAMERICANOS (649-50): 21-27 JUL-AUG 2004.

Unruh, Vicky. "The Performing Spectator in Alejo Carpentier's Fictional World". Hispanic Review, Vol. 66, No. 1 (Winter 1998), pp. 57-77. [JSTOR] (Role of the reader) Katie322 (talk) 02:33, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Vélez-Sainz, Julio. "El cuerpo político: Carnaval, corporeidad y revolución en El reino de este mundo de Alejo Carpentier". Revista de Crítica Literaria Latinoamericana, Año 31, No. 62 (2005), pp. 181-193. [JSTOR] (Politics in The Kingdom of This World) Katie322 (talk) 02:41, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Short List:

Libros

Carpentier, Alejo. La música en Cuba. México: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1972.

Navarro, Gabriel. Música y escritura en Alejo Carpentier. Alicante : Universidad de Alicante, 1999.

Pancrazio, James J. The Logic of Fetishism: Alejo Carpentier and the Cuban tradition. Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Press, 2004.

Shaw, Donald. Alejo Carpentier. Boston : Twayne Publishers, c1985.

Wakefield, Steve. Carpentier's Baroque Fiction: Returning Medusa's Gaze. Great Britain: The Cromwell Press, 2004

Webb, Barbara J. Myth & History in Caribbean Fiction: Alejo Carpentier, Wilson Harris & Edouard Glissant. USA: University of Massachusets Press, 1992. (biography, analysis)

González Echevarría, Roberto. Alejo Carpentier: The Pligrim at Home. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1977. (biography) --Tniamath (talk) 04:40, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Artículos

Cohen, Deborah N., "Retracing The Lost Steps The Cuban Revolution, the Cold War, and Publishing Alejo Carpentier in the United States". pp. 81-108 Volume 3, Number 1, Spring 2003 CR: The New Centennial Review.

Henighan, Stephen. "Two Paths to the Boom: Alejo, Asturias, and the Performative Split". The Modern Language Review, Vol. 94, No. 4 (Oct. 1999), pp. 1009-1024. [JSTOR]

Kaup, Monika. "Becoming-Baroque Folding European Forms into the New World Baroque with Alejo Carpentier". pp. 107-149 Volume 5, Number 2, Fall 2005 CR: The New Centennial Review.

Paravisini-Gebert, Lizabeth. "The Haitian Revolution in Interstices and Shadows: A Re-Reading of Alejo Carpentier's The Kingdom of This World. Research in African Literatures, Vol. 35, No. 2, Haiti, 1804-2004: Literature, Culture, and Art (Summer 2004), pp. 114-127. [JSTOR] (Criticism for The Kingdom of this World)

Rodriguez, EJ. "Alejo Carpentier's search for Amerindian and African origins". RLC-REVUE DE LITTERATURE COMPAREE 76 (2): 167-177 APR-JUN 2002.

Vélez-Sainz, Julio. "El cuerpo político: Carnaval, corporeidad y revolución en El reino de este mundo de Alejo Carpentier". Revista de Crítica Literaria Latinoamericana, Año 31, No. 62 (2005), pp. 181-193. [JSTOR] Katie322 (talk) 06:10, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Article Ideas
Hey group!

Here are some article ideas that we can think about while reading through our sources:

-Add a music section (credit goes to Josie for this one!)✅

-Sections on magical realism and baroque style after the themes section?

-A section on Carpentier's connections to/thoughts about Haiti and Cuba (or other geographic regions)?

-Style of writing (we could look at a few select works and break them down)

-More quotes (?)

-Alphabetize the 'Further Reading' section

Feel free to add more ideas to this list. Also, if you have added something/completed something from the list, you're welcome to add a green 'done' checkmark by typing the word 'done' between double sets of curly brackets: ✅ That way the rest of the group will know what has been crossed off the list. --Katie322 (talk) 03:11, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Group member sections

Josie: Music

Hanne: Later life

Katie: ✅Baroque style - For the annotated bibliography, I'll read the Steve Wakefield book for sure and maybe the Monika Kaup article (both have to do with Baroque style) Katie322 (talk) 20:30, 26 January 2010 (UTC). If we do a 'Style of Writing' section, I'll do a description of El reino de este mundo✅ Katie322 (talk) 18:49, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Tristán: Early life

Jordi: Cuba and exile in France ✅

*add other ideas/sections that you want to do as we go :) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Katie322 (talk • contribs) 18:27, 20 January 2010 (UTC) --JordiHUBC (talk) 21:25, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Greetings
Hi. I've signed up to assist with the article development with. I've read the article and it looks like it is getting a good start. I have some recommendations for improving style, sourcing, and I have contacted a specialist with image rights to find out how we might be able to use a better image taken in Cuba. I do not know copyright laws and such from Cuba.

I have the article on my watchlist. Feel free to ask questions and when you are ready for suggestions on how to improve the article, I will be happy to give them. --Moni3 (talk) 19:31, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Hi Moni3 and thanks for taking on our article! AND for checking into foreign copyright laws to improve the picture, that's awesome!! I did have a question regarding how the 'reference lists' have been set-up on the article. It has a NOTES section and a FURTHER READING section....should we add a REFERENCE section to tie into the notes that are throughout the artcle? That way we can give accurate reference information on journals, books, etc... Is this needed? Thanks! Katie322 (talk) 23:18, 21 January 2010 (UTC)


 * This varies from one article to the next. Your Further reading section is extensive, and I hope you will be accessing many of these sources to improve the article. In general, however, it can go in this order:
 * Footnotes or Notes (which can be added as there are some interesting yet not necessary items to include--see, for example, this section in Rosewood massacre and scroll down to see what is below)
 * Citations or References
 * Bibliography for book-length sources
 * Further reading for books that were not included yet would be able to add more to the article if included --Moni3 (talk) 23:27, 21 January 2010 (UTC)



Ah, okay, thanks for that example. It clears up the confusion I had with the section titles :) Katie322 (talk) 20:26, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Some comments
I think this article is already very close to GA standard.

For a long time it was believed that he was born in Havana This is very vague. Who believed? His mother? His sister? His friends? The literary scholars? All the people in Iceland? All humans? In what time period did they believe this? Until the day after he died? Until 10 years after he died?

the poor of the island What island? I guess Cuba. But this is not explicit.

surrealists seems to be an important phenomenon. What is it? Can we get a wiki-link? (I tried surrealism after looking up Desnos.

Link to the Communist Party journal ?

In 1966, he settled in Paris The last mentioned man is Márquez. he is supposed to refer to Carpentier?

His remains were returned to Cuba Does returned imply some kind of origination? The article says he was born in Lausanne.

I think two sentences, with a reference for each, is too much about the Baroque in an article about Carpentier. I copied the second one to the article about the Baroque.

I don't think Europe is an identity; European?

How is stuff divided between style and themes? The baroque inspiration is mentioned in both.

--Ettrig (talk) 07:14, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Hi Ettrig! Seeing as there are a few of us working on this article as a group project for our spanish course, we are grateful that you've taken such an interest in fine-tuning many of the details :) Regarding the Baroque (as this subject has been delegated to me within the group), I have removed its mention from the Themes (I agree that this does not have to be mentioned twice and it is more of a style than a theme). Regarding some other comments: Where was the mention of Europe as an identity....or have you already corrected this? Also, not sure what you meant about the two sentences about the Baroque with a reference for each. I feel that Carpentier contributed much to the baroque style, especially concerning 'New World' Baroque and there will probably be several more sentences added to that section (from how it looks today) as soon as I finish reading the Kaup article. I will look into your other queries in the near future. Thanks again for all the help!

--Katie322 (talk) 20:33, 13 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Carpentier's dual identity in both Europe and Latin America I interpreted this as saying that he had both European and Lating American identities. When rereading I think it is just obscure. It says he had two identities in Europe and America. It does not say what the identities are, nor how the identities relate to the continents. --Ettrig (talk) 05:15, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

I changed "Carpentier's dual identities in both Europe and Latin America" to "Carpentier's background in both Europe and Latin America". I think this makes more sense and is less convoluted. When looking at this in the context of the sentence, it is now talking about him having spent time in both places and being influenced by both cultures. Katie322 (talk) 15:53, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Comments from NuclearWarfare
First of all, I would like to congratulate you all on the wonderful work that you have put into the article. The page certainly looks much better now than it did in December. So great work on that. But still, there are, as with any article, a number of things that could be improved. And of course, if you are missing any information at all that you are aware of, you should add it to the article. I cannot claim to be an expert of Alejo Carpentier – my only real experience with magic realism comes from reading the works of Gabriel García Márquez and Rudolfo Ananya – so I will be unaware if any information is missing.

The main issue with the lead is that it needs to be expanded. A good lead section should summarize the entire article in two to four paragraphs, depending on the length of the article. For this article, I recommend summarizing it in three paragraphs of length approximately that of this section. They could include one paragraph on his life, one on the themes in his works (including a mention of a couple of the most famous ones), and another on the styles of his works.
 * Lead ✅ (though add more/edit if you have the time)

Make sure that every piece of information is cited properly. That is a critical matter for GAN
 * Life

Also, I have a number of other comments:
 * Could you explain why he did not complete his architecture degree?
 * What degree did he actually complete?
 * What newspapers did he work for?
 * Did contemporary critics also think Ecué-Yamba-O was superficial?
 * Robert Desnos was a "poet journalist"? I don't believe I have ever heard that phrase before.
 * I would think that a number of Carpentier's works are available in translation. I don't know if it is worth singling out La música en Cuba.
 * Is From 1945 to 1959 he lived in Venezuela, which is the obvious inspiration for the unnamed South American country in which much of The Lost Steps takes place your own original research? Or does a source say that? Also, could you remove "obvious"? If it is true, it is true.

Remember the importance of citations, especially for the 'Lo real maravilloso' paragraph.✅ That is the only real flaw I can find with the section. If you can expand any of this, that would be well appreciated.✅
 * Themes

Is Kingdom of the World Carpentier's only work that is major enough to merit a subjection? Also, do any of those books have a Wikipedia article?
 * Famous Works

The Baroque section is a bit large. Perhaps it could be split into multiple paragraphs? ✅ Also, again, could any of this be expanded?
 * Style

These should probably moved over to Alejo Carpentier (which should probably be created if it hasn't been already)
 * Quotes

'''I checked the UBC library search and an ISBN database but couldn't find more than are already there. Is there a better place to be looking?''' Katie322 (talk) 06:12, 12 April 2010 (UTC)
 * References
 * This ref is broken.✅
 * Format this ref using cite journal.✅
 * Could you add ISBNs for as many of the references as possible?

Again, very nice work! Please contact me if you have any questions. NW ( Talk ) 21:28, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Hey Group Group!
That was some really helpful advice we just got. Neat!

I think the best way to go about improving the article based off of what NuclearWarfare has suggested is to work in his comments as they apply to your own section of the article and as for things that were not assigned to each person (aka no one was assigned the lead nor quotes) we should decide who will oversee those.

Lead I think NuclearWarfare has a really good point about the lead. That shit needs to be really strong! I'd be willing to edit it, but I think because it's a summary of everyone's sections, we all should keep an eye on it and add what we find important. Famous Works How do we feel about having a blurb on El Reino de este Mundo? It does have its own wiki page. I know Musica en Cuba does not, so I went ahead and added that blurb. It's a tad long, so I may cut it down still. Thoughts?

Quotes And if someone wants to jump in on organizing quotes? How do people feel about including direct quotes from Carpentier, or do those belong on his wikiquote page?

Further Reading Maybe someone wouldn't mind organizing the further reading section? Alphabetize it? ✅ I don't know, that may be overkill.

References It seems like we have loads of Navarro and Wakefield, we should probably get some other stuff in there. For you guys that are doing "Life" sections, are there other books/authors that we can reference? The more references, the more legit our article!--Josiemitchell (talk) 16:32, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Good comments, Josie! I agree with you and Nuclear Warfare on the 'Famous Works'. If these books already have their own wikiarticles, then maybe the list of them in our article will suffice. Yes, definitely let's all work on the lead to pump it up a bit. Gonna have to check out the wikiquote page and the advice that Nuclear Warfare said about quotes again....not sure what to do there yet. I'll alphabetize the further reading :) ✅ And yah, the "Life" sections should be coming along which will hopefully add some more (and different) references to the list. I'll also go over the Baroque section to break it down a bit ✅ (along with looking into other pieces of advice that NW had). Good luck guys!  Katie322 (talk) 18:56, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Hey Josie, I hadn't looked at the page before I wrote the above comment and I saw what you mean by Música en Cuba. My opinion now is that we should keep the annotated Famous Works section. If we can't many more entries to it by Monday or soon after, then the section is there for any other Wikipedians to add to. Also, El reino de este mundo is arguably his most famous work and then Música en Cuba, as you said, doesn't have a Wiki page so those two are a good start! What are your thoughts? Katie322 (talk) 20:18, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Hey there, Yeah, I think that keeping the tid-bits about both works would be good. There's no such thing as too much information on Wikipedia, it's just about presenting the information so it's accessible and having these books up there help I think. YEAH!

P.S. I presume this thing is due tomorrow at mid-night. Is that right?--Josiemitchell (talk) 20:34, 11 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Yeah, pretty sure it's due April 11th at midnight. Katie322 (talk) 05:28, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Photo
The photo is flagged as incorrectly licensed. --Ettrig (talk) 04:39, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Hello Ettrig,

Help! We thought that licensing flag was meant for people wishing to use the photo outside of the English Alejo Carpentier wiki page, not for the wikipedia article contributors, because the image fell under certain non-free content exemptions.

Because it says:

This work is copyrighted and unlicensed. It does not fall into one of the blanket acceptable non-free content categories listed at Wikipedia:Non-free content#Images or Wikipedia:Non-free content#Audio clips. '''However, it is believed that the use of this work in the article "Alejo Carpentier" :

* To illustrate the subject in question * Where no free equivalent is available or could be created that would adequately give the same information * On the English-language Wikipedia, hosted on servers in the United States by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation ([1]),

qualifies as fair use under United States copyright law. Any other uses of this image, on Wikipedia or elsewhere, may be copyright infringement. See Wikipedia:Non-free content and Wikipedia:Copyrights.''' To the uploader: this tag is not a sufficient claim of fair use. You must also include the source of the work, all available copyright information, and a detailed non-free use rationale.''

In that last bit, I'm not sure who is deemed "the uploader". Is that the contributor who originally put the image up or someone wanting to take the image from Wikipedia and use it elsewhere? Would you happen to know? And would you happen to know how to fix that flag? Cause I sure don't.

Thanks for bringing this to our attention!

Cheers, --Josiemitchell (talk) 21:06, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Second wind
O Hi there Group!,

How is everyone? I know I'm kinda procrastinating my final paper right now. But yea, Jezhotwells had some really good feedback on our article. Besides the issue with the photo, we mainly just need some tighter editing. I looked into the Copy Editing Guild and there's a backlog of about 8,000 articles. So it might be out of the question to ask someone to look at it within our time frame. If we have the time we might want to go through ourselves and clean some phrases, grammar, etc. Jezhotwells had some specific writing stuff he commented on, so look at that I suppose.

As for the photo I know Katie has been looking into that. Maybe we just need to find another separate photo and write up our own rationale? Then we can have the text box below giving the photo's place and date like what Jezhotwells was describing. That might be easier than tracking down the uploader of the current image and all that. Thoughts?

Keep up the good fight!--Josiemitchell (talk) 21:37, 17 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I will take a look at the photos tonight or tomorrow and will see if I can fix that problem for you. If I have time I'll also do a copyedit. Mike Christie (talk) 21:48, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

'''WoW! Heck yeah Mike Christie!''' Our deadline is on Tuesday the 20th of April (pretty close), so we'd need it before then, if you have the time. It'd be such an awesome help if you could! No pressure though, but if you did we'd get shirts made with your name on them and wear them all the time. Incentive- I think so! Just let us know if you can- thanks!--Josiemitchell (talk) 22:10, 17 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I know that I want a 'Mike Christie' shirt, haha! Thank-you so much for your copy-edit and overall help!  We will be double-timing this effort as a group!  Also, thanks to Josie for putting the call out for a copy-editor!  Alright guys, let's do this shiznat! :) Katie322 (talk) 06:34, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for the image
I've modified the image (see File:Alejo Carpentier.jpg) to give a more specific fair use rationale. I'm not an image expert, but I think this will be good enough for GA as the subject is no longer alive. Mike Christie (talk) 00:34, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks for editing this, Mike Christie! We, as well, are not image experts by any means, but to me the rationale makes sense: no free-use images could be found AND the subject is dead soo.....self-explanatory in my eyes!  We'll see if it pulls through!  Thank-you! Katie322 (talk) 06:37, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

Copyediting notes
I'll add notes here as I copyedit. Not all of these are going to be necessary for GA; these are just points that occur to me as I go through. I changed the name of the magazine to "La Révolution surréaliste", which is the form used in the Wikipedia article; for all I know that article has it wrong, so change it back if you have a source. I also removed the "(1928)"; it appears from the Wikipedia article that the magazine was founded in 1924 and only had one issue in 1928, with one last issue following in 1929. So I'm not sure what the "1928" refers to. If you mean Carpentier was only involved with that issue then I think that should be clarified.
 * Early life section
 * The date of birth wasn't included; I've added it but it needs a citation. The names of his parents were given but not cited; I've moved things around so it looks as if they're named in Belnap/Wakefield, but I don't know if that's the case.  Could you make sure the given citation does cover those facts, or add a new citation?
 * This is now cited. Mike Christie (talk) 21:36, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Second paragraph of the early life section is a bit disjointed and has no dates. Can these apparently random facts be connected with a narrative sentence in some way, and placed in sequence?  Most readers will have never heard of a "Lycée" and won't even know it's a school, so a link to Secondary_education_in_France might be useful.  From that article it appears it's equivalent to North American 10-12 grades: if it's not interesting to mention his school from ages 12-15 (and it probably isn't interesting) then there should be at least a glide for the reader: e.g. "when he was 15 he went to the Lycée, where he studied music theory", or whatever is accurate.  As it stands a reader will think he attended the Lycée at age 12.  Similarly, with regard to reading Flaubert and Zola, the reader is going to assume that he's Spanish-speaking and may not have noticed that his father was French.  Is he bilingual?  If that can be mentioned (and cited) it would help the reader.  Other connections between the sentences would be useful, if possible: did he try to find work because he had to support himself (and perhaps his mother) when his father left?  How old was he when his father left?
 * This is much better now. Mike Christie (talk) 21:36, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Cuba and Exile in France
 * Seems like there's a contradiction in the dates between the early life section and the first paragraph of this section. If he was in Paris from 1912 to 1921, then he was eight when he went there, not twelve as given earlier.  If he returned to Cuba to study architecture in 1920 he was only 16, so he can't have been at the Lycée for long.  This should be clarified.
 * This now looks OK. Mike Christie (talk) 11:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think "a diverse cultural understanding" is a very clear phrase. Do you mean his diverse education enabled him to better understand cultural conflicts?  Or that his diverse cultural background later became significant in his work?
 * Phrase removed, so not a problem. Mike Christie (talk) 11:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "while attending his studies in La Havana" -- this is an odd phrase. I changed it to "while studying in Havana", which I think is what was meant; please correct it if I'm mistaken.
 * Unchanged in the recent edits, so I'm assuming this is OK. Mike Christie (talk) 11:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm completely confused by the "returned to France" bit -- it sounds from the succeeding sentences as if he were still in Cuba -- he is contributing to Spanish papers and was arrested for opposing Gerardo Machado y Morales. Was he really in France for this?  And is it accurate to call Machado a dictator?  The Wikipedia article makes it sounds as though he were an elected president who left office when his term was over.
 * The confusion has been removed, and the reference to Machado changed, so this is OK now. Mike Christie (talk) 11:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "During 1924 to 1928 he became editor in chief of the magazine Carteles": this makes no sense -- he didn't become editor gradually over those four years. If we know the date let's give it; if we don't, say so.
 * This was removed, so not a problem any more. Mike Christie (talk) 11:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I think you need to explain Los Cinco; my Spanish is limited to restaurant Spanish, but I assume this means "the five", and the reason there are only four names listed is because Carpentier is one of them. If Los Cinco are worth mentioning they should be given a sentence of explanation; if an explanation would be intrusive I'd suggest not even mentioning them -- perhaps just say "with the help of friends", in that case.  Could all this be changed to ". . . and in 1927, he was one of the founders of Revista de Avance, a magazine devoted to nationalism, radicalism and new ideas in the arts.  The first issue appeared on March 15, 1927; it lasted until September 15 1930, and became the "voice of the vanguard" and the primary voice of expression of the Cuban movement."  Is that accurate?  I think it would be good to attribute "voice of the vanguard"; if that's from Bergh then I guess it's OK because you cite Bergh for this, but direct quotes are always good to give specific attributes to.  You could even make it 'became, in the words of critic Klaus Müller Bergh, the "voice of the vanguard.
 * This is much better now. Mike Christie (talk) 11:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * The last part of the "During 1923 and 1924" paragraph is uncited; can you add a cite? Also, what do you mean by "had to define their political position"?  I suspect you mean that certain positions were unacceptable to the authorities, but you don't say this.
 * The second part is dealt with now but there is still no citation. Mike Christie (talk) 21:36, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "Carpentier focused primarily on reading and studying all he could about America so that he could know what he was writing about": I don't understand this at all.
 * This has been cut, so I'm striking this. Mike Christie (talk) 21:36, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "In the Homenaje a nuestros amigos de Paris he published the current news and activities of those who have also been exiled and who belonged to the “Comité de Jeunes Revolutionnaires Cubains” which published La Terreur á Cuba, a brochure against the Machado government": this is confusing. Is the Homenaje a book he wrote?  A newspaper?  It's not listed among his works at the end of the article.  And what's the Comité?  A group of exiled Cubans?  My French is good enough to understand the title but it should be translated for the general reader.  Assuming that my guesses are correct, how about changing this sentence to "Carpentier was familiar with the activities of the Comité de Jeunes Revolutionnaires Cubains, a group of exiled Cuban leftists who had published La Terreur á Cuba, a brochure against the Machado government.  He documented the latest news about this group and their activities in his book Homenaje a nuestros amigos de Paris."
 * Now OK. Mike Christie (talk) 21:36, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "together with the vanguard" -- I don't follow this. The "vanguard" hasn't been defined to this point, and is only mentioned in a quote about his magazine becoming "the voice of the vanguard".
 * This was cut, so I'm striking the comment. Mike Christie (talk) 21:36, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I decided to cut this, so I'm striking it off.--JordiHUBC (talk) 08:27, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "In this magazine, they wrote “surrealist stories” like the short-story ‘El Estudiante’ (L’Edtudiant)" -- this isn't very helpful as it stands. The magazine include much more than surrealist fiction, and we don't know who wrote this particular story (Carpentier?).  The translation from Spanish to (apparently mis-spelled) French isn't very helpful either.
 * This was removed, so I'm striking the comment. Mike Christie (talk) 21:40, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "Surrealism helped Carpentier to see contexts and aspects of American life that he did not see before approaching it as a “nativism”." Not clear what this means; you haven't defined nativism, for one thing; and I'm also not clear whether you mean he had previously approached American life as a nativism, or that he now was learning to approach it as a nativism.
 * The parts I was concerned about have been cut, so this is now OK. Mike Christie (talk) 21:40, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "At this time Carpentier began to observe that the French approached surrealism in a different way which he was somewhat critical of because of the way they defined it. What he saw was the French adaptation which suggested the “search of the marvelous in the world of the absurd, subconscious, in travels and in dreams”. He believed that the search of the marvelous within the “rules of a disorderly fantasy” was called “magical realism”": Several problems with these sentences.  First, you don't give the French definition which Carpentier was objecting to, which makes it hard to understand these points.  What is "the French adaptation", and what does it mean to say that the adaptation "suggested" something?  Is that quote (starting "search of the marvelous") the French definition?  What's the relevance of the three quoted phrases, and who said them?  And do you really mean that he believed that the search (etc.) 'was called magical realism'?  Seems an odd thing to "believe"; do you mean that he felt that was the right name for it, or that he was disagreeing with the existing definition?
 * What is "Etudes Foniric"?
 * changed it to Studios Foniric. I looked it up further but was getting articles in French.
 * OK -- the reader now can see it's a production company of some kind, which is all we needed. Note that you can use French sources if you can understand them; English sources are preferable but not compulsory. But I think this is fine.  Mike Christie (talk) 21:45, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "As director he worked on the productions of Claudel’s Le Livre de Christophe Colomb and also collaborated further with Desnos where they programmed readings of Edgar Allan Poe's The Murders in the Rue Morgue, and Walt Whitman’s Salute to the World." Why are these two things linked?  Did he take a directorial role in the readings?  The second half is oddly phrased.  How about "He directed productions of Le Livre de Christophe Colomb and collaborated with Desnos on arranging readings of Edgar Allan Poe's The Murders in the Rue Morgue, and Walt Whitman’s Salute to the World."  And was it "productions" of Le Livre de Christophe Colomb or just one production, as would seem likely?
 * OK now. Mike Christie (talk) 21:52, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * "He also contributed to important movements of expressionism, Cubism, and surrealism and participated in the Grupo Minorista and other avant-garde cultural groups, which he became deeply involved with as a political protest." Needs just a bit more context: are these Cuban movements?  How did he contribute -- by sending articles and fiction to their magazines?  Was the Grupo Minorista a Cuban group?  Was the political protest against Machado? (I said above that Machado seemed to have been democratically elected, but rereading the Wikipedia article it looks like he was trying not to leave office so the "dictator" comment above I asked about earlier might be OK after all.)
 * Deleted, so OK now.
 * Later life
 * ✅ "Carpentier was struggling with cancer as he completed his final novel" -- can we name the novel?
 * Lo real maravilloso
 * ✅ This section needs a little work. The first instance of lo real maravilloso is linked to magical realism, but then the paragraph goes on to say that the two are often thought to be different, and another link is given to magical realism, as if to demonstrate the difference.  I'd cut the first link, which is confusing, unless general critical opinion is that the two really are the same, in which case that should be made clearer.
 * The two ideas are related, but there is a fine line which seperates the 'marvellous' that Carpentier incorporates into his writing versus the 'magic' that Márquez adds to his (basically the improbable vs. the impossible, to put it in very simplified terms). I agree that the first link shouldn't be there as it is confusing and so I removed it.Katie322 (talk) 18:51, 19 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Music
 * ✅The last couple of sentences are uncited; can a reference be found for these? Also, I don't understand "Between developing his own footprint in the Cuban musical landscape, Carpentier formally studied the origins and political nuances of Cuban music": I don't know what "his own footprint" means.  I think you mean something like "Carpentier's own compositions made him an important part of the contemporary Cuban musical landscape, but he also studied the origins and political nuances of Cuban music".
 * I traded what was there for your suggestion, word for word. I hope that's okay.  It made more sense. Let me know if there's issues there with using your exact suggested sentence.Katie322 (talk) 18:51, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * No, that's fine, but it's still not cited. Mike Christie (talk) 01:01, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

**Desnos is described as a poet in this section, but earlier in the article he's described as a journalist. The two descriptions should be consistent with each other.
 * Musical career
 * Some of this duplicates material in the biographical sections. That's not terrible, unless the duplication is extensive, but you might want to look at what's in each section and make sure there's not too much repetition.
 * I think that someone already removed this section....yes? Otherwise I'm just not seeing it :S Katie322 (talk) 18:51, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It's the second paragraph of the Music section; the sentence about Roldán is essentially already in the early life section. On second thoughts, though, I think it's OK; the context is different and the details aren't given identically, and it's just one sentence. Mike Christie (talk)
 * El reino de este mundo
 * ✅ The sentence about racial stereotyping isn't quite clear to me -- do you mean that Ti Noël might be regarded as a racial stereotype, or that Carpentier might be accused of being a member of the stereotypically white Cuban elite?
 * It means that Carpentier, being a member of the white Cuban elite, chose to write from the black character's point of view so that he couldn't be criticized for being racist against the haitian people. I hope that makes more sense now. Katie322 (talk) 18:51, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's clearer now. Mike Christie (talk) 01:01, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Baroque
 * ✅ "Carpentier enriched his vision of the baroque in his early crónicas before he equated himself as a writer of that fashion" -- not completely clear.  What's a "crónica"?  And to "enrich" something means to add something to it that changes it in some way; it's not clear what Carpentier was adding to his vision from this.  And what does it mean to equate oneself as a writer?  Do you mean "before he began to describe himself as a baroque writer"?
 * The new version is better. Mike Christie (talk) 21:52, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * ✅ Can you find a better word than "distinguished" in the next paragraph? It's not clear what's meant.
 * Much better. Mike Christie (talk) 21:52, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * In the third paragraph of that section, the quote from Carpentier includes a colon after the ellipsis, which reads oddly. I'm not familiar with the original quote so I didn't want to delete it, but I suggest removing the colon if it doesn't harm Carpentier's meaning.
 * Here's the quote from the Kaup article (albeit not the original quote from Carpentier's essay): "The American Baroque develops along with criollo culture, . . . with the self-awareness of the American man, be he the son of a white European, the son of a black African or an Indian born on the continent [ . . . ]: the awareness of being Other, of being new, of being symbiotic, of being a criollo; and the criollo spirit is itself a Baroque spirit." I feel that the deletion of the colon wouldn't harm the meaning of the quote, but thought that you may want to analized it yourself.  I understand what you mean by it being a little awkward. Katie322 (talk) 18:39, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It looks as though Kaup thought the comma colon was worth retaining when he elided part of the quote; we might as well leave it the way he has it. Mike Christie (talk) 21:53, 18 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Surrealism
 * Quotes
 * Are all these by Carpentier? The third quote refers to him in the third person, so it would appear not.  I think the reader should be able to tell who is being quoted without going to the notes.
 * We've decided to remove this section as it seems a little redundant with only three quotes. Katie322 (talk) 18:51, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * OK. Mike Christie (talk) 01:02, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

That's it for a first pass. I hope this isn't too detailed; the article has a lot of good material but is a bit choppy in places and doesn't flow as smoothly as it might. I don't think everything above needs to be fixed for GA; I'm probably being pickier than a GA reviewer would be. If any of my comments seem wrong, please say so -- I have no knowledge of this field so I'm likely to make silly mistakes.

It's up to you how (or if) you respond, but a good way to deal with a list of issues like this is to put a response to each point into the middle of the list, so that I can read down the list and see the response next to the original point. Then I can go through and strike out each point that's dealt with, which helps you see what's left. I've done a bit of that above. You can also just put your notes in a new section below, if you prefer. Mike Christie (talk) 16:24, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

made some edits
Thanks for looking into the article. I just made a bunch of edits to my section and took some things out that were confusing. I went with your suggestion about the date's and Bergh citation.

--JordiHUBC (talk) 04:16, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Those have fixed quite a few points; I've struck out the points above that are corrected and left the others. It looks like y'all are dividing up the work by section -- one thing you might consider is to copy-edit each other's sections rather than your own.  It is much harder to see problems in your own work.


 * I'll keep going through the article this morning and add more notes to the section above. Mike Christie (talk) 11:41, 18 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I made some further changes as you suggested. I appreciate your help, most of the issues I had were trying to translate Spanish text into English and it looks like my translations did not materialize very well. Thanks again.--JordiHUBC (talk) 18:27, 18 April 2010 (UTC)

One last point
Almost everything I commented on is fixed, with one exception: the sentences "Carpentier's own compositions made him an important part of the contemporary Cuban musical landscape, but he also studied the origins and political nuances of Cuban music. His devotion to the adaptations of European artistic styles into Latin American music styles can also be seen in his admiration for Afro-Cuban musical themes." are still uncited.

This looks much better now. Good luck with the GA review. Mike Christie (talk) 01:05, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Got it! Thanks Mike Christie!--Josiemitchell (talk) 17:01, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, thanks Mike Christie! You've been a great help to us all! Much appreciated! :) Katie322 (talk) 18:07, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Mike for all your help! Hopefully we can get the GA status. Great job group! Last minute push has had the nerves going a little! Thanks for all your help it was fun working with all of you. All the best. --JordiHUBC (talk) 19:10, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Major works citation
A suggestion on how to cite the major works: if you have a reference that lists the major works, I'd suggest adding a single footnote to the lead sentence of that section -- the one that says "Carpentier's major works include:". That would avoid adding a ref to every line in the list. Mike Christie (talk) 11:07, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Pronunciation needed
Since Carpentier had a French father but grew up in Cuba, his last name has two possible pronunciations (French and Spanish)--it would be great if someone would clarify in the lede which pronunciation is preferred. Thanks. Aristophanes68 (talk) 18:30, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

Robert Desnos
Robert Desnos may have been working as a journalist when he helped Carpentier to escape, but he is remembered more as a poet, political activist and member of the Surrealists. Everybody got to be somewhere! (talk) 00:17, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

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So few footnotes, so much hagiography
So...a bit strange that no mention is made, anywhere, of Carpentier's lifelong (false) claims of being Cuban-born (rather, we get "he strongly identified as Cuban throughout his life" lol)...nor do we hear anything whatsoever of the controversies surrounding everything from his arguable cultural appropriations, to his support of the Castro regime. The article seems entirely sanitized of anything but an official, approved narrative.

The introductory section, for instance, makes all sorts of statements--many explicitly subjective (ok, let's be honest: fawning), in non-encyclopaedic style--without a single citation or footnote.

Just wondering if anyone's paying attention. ;-)

Withnail68 (talk) 03:22, 15 September 2021 (UTC)