Talk:Belacqua

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 15 February 2021 and 30 March 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Kashmir2001.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 17:55, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

"in Dante"?
The article says that Belacqua was a character "in Dante". But Dante is an author; certainly, this is meant to say that he's a character in Dante's Divine Comedy. Right? -- Mikeblas (talk) 13:02, 1 July 2014 (UTC)


 * The article says that Belacqua was a character "in Dante, Purgatorio Canto IV". I'll change it to apostrophe-s.  I believe the difference is one of style only.  Choor monster (talk) 13:19, 1 July 2014 (UTC)

Not a stub
Although there is no definitive definition, the various objective criterion listed in WP:STUB include <250 words (there are about 330 here, not counting references, captions, headings and the like), <10 sentences (there are about 20 sentences here) and <1500 characters (there are about 2000 here). And if you apply the Croughton-London rule, well this is obviously a Croughton, not a London. Choor monster (talk) 17:38, 8 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Pretty clearly a stub, since it's completely unreferenced. -- Mikeblas (talk) 03:10, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
 * There are seven references, all quite scholarly, and six of them are available on-line. Choor monster (talk) 12:41, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
 * They're not references; they're "further reading". No footnotes are provided, so they're inherently unverifiable. -- Mikeblas (talk) 14:03, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Really? Based on the sources and links I've provided, no one in the universe is capable of following them and checking that the material here is indeed supported?  That is what "inherently unverifiable" means.  "Inherently unverifiable" means something my grandmother told me, or some anon posted to amazon.com, or the like.
 * As it is, you are making up policy as you go along, playing trashy word-games. See WP:CITE.  In brief, they are references, and they are listed in the "further reading" section.  I do not call it the "references" section because that is most commonly used on WP for footnotes.  There is absolutely no requirement to tag sentence by sentence or paragraph by paragraph.  See WP:CITE.  There is a requirement that the reliable sources be provided in some way suitable for the material.  I chose this arrangement as the simplest and clearest for the material at hand, because tagging the same three footnotes for the Dante material, and the same four footnotes for the Beckett material, over and over again, would be ludicrous. Choor monster (talk) 17:03, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

Correct link?
The bibliography section in this article provides this link:, which leads to a book store. It doesn't seem appropriate to provide a link to a commercial site -- the page linked just sells the book, it doesn't provide any information about the material in question.

Further, it seems to be the wrong book. The bibliographic reference given is to a Daniela Caselli title ("Samuel Beckett in Context"), published by Cambirdge University Press. The page linked is to a book edited by Angela Moorjani and Carola Veit. Shouldn't this link be removed? -- Mikeblas (talk) 14:15, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
 * The same link is used for the Julie Campbell item. I have removed both, per WP:ADV and the documentation. -- Mikeblas (talk) 14:22, 10 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Rodopi is the publisher, not a bookstore. The link provides useful information about the item.  As such, your removal of the link was incorrect.  WP:ADV permits appropriate, reader-useful links, and  bans bookstore links, not publisher links. Choor monster (talk) 17:10, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
 * I have no idea what your problem with the Campbell link is, it links to the particular issue of the indicated journal. If you had looked at the information-packed Rodopi link, you would have seen her article listed, way at the bottom.  The Caselli link is to a different article. Why are you finding this confusing?  For what it's worth, Caselli also has a relevant article in the same journal as Campbell. Choor monster (talk) 17:15, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Looking over things again, I believe I did not cite the Caselli 2001 article since the material was incorporated into her cited 2006 book. I also cited Caselli 2013 since it is shorter, and freely available on-line. Choor monster (talk) 17:45, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
 * There's nothing at the linked page besides a table of contents and a purchase button. I've removed the links again, since they add nothing to the article and are essentially advertisements. -- Mikeblas (talk) 02:23, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
 * It is certainly useful for letting you know the source is from a major scholarly publisher. Choor monster (talk) 13:00, 11 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Much more importantly, WP:ADV is a section within WP:EL, which states point-blank at the top: "This guideline does not apply to citations to sources supporting article content" and "This guideline does not apply to inline citations or general references". In other words, your complaint is completely irrelevant, and your removal of the link was not based on any policy whatsoever. Choor monster (talk) 13:54, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Favorites
This article is about the character Belacqua, but seems to spend a lot of time describing Samuel Beckett. Shouldn't that material be moved to the Beckett topic? Meanwhile, the Beckett discussion claims "Samuel Beckett, whose favorite reading was Dante" but no reference is provided for that claim. It seems both irrelevant and unencyclopedic, especially in this context; why is it here? -- Mikeblas (talk) 14:15, 10 September 2014 (UTC)


 * For someone who calls this a "stub", you seem to think there's a "lot of time" in the article. Sheesh.


 * It is here because it is extremely contextually relevant to someone seeking information about Belacqua. Why force them to wade through tons of Beckett information first?  Multiple references are provided for the Beckett claim.  And the information is here because it is 100% relevant information about the fictional character named "Belacqua", both Dante's and Beckett's.  In this case, the story behind the choice of name and what he is like. Choor monster (talk) 17:24, 10 September 2014 (UTC)


 * Even if you are only interested in Dante's character, as it states in the lede: "Most contemporary commentary on Belacqua is by way of Samuel Beckett's strong interest in him." Dante's Belacqua is a very minor character, and as such, gets very little attention from Dante scholars.  Because Beckett's Belacqua is the central character in Beckett's first two works, and as such, gets tons of scholarly attention, the consequence is Dante's Belacqua gets a strong attention boost.  Choor monster (talk) 18:37, 10 September 2014 (UTC)


 * These claims aren't referenced, so I've added "cite needed" tags for them. -- Mikeblas (talk) 02:36, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
 * These claims are referenced, as per policy in WP:CITE. What you mean to say is these claims aren't footnoted line-by-line, which is not required.  Choor monster (talk) 13:01, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Removed category
Nothing in this topic establishes a real person as the basis for the Belacqua character. As such, I've removed the Category:Fictional characters based on real people from the article. -- Mikeblas (talk) 02:37, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
 * The real person who has been identified by scholars as Dante's source for Belacqua is mentioned in the articles. There are references, with links. Choor monster (talk) 13:02, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
 * The links provided sell books; they don't directly provide a verifiable source for the material. Thus, they've been removed. The article remains very flimsy because of poor verifiability. -- Mikeblas (talk) 17:43, 14 September 2014 (UTC)
 * One link, not "the links" has a shopping cart. You do not make your point, or any points for that matter, by misrepresenting the contents of the article.  As explained above, this particular link is completely acceptable according to WP policy.  Moreover, there is more than one refer that provides support for the claim about the category, which you choose to ignore.  There are seven references, three for the Dante Belacqua, four for the Beckett Belacqua.  Ergo, verifibility is well-established, and your claims remain utter nonsense. Choor monster (talk) 11:58, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

adding literary commentary and more details about Dante's Belacqua
These are the sources I intend to use: Alighieri, Dante. Purgatorio. Translated by Jean Hollander and Robert Hollander, Anchor Books, 2004. - Source contains comprehensive commentary on and history of Belacqua's character in Purgatorio.

QUAGLIO, ENZO. “The Lute Maker.” Lectura Dantis: Purgatorio, A Canto-by-Canto Commentary, edited by ALLEN MANDELBAUM et al., by Charles Ross, 1st ed., University of California Press, 2008, pp. 39–46. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/j.ctt1pn7mj.6. Accessed 11 Mar. 2021. - Source offers insightful analysis on Belacqua's state in ante-purgatory and the evolution of the reading of his character.Kashmir2001 (talk) 22:38, 11 March 2021 (UTC)