Talk:Geoffrey Barraclough

Unclear text deleted
I have deleted the following unclear text:


 * By writing book reviews, essays and newspaper articles Barraclough worked his ideas into narrative form, while experimenting with new material and also receiving useful criticism.

My questions on the text are:


 * What is "narrative form"? As distinct from what form? Does "worked his ideas into narrative form" mean "interspersing his ideas with narrative history"? What is so noteworthy about that? It is a commonplace practice.


 * What is his "experiment" exactly?


 * What is so noteworthy about "receiving useful criticism"? Any historian must do that.

By the way, the following text adds almost no noteworthy information:


 * His first two books on historiography, History in a Changing World and An Introduction to Contrmporary History are collections of essays. With scholarly authority, Barraclough served as editor of The Times Atlas of World History, which continues to be updated.

Would the editor concerned care to justify its existence?- Palaeovia talk 22:10, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

There are many many ways of working up an historical narrative. The process changes from historian to historian. Few professional historians actaully reach outside of academia, but Barraclough did and he made that an important part of his method for developing his story. I know first hand that it was an important part of his methodology. I spoke with him about it several times. I think the sentence you removed is significant for any scholar that might want to know how this historian worked with his material. The sentence you removed made the final two sentences far more relevant. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.221.84.76 (talk) 23:06, 28 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Thank you for the clarification. As I said, the deleted sentence is vague, almost devoid of content. Is your purpose to emphasize that Barraclough made history accessible to the public? The deleted sentence does not convey such an intention.


 * First-hand knowledge, I am afraid, is not a basis for Wikipedia material. You can include such knowledge in this talk page, for the benefit of readers. However, material in the article itself should be adequately sourced.


 * I imagine that it is not too hard to find published texts attesting to his historical methohology. Such texts would be valuable.


 * With best regards,-- Palaeovia talk 01:49, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Geoffrey Barraclough - extra material - is this wanted/relevant
I have two items relating to Geoffrey Barraclough. The first is an "autobiography" covering 1908 to 1942. I have put autobiography in quotes because it was written as a sort of love letter for his second wife to set down for her factors that influenced his life to that date. This runs to 62,000 words. The second is a biography written by David Hackett Fisher, a colleague of his at Brandeis (for what purpose I do not know) - this runs to 13,000 words.

Would anyone want this stuff to be uploaded for consideration - alternatively I could send it as a MS Word file to anyone who is interested.

It is probably helpful to add that I am one of Geoffrey's sons, which is why I have the material.

Finally I have never used Wikipedia before so I apologise in advance if this entry is not appropriate.

Nngb (talk) 15:32, 24 March 2013 (UTC)