Talk:Jacques-Louis Monod

Composer project review
I've reviewed this article as part of the Composers project review of its B-class articles. This article was probably raised to B by a bot, since the Biography project had given it a B rating.

I find this article to be of Start quality; it is missing significant details that a typical composer biography should have. (This in spite of the length of the article.) My full review is on the comments page; questions and comments should be left here or on my talk page.  Magic ♪piano 15:09, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

In the highly extraordinary case of the life and legacy of Monod's, I'm afraid we must occassionally reconsider the overly rigid rules laid forth by writers/editors of Wikipedia and assume that all statements made on Monod are true until proven otherwise. Monod's legendary career has yet to be written and the public would be at a great disservice to readers if various significant information on his oeuvre would be omitted merely for reasons of some ill-adequate rules in Wikipedia. The facts are that some artists have transcended the media and accompanying hype: Monod is one of those rare artists who has had little interest in generating publicity; unlike his avant-garde peers and former colleagues from Paris and Darmstadt, who extoll in media support and have made careers with the hype. The fact that far greater attention has been paid in the media for ex. to the careers of Boulez, Stockhausen and Nono does not necessarily validate their musics, nor is this attention any indication that Monod's oeuvre is of lesser merit; on the contrary, the media has not only made a "living" for themselves, but also for those whom they have classified as the avant-garde. The prudent and ethical choice would be to publish as many details on Monod as available in Wikipedia, since few studies are currently available on Monod, until rigorous research is undertaken on his life and legacy. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.177.91.124 (talk) 06:53, 14 March 2009 (UTC)


 * The problem with "reconsidering the overly rigid rules" is that this is your opinion. Please describe a coherent policy by which it could be determined which articles should have the rules relaxed (I suggest you do this on the Verifiability talk page, not here).  Additionally, why should anyone take your say-so on this or any other subject?  (I don't claim to be authoritative on anything other than my opinions, which I try to avoid putting in the article mainspace.  Everything else is derived from sources I am prepared to list.)
 * There is much in this article where there is no way to verify what is said. For all anyone knows, the uncited text in this article is entirely fictional.  The fact that the subject of the article does not seek publicity is beside the point (although it may make the biographer's job more difficult).  I've reviewed many articles that describe poorly documented individuals (think Renaissance composers).  Quality articles can be written under these circumstances, so this subject is not really an exception.
 * The "prudent and ethical choice" is not to subvert Wikipedia's policies, but to find a different forum (for example, a scholarly journal or a book), and publish what you know there, according to that publisher's standards. Once that has happened, feel free to reference that material here. Until then, this article does not meet the publisher's (Wikipedia's) guidelines, and is subject to having uncited claims (especially WP:NPOV and WP:PEACOCK commentary) removed.
 * By the way, I agree with you that mention in press (Boulez, Stockhausen, Nono) does not necessarily correlate to importance. (I have no interest in most modern music, so I have no axe to grind in this.) If Monod is really important, it will show at least in part in the notability of his students, as well as statements from them, his collaborators, and others, who claim him as an influence (all of which is in short supply in this article, by the way).  Magic ♪piano 15:59, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Referencing
User:Kleinzach has removed the refimprove tag I placed. I stand by my contention that the things that are listed in External links/References likely do not adequately source the text of this article. Of the items listed, all but two are little more than concert or publication reviews, and do not speak to Monod's life in any significant detail. Of the other two, one is Grove, to which I do not have access. The other is the NYT piece by Allan Kazinn, which contains a short biography, lacking in much of the detail present in this article. Are you claiming that the bulk of this article is actually sourceable to Grove?  Magic ♪piano 02:10, 16 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree with you, Magic. There may perhaps be a conflict here between use of the "refimprove" tag and the "morefootnotes" one, which produces a message calling for more inline references. It appears that Kleinzach is interpreting the former to mean simply that more references need adding to the reflist. As a matter of fact, I find only three inline citations in this entire, very long article, and one of these I cannot verify directly. This is the one pointing to "Michael Steinberg in the New Grove". The reference list includes a link, but it will only work if you have a personal account with Oxford Music Online. Since I have access to this site only through my university library, the linking URL cannot be used there—I need to know the subject of the article including the "citation by Michael Steinberg" (a "contributor" search for Steinberg produces a list of 59 articles). There is a (very short) article on Monod in New Grove, and it is by Steinberg. Further, it does seem to contain the claimed information about poets whose works Monod has set, but the reference could equally well have been to remark quoted from Steinberg in an entirely different article not by him—there is no way to tell. So, I would say that the way the list of references is formatted is itself very doubtful. The point you raise—that there are nowhere near enough inline citations—is far more serious. Steinberg's New Grove article on Monod is only two short paragraphs, and practically nothing in this Wikipedia article is verified by it, except for that list of poets.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 04:04, 16 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Gentlemen, I take the points you've made. I certainly agree that the references should be copy-edited. I removed the tags in the context of the BLP content deletion problem (I assume you know what has been happening), as part of a sweep that I have been doing today (see here). If you are involved in detailed work on this article, then please restore the tags as you see fit. If the article is on your watchlists then it will be in good hands and we won't have content being removed. -- Klein zach  09:03, 16 February 2010 (UTC)


 * This article has been on my watchlist ever since I reviewed it -- I tend to keep track of articles like this that appear to be the product of editors with potential POV issues, especially if they engage in discussion (as the anon editor responded above). I think it has been long enough that some of the more problematic material in this article ought to be removed.  Formatting of the references aside, there is no real reliable source here to back up most of the content. BLP watchdogs do not appear to have hit this article, but in its present state, it presents a clear target, and there is no obvious reason to support the retention of much of the material here.   Magic ♪piano 13:59, 16 February 2010 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 19:21, 29 April 2016 (UTC)