Talk:John Wilson (Puritan minister)/GA1

GA Review
The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.''

Reviewer: Khazar2 (talk · contribs) 15:30, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

I'll be glad to take this review. I'll do a close readthrough over the next few days, noting initial issues as I go; then we'll turn to the criteria checklist. Thanks in advance for your work! -- Khazar2 (talk) 15:30, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much for the review!Sarnold17 (talk) 01:48, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

First readthrough

 * "greatly lamented by those who knew him and worked with him" -- lamented is a enough strong word that "greatly lamented" may be overselling the point.
 * removed "greatly"


 * "John Wilson was born in Windsor, Berkshire, England about 1591, the son of the Reverend William Wilson (1542–1615), originally of Sudbury in Suffolk,[1][2] who was a chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Edmund Grindal." -- this sentence has a lot of clauses--you might split it in two by starting a new sentence at "he was the son of the Rev. William..."
 * Split into two sentences


 * "His father" -- John or William's?
 * I think I've clarified this


 * ""three angels," a gold coin " -- this phrasing throws me--is the coin called a "three angels"? Or did he get three of these coins?
 * I reworded this a bit, but the single coin was called three angels, likely based on the image stamped on it, but I don't know this; there may be some other reason it has that plural name. I like including this, because it is a bit of history that is different, and to some might be interesting.


 * "he was invited, and accepted the position of minister at Sudbury" -- I rephrased this for clarity (I'm not sure you can "be invited the position of minister"), but please correct me if this was a technical term that I botched up.
 * Looks fine


 * This isn't a Good Article criterion, and won't affect this review at all, but as a side note, this article needs a look for WP:REPEATLINK--links like New England and John Winthrop appear to repeat from section to section or even paragraph to paragraph.
 * This is a valid point, and it is a fairly big deal for featured articles. I will take note of this and de-link where appropriate, and please feel free to do so also.  DONE:  I've removed a good dozen or more redundant links, particularly "New England" "John Winthrop" "John Cotton" and a few others.


 * " Plymouth historian Nathaniel Morton said that he "bare a great " --Morton bore this or Wilson did? I'm assuming Wilson is meant.
 * changed "he" to "Wilson"


 * "who had previously been ordained teacher" -- this phrasing seems unusual, but again I may not be familiar with terminology of the Puritan church. Should this be "ordained as a teacher"?
 * the wording is correct, and used universally in books on the early Puritan ministers. In the Puritan ideal, the church would have two ordained ministers:  one called teacher in charge of doctrine and the other called minister (or pastor or priest) in charge of people's souls.  It is correct to say that "he was ordained rector/minister/teacher" without the article in front of the word.  I think it would be appropriate for me to use parenthetical expressions for clarification the first time I introduce "teacher" and "minister".  I'll read through and see where these would best fit in.


 * "In the autumn of 1634" -- switch to "late 1634" or a specific month per WP:RELTIME.
 * changed


 * "of some heterodox views that she had while en route to New England on the ship Griffin" -- this phrase left it ambiguous whether Hutchinson had these views while en route, or Wilson was informed en route. (It also implies that AH only had these views while en route, which doesn't seem to be the case.) Maybe "some heterodox views she had expressed" would clear up the confusion?
 * changed to "heterdox views that she revealed while enroute"


 * " with the other ministers seeing this as being directed at them." -- this makes the sentence rather awkward and is probably unnecessary; the attack is clear.
 * I've reworded this; it was redundant as previously written, and did not properly express the idea


 * " During the court held in early November" -- "Court meeting" or "court session" would probably be preferable here.
 * In my research about the controversy, I've found the usage "May court" or "November court" to be predominant, and I seldom see it written as "court session" except possibly to offer some wording variety. This word usage most accurately reflects the prose found in the sources.


 * "were picked up" -- makes it sound a bit like there's a microphone taking this down. Maybe "recorded" or "noted"? --
 * changed "picked up" to "recorded".

Khazar2 (talk) 16:50, 1 January 2013 (UTC)


 * "Unlike Wilson's early life, very little has been written about his later career. While Wilson's biographer gave more than 60 pages of text detailing his early life from England through the Antinomian Controversy in Massachusetts, he then proceeded with a 70-page dissertation to justify the Puritan position for banishing Roger Williams, Anne Hutchinson and John Wheelwright, for whipping Baptist activists, and for executing the Quaker martyrs. Not once in these 70 pages of Wilson's biography is the name of Wilson even mentioned" -- This paragraph verges into analysis of M'Clure; is it possible to find another source that makes this observation about his work? The sentence "very little has been written about his later career" could also use a citation.
 * I've removed this entire paragraph; it was just me blowing steam, and being disgusted with M'Clure's biography, which turned out to be largely an apology for Puritan shortcomings. It was largely editorializing on my part, and really doesn't belong in this article.


 * "One of the final acts with which Wilson had become well identified was the persecution of the Quakers;" -- a bit convoluted for a basic point. It also appears that the source doesn't say he's "well identified with the persecution of Quakers", simply that he did so. Perhaps this phrase could just be cut? -- Khazar2 (talk) 19:15, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I've removed the quoted material and done some rewording


 * "In the 1650s he became a fierce opponent of Quaker missionaries" is almost word-for-word from the source; please rephrase this a bit or add quotation marks.
 * reworded


 * "An anecdote, repeated by several authors, whether true or not, points to the character of Wilson." -- this appears to be a bit of unsourced commentary.
 * While the anecdote is given by M'Clure, I have seen it in multiple sources, but don't want to go digging for them. I've reworded, and just attributed the story to M'Clure.


 * " at one point took the orphaned son of a local sagamore into his home to protect and educate" -- almost word-for-word from original source; please rephrase, and check for other close paraphrasing issues per WP:PARAPHRASE.
 * I've reworded this to avoid close paraphrasing.

This article is quite good on the whole: readable, interesting, and comprehensive. My main concern is that the phrasing in the sources I've checked hews quite close to the original. I don't believe M'Clure is an issue, as his work is presumably out of copyright, and he's generally attributed in-text anyway; but the phrases like "began to make adverse comments about Wilson" are unnecessarily close to those in copyrighted sources. The wording in these sections should be significantly reworked. In the above phrase, for example, you might simply say "began to criticize Wilson", rather than using Bremer's precise language. This is always a bit of a judgement call, but it seems to me that this article relies a little too heavily on the wording and phrases of the originals. -- Khazar2 (talk) 19:15, 1 January 2013 (UTC)


 * I've gone through all of the Bremer references and removed a bit of close paraphrasing. Bremer has an excellent use of words that I found a bit too attractive.  Spot checking Plimpton, I don't seem to have the same difficulty with the few references I checked.


 * I think I've addressed all of the comments up to this point.Sarnold17 (talk) 02:22, 2 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks much for your quick responses! I'll take another look tomorrow morning/afternoon to follow up in detail. Cheers, -- Khazar2 (talk) 02:23, 2 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Yep, looks like all of the above is sufficiently resolved. Thanks again for your quick and thoughtful responses. I'll now begin the checklist below. -- Khazar2 (talk) 16:45, 2 January 2013 (UTC)