Talk:Quenya/GA2

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

Reviewer: Maunus (talk · contribs) 14:00, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

I will review this article. More to come...·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:00, 3 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Nominator: Thank you, Maunus, for reviewing this page. I appreciate this a lot. I'm going to respond to your particular comments below. De728631 (talk) 09:24, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

Checking against GA criteria

 * GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)


 * 1) It is reasonably well written. Yes
 * a (prose):
 * There are prose problems, odd phrasings, with redundancy, lack of clarity and coherence between sentences and paragraphs, odd phrasings etc. I would recommend a very good copyedit once the content issues have been taken care of.
 * Something else has recently been observed by Helge Fauskanger: the article may be too detailed for the general reader. I agree that it contains a lot of "linguist-speak" aka jargon. Therefore while doing the copyediting, I think the explanatory sections should be left in place most of the times. De728631 (talk) 16:25, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I don't have a problem with details, as long as necessary jargon is explained. But I agree sometimes it is a good idea to spin out the details to daughter articles and have general summaries in place.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:45, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Reading through the sections I still think the prose could be a lot better. Many of the sections read like lists of information because there is no coherence between one sentence and the next, and no overall progression to each section. It makes for very choppy reading. Making the history sections chronological does give some structure, but the language itself could be a lot more coherent and flowing. I know that it often depends on the tastes of the reviewer the extent to which they attend to prose quality in GAs, and I wouldn't like to fail an otherwise well written article because of language problems, but here I am on the fence.  It is particularly important to improve the quality of the prose if there are any  plans for FA, because as it is it wouldn't stand a chance there. So if you have FA plans we might as well address the prose now. I will try to give it a copyedit to improve textual coherence and see if that a sufficient improvement.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:45, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thank you for dealing with the lead, I was going to do that today. Anyhow, I for one don't have any FA plans for this article, but I'd be happy to lift it to GA status and let it rest there for a while. Apart from the history sections I don't see any possibilities though to improve the text flow since the linguistic parts are in fact mainly composed of samples and lists of rules. And you're right that this is largely dependent on personal taste. I'm always reluctant to write in a too coherent mode because that tends to drift towards an essay-like style which we don't want to have either. De728631 (talk) 13:15, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):
 * The lead is too short and does not provide an adequate summary of the article as a whole. The way tables are used is not the best graphical solution for the presentation of grammatical data since they break up the flow of the prose and make reading the article seem choppy. Also the lead has citations which it doesn't need. All of the material should be cited in the body of the article and then the citations in the lead can be removed. Especially since some of the citations are supporting facts that seem entirely uncontroversial such as that it was created by Tolkien etc.
 * Once the article body has been improved in terms of topics, I'm going to take care of the prose and will update the lead section. As to the tables, I'm considering breaking out the main part of the Grammar section into a separate article so we can present a compact text-only section over here with one or two short tables at most. See e.g. the featured article Swedish language where the Grammar section has been treated that way. De728631 (talk) 09:24, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * There's now a new article Quenya grammar, and the appropriate section in the main article has been trimmed a lot. De728631 (talk) 14:35, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I think that is a good approach.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 16:34, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I have now finished editing the main sections into a (hopefully) improved version. So tomorrow I shall take on the lead section. De728631 (talk) 20:37, 9 January 2013 (UTC)


 * I have now started reviewing the grammar section, and it needs a lot of work. The information presented is not well organized it gives some very specific information and leaves out some general information and gives no real overview. For readability it is best if each section starts byt giving a general overview and then goes into specific detail e.g. "Nouns inflect for case and number > these are the numbers/these are the cases > the numbers and cases are formed like this" This makes it easier to read and understand. You could check out how Helge Fauskanger does it in his short grammar sketch for ideas. You can also read the Greenlandic language GA for an example of how to construct grammar sections that go from the general to the specific. Also all information in the grammar section should be cited to a reliable source that is preferably not a primary source - I would not mind it if you cite Fauskanger's website as he is a recognized expert. Other sources could be Arda Philology or Tolkien studies. Or it could perhaps be Allan and Carson's "introduction to Elvish" or some of the other basic Quenya introductions - I do doubt they reach the level of Fauskanger or the other academic studies. I have introduced some embedded commentary where I have suggestions or specific questions for clarification.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:47, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the input. I have just added some references by Helmut Pesch and I shall look at the Ardalambion site too. I have also added some clarifications where you indicated them. But as to the general text flow, I'm beginning to think that the two of us have some fundamentally different views of what it needs to write an encyclopedical text. E.g. I can already find a lot of introductory parts for the various sections. While I agree that the general introduction to the grammar section could longer and more comprehensive I don't see a need for much improvement to the subsections. Please bear also in mind that this is not a feature review but "only" a GA check. De728631 (talk) 19:20, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I understand that it can be frustrating to have to look at one's text in relation to the expectations of others. I have written one language FA and one language GA and have undergone several unsuccesful nominations, so I know this is demanding and the critique can feel harsh, when one as a nominator felt the article was very close to meeting the criteria. But please be assured that I am not interested in failing the article - what I am interested in, is to make it of comparable quality to other language GAs - and I intend to help in that process. In order for the grammar section to be adequate I see a need for a substantial rewrite. It is simply not coherent or comprehensive. It seemingly arbitrarily goes into detail on some topics and treat others very cursorily. As a redaer you are not left with a general understanding of how the language works after reading this section. If you really think we have "fundamentally differrent views" you can ask me to stop the review and let someone else take over, but if you are willing to keep working with me the article will end up as a truly Good Article. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 19:39, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm certainly interested in continuing the work with you but from my comments you might imagine that I didn't realise how the article was of such a bad quality and would require that much work to become acceptable. Grammar section aside, I just came across your html comment about the vowels. That entire section is actually inferred from Gebhardt's treatise (p. 45 who writes it pretty much this way. He also provides a vowel chart with only 7 sounds. Admittedly though he does not directly compare Pesch's and Fauskanger's statements. When I added this part I think I couldn't go into any further details without beginning to paraphrase the source text. Also I don't know where the number ten comes from, after all, a, e, i, o, and u are only five basic sounds; and in his 2003 book, Pesch writes that there are five vowels, each of them being short and long. Please see my latests edits to that section. De728631 (talk) 22:05, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't say it is "bad" I just think the prose can be improved quite a bit to make it easier for the reader to understand the information. I'll look at Gebhardt (whoc should of course be cited) and then see how to solve the wording. I think that the discrepancy is that it mixes the phonological and phonetic levels - i.e. there are 5 phonemic vowel qualities with a length distinction which means that there are 10 possible vowel sounds. But then the issue is complicated by the fact that Tolkien states that long mid vowels are slightly raised relative to the short ones. And I do think Fauskanger and Pesch's views are not contradictory.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 22:18, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's why I removed the contrasting point of view from the article text. Now, as to dental vs alveolar consonants, I don't remember where that current table came from but there is a different version in Pesch (2003) that also includes alveolar and postalveolar consonants, namely s, n, l, and r, respectively. Since this can be cited, I suppose we should add it. With the names of the tengwar columns being used (Tincotéma etc.), I fear that this table was actually loosely constructed from LotR Appendix E some day in the past. De728631 (talk) 23:01, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

I now have removed the connection to the tengwar columns except for the image. It seems to be a common misconception to reconstruct the consonant values from the tengwar rows (témar) alone. Instead one should in keep in mind that Feanor aka Tolkien constructed the Tengwar so that they could also be used to write a whole number of foreign languages. Therefore, as stated in Appendix E of LotR, the entire 3rd téma could freely be used according to the respective language to write. As you have marked yourself, grouping all Quenya consonants into témar is inconclusive (alveolars etc.). There is certainly a connection between the sound they represent and their name but this should rather be shown in the tengwar article proper and not here. De728631 (talk) 14:05, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I disagree, IO think the tengwar shows a lot about how Tolkien thought about phonology. And it doesn't matter that not all the tengwar fit to a poa. If you remove the description then I think you should remove all mention of tengwar from the phonology section and only include them in the section on writing system. In fact i think the entire part of the consonant section that comes after the table is problematic - especially if it isn't preced b7y a description of what tengwar is and how they relate to phonology. Letters and sounds are not the same - but in this case letters have been devised to mimic sounds to the highest possible degree. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:10, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * My primary concern was to fix the consonant table. But you're right that the part right below the table needs more background. So I'm going to restore your text part about the tengwar but it should probably be noted that the auxiliary tengwar at the bottom of their table are not part of the usual scheme. Also, the palatals (tyelpetémar) do have a name but don't have a row of their own. Instead these tengwar are made up of the usual calmatémar with a diacritic (two dots below the tengwa). So this whole téma business is not very comprehensive in my eyes. De728631 (talk) 14:22, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Since you have already removed the tengwar completely from the phonology section, I think this is even better. We shouldn't mix up letters and phonemes. But I did like the "subgroups" – we're not writing for linguists, we're writing for the general public. ;) De728631 (talk) 14:28, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * But I don't even know what subgroups would mean, neither would a general public person - the article has to be linguistically accurate while also being intelligible to layfolk that is the challenge. Subgroups didn't convey any information. I suppose you mean that the velars are plain and labialized? But basically the prose description of the phoneme inventory should be complete, mentioning all distinct poa & moa and the distributions.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:33, 11 January 2013 (UTC)


 * 1) It is factually accurate and verifiable. yes
 * a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):
 * I think it relies very much on primary sources and leaves out a lot of secondary literature that would be useful in describing the process of creation and the reasons Tolkien made the choices he did. Also there are many paragraphs and statements without sourcing. Some statements are evaluative statements that are only supported by primary sources, e.g. "Tolkien changed his mind" supported only by the primary source in which he describes a new version of the language, or the statement saying that Qenya and Quenya were substantially different supported by a citation to Qenyaqetsa - we can't use primary sources in that way because it looks like original research. It would not be difficult to find a source stating this (e.g. Gilson & Wynne "the growth of grammar"), but these are important required changes because otherwise the article suggests original research.
 * I think it relies very much on primary sources and leaves out a lot of secondary literature that would be useful in describing the process of creation and the reasons Tolkien made the choices he did. Also there are many paragraphs and statements without sourcing. Some statements are evaluative statements that are only supported by primary sources, e.g. "Tolkien changed his mind" supported only by the primary source in which he describes a new version of the language, or the statement saying that Qenya and Quenya were substantially different supported by a citation to Qenyaqetsa - we can't use primary sources in that way because it looks like original research. It would not be difficult to find a source stating this (e.g. Gilson & Wynne "the growth of grammar"), but these are important required changes because otherwise the article suggests original research.


 * Some suggestions for sources to integrate:
 * Lawrie Barnes & Chantelle van Heerden Virtual Languages in Science fiction and fantasy literature. Language Matters: Studies in the Languages of Africa, Volume 37, Issue 1, pages 102-117 2006; (OK, I read this one now and it is quite poor admittedly and gets lots of things wrong, I think you did a good job at taking out the only useful point they make) [In fact this peerreviewed journal article cites this very wikipedia article regarding the grammar of Quenya! Poor fools.]
 * Dimitra Fimi. Tolkien, Race and Cultural History: From Fairies to Hobbits.
 * Ross Smith. 2006. Fitting Sense to Sound: Linguistic Aesthetics and Phonosemantics in the Work of J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien Studies Volume 3, 2006 pp. 1-20
 * Christopher Gilson. 2009. Essence of Elvish: The Basic Vocabulary of Quenya Tolkien Studies  Volume 6, 2009;
 * Petri Tikka. The Finnicization of Quenya. In Arda Philology 1. Beregond, Anders Stenström (ed.).

These are some very interesting sources but I'm afraid that they're not easily accessible. So far I've only gotten the conference paper by Tikka in full, and Fimi's book has a snippet preview on Google that is not very helpful either. The articles in Tolkien Studies cannot be previewed but I'm trying to find an abstract for them. Anyhow, Google Books should have more than these so I'm going to do a search of my own. De728631 (talk) 09:24, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I've ordered Fimi and Solopova's books which should both prove useful. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:02, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * That's great. I've got Solopova's book which is pretty useful for a broad background on JJRT's general influences but doesn't go into much details when it comes to his languages. The Fimi book should be interesting though. De728631 (talk) 14:35, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I also think we should cite Hostetter and Gilson and Wynne regarding the development.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:51, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Do you mean the papers mentioned in "Further reading" or anything else? De728631 (talk) 15:15, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Primarily the further reading papers, which I think could be cited for many of the statements that are now based on primary sources or no sources. Probably it is a good idea to incorporate as many of the further reading sources into the references as possible.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:21, 10 January 2013 (UTC)


 * 1) It is broad in its coverage.
 * a (major aspects): yes b (focused): yes
 * I think it misses some major aspects such as an engagement with Tolkien's intent in creating the language, what was his vision of it and what was the role he assigned to it in the Middle-earth universe. The Quenya/Sindarin distinction is emblematic of the distinction between light and dark elves, and imply a hierarchy of being. This applies on all levels of description from the level of phonetics (why did he choose the sounds he chose?) Perhaps you could make a section called "Quenya in Middle-earth" describing how within the universe the language has a particular social/cultural/mythical significance, in relation to other languages spoken e.g. Valarin, Sindarin, Black speech etc. Also i think it would be an excellent addition to have a selection of the phrases in Quenya in the published works - LOTR and Silmarillion. This would be good to have before the grammar section, so that it gives the reader a sense of what the grammar analysis is based on.
 * I've been working a bit on the phonology aspect but including some quoted phrases is certainly a good idea. I think though that the role of Quenya envisioned by Tolkien is already mention in "Parmaquesta and Tarquesta", and in the Internal history section in general. Also Thingol's ruling to forbid the use of Quenya in Beleriand has been mentioned, so I don't see how we should add more in-universe content. De728631 (talk) 09:24, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I think the internakl history section could be consolidated which would make room for more information. Basically I don't think there is a need for separate subsections in the internal history section. many of the subsections are just a couple of sentences. What I think is missing in the internal history section is more information about the way that quenya/sindarin is emblematic of a hierarchic difference between High Elves and Dark Elves so that Quenya takes on a function as a kind of "classical language" tied both to religion, history and social status. I am hoping Solopova or Fimi will have more on this. I like what you did to the Grammar section - you can also see what we did at Greenlandic language for another way of integrating grammatical information without tables. Maybe a similar consolidation could be done for the phonology section spinning out an article on Quenya phonology for the more detailed material? ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:02, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I have now modified the internal history section a bit. I do think we should stick with the subsections since they provide a hierarchy and also function as a sort of timelime. I have however added some insight about the Light Elves and Dark Elves from V. Flieger's Splintered Light. While this is a first insight, I may dig deeper into that book to see what I can find. De728631 (talk) 14:35, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks for correcting my terrible mistake of confusing Okrent with Okrand! That was really embarassing. If we stick with the subsections I think the small ones should be expanded. Another way of maintaining the structure would be to use simple bold headers instead of the == part. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:25, 9 January 2013 (UTC)


 * 1) It follows the neutral point of view policy.
 * Fair representation without bias:
 * Yes.
 * 1) It is stable.
 * No edit wars, etc.: Y
 * Yes
 * 1) It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.
 * a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):
 * 1) Overall:
 * Pass/Fail:
 * Pass/Fail:

Issues with the grammar section – second opinion requested

 * I think the presentation of the article is complicated by the fact that Quenya is not a single language, but has different registers, dialects and stages of development. Overall the article would be improved by a greater degree of clarity about which variety is being described so that examples are primarily chosen from one variety. Alternatively I think it should be made fully clear what varieties examples represent.
 * The grammar section is very hard to read, it consists of short sentences with little coherence and a high information load, often with no supporting context for example one paragraph starts with "The plural forms (suffix -r in late Quenya) are used only with a detached plural subject." - this is a very specific piece of information that comes out of the blue and uses jargon that I frankly don't understand (being a linguist by profession) - I don't know what a detached subject is - and this information has not been preceded by any background information about what the inflectional categories of the Quenya verb are, or how they are encoded. This kind of writing makes the section very hard to read. It could be improved by starting each section at the general level and then moving into the specifics of different categories. E.g. "The Quenya verb inflects for agreement with number and person of the subject. Subject agreement is expressed with one of the suffixes..." Also examples should be glossed to make it easier to see what they mean, and they should illustrate specific topics. For example in the Pronoun section one paragraph starts with the sentence ""I love him" (or "her") can be expressed in Quenya as Melinyes or Melin sé." What is this example illustrating? What is the difference between the two ways of saying I love you? Context is urgently needed.
 * The issue of coherence should be addressed from the level of the structure of the entire section and to the level of the structure of each paragraph and each sentence. The section should be organized so that similar topics are treated together and in a sequence so that the reader gets the knowledge necessary for understanding each section. Solving this requires making a basic decision about what the function of the grammar section is. Should it provide a comprehensive catagllogue of the grammatical categories? Or should it simply give a basic typological overview of Quenya grammar? If the second then the section has too much detail in several sections (e.g. the section on a conjugated pronoun, adjective endings in late Q,), but if the first then it needs to be much more comprehensive. I think the wisest would be to opt for a relatively short typological overview that does not go into great detail but which provides examples of the major grammatical processes. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 19:29, 13 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thank you for these suggestions. Your first point is quite easy to address by restricting all samples to late exilic Quenya as has been done in the Phonology section. While I don't mind short sentences at all, I agree that some jargon could still be eradicated from the section. As to the major issue, coherence, I'm unsure whether the section needs to be struck down even more to merely present the "typological overview" as you call it. E.g. even your sample article Greenlandic language (see discussion above) has a quite detailed grammar section with many sub-headings and lots of lists instead of free-flowing prose. On the other hand, now that we have the separate article Quenya grammar it would be easy to just refer to that one for details. On that note, I'm planning to update the grammar article with the latest facts and phrases from Quenya proper once we've reached an outcome in the review process. Finally I should note that I didn't contribute much to this article before the review, but I found it ready to go when I nominated it. I'm not even a linguist so perhaps that is why I fail to see the incoherence here. De728631 (talk) 20:13, 13 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes, in Greenlandic we opted for comprehensiveness and the grammar section includes explanations and examples of all grammatical processes in the language. I wouldn't recommend this here because it would be more work, although it would make for a more exhaustive article that would be closer to FA status. I don't think the Greenlandic article has many lists, and all lists are tied to prose explanations. Articles that uses the typological overview approach is Swedish language  and Nahuatl (both FAs). I agree that the best approach would be to take examples mainly from late exilic Quenya. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:21, 13 January 2013 (UTC)

Aircorn's second opinion
A request for a second opinion was asked and I am willing to provide one. I haven't read the article yet, but thought I would leave a few preemtive notes. First, the reviewer will have the final say on whether the article passes, no matter my opinon. Second, judging whether an article is well-written is quite subjective. As a minimum I expect to be able to follow and understand what is being said. AIR corn (talk) 09:32, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Okay I have had a read through. To be honest the phonology and grammar was a hard slog, but the rest was fine. A few more wikilinks would help for the more technical terms, i.e. "The Quenya consonant system has 6 major places of articulation: labial, dental, alveolar, palatal, velar and glottal." Many language articles (including a few featured articles) are like this, so I don't think it is a prose issue. I have some comments about the lead. AIR corn (talk) 11:34, 15 January 2013 (UTC)


 * is a fictional language devised by J. R. R. Tolkien, and used in his fictional universe, often called Middle-earth. Why often called? What other names does it have?
 * Might want to say that it is elvish language earlier (maybe even in the first paragraph).
 * The third paragraph of the lead tends to stray a bit. Out of all the sections the lead should be the most focussed. For example:
 * "who left Middle-earth to live in Eldamar ("Elvenhome"), in Valinor the land of the immortal and God-like Valar. Of these two groups of Elves, the Noldor returned to Middle-earth where they met the Sindarin speaking Grey-elves. The Noldor eventually adopted Sindarin and used Quenya primarily as a ritual or poetic language, whereas the Vanyar who stayed behind in Eldamar retained the use of Quenya."
 * does not seem terribly relavant, especially for the lead.


 * Thank you very much for providing your opinion and the additional hints, which I think are very valuable. Wikilinks can easily be added to the introductory parts of the Grammar and Phonology sections, so any technical terms can be looked up. As to your specific points concerning the lead:
 * "Middle-earth" is actually only a small part of Tolkien's universe but in popular culture it has become the collective term for the entire world. I think this can be clarified with some simple changes to the lead.
 * Re: elvish language: Sure, this should be mentioned quite early.
 * This is actually the summed-up internal development of the language which is quite crucial for the internal history of Tolkien's world as has been published in The Silmarillion. I think it has also been mentioned in the main part of the article that Tolkien intended to give Quenya an archaic or ancient status compared to his other elvish language Sindarin. I think though that this can be clarified in the lead.
 * De728631 (talk) 17:45, 15 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Ok, I personally think that coherence and organization is an important part of what makes an article reasonably well-written, and I find this article article to be lacking in that department. Certainly it is not close to FA level quality of prose and organization. But, I do think that my personal taste in prose should not be what keeps an otherwise well-researched article from promotion. I will take Aircorn's point and not fail the article on prose concerns. I would still prefer a higher ratio of secondary to primary sources, but when we have worke4d more on that - for example using Ardalambion for grammar and phonology then we should be very close to passing.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:04, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm tempted to shout "Auta i lóme!" Regarding primary sources, I think it's alright to use the "Outline of Phonology" and "Quenya Grammar" by Tolkien as long as the article does not contain synthesis from these sources. After all, the Tolkien papers published in VT and PE include a lot of direct "recipes" for the language as envisioned by Tolkien, so citing primary sources is ok in this case. Of course we can always add "Tolkien wrote", or "according to Tolkien" but that would become too tiring and repetitive. De728631 (talk) 20:22, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
 * It's not so much about the attribution, it is about the risk of synthesis which arises from choosing information from his unpublished manuscripts. It introduces the problem that the sources don't always accord, and we have tom ake sense of that somehow. We don't know which ideas Tolkien later discarded, or reworked, except when someone has done that analysis for us and published it in secondary sources. If you want to rely mainly on Outline of phonology and Quenya grammar then I think they should be described in separate sections that do not include information from other primary sources. Then secondary sources would mainly have to be used to put those two sources in perspective and provide analytic commentary.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:28, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
 * You may be on to something there. VT No. 19 states that the Outline of Phonology refers primarily to Quenya in Valinor while we are attempting to present LotR-style Exilic Quenya. I have now added some secondary sources that actually confirm the facts attributed to the "Outline" for late Quenya, but of course there have been certain changes (not only in Tolkien's mind but also in the internal development). So I've dug out this paper by Fauskanger which I'm currently reading. That said, it seems to me that Ardalambion may be a bit outdated, especially since new findings have emerged in VT and other journals in the last few years. See also Ardalambion's timetable. De728631 (talk) 22:18, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
 * VT and similar Tolkien scholarship is of course an even better secondary source, but you said you didn't have access to most of that.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 22:28, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's right. The info I mentioned above is from their website that provides a sort of abstract for VT 19, but I don't have access to the full version of either journal. It would certainly be interesting to read the annotations by Gilson to the Outline of Phonology and other papers by Tolkien, but otherwise, Vinyar Tengwar and Parma Eldalamberon have resorted to publishing primary works only. Tolkien Studies may be an interesting source, at least here's a statement that Tolkien "to have remained largely satisfied by the 1951 phonology for the rest of his life." But then again I can't get hold of it either. De728631 (talk) 22:50, 15 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Sorry for the absence the last couple of days. I am going to look over the article today and give it a final copyedit, then I expect to be able to pass it tomorrow.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:40, 19 January 2013 (UTC)


 * I am passing this article. Prose-wise I think it is not terribly well written, but it is reasonably well written. Same with comprehensiveness. It is a definitely worthy of being called a Good Article, even though there's a good way to go still for it to be among Wikipedia's finest work. ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 22:46, 23 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Hurray! Thanks a lot for your patience and cooperation. De728631 (talk) 14:42, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

ñw pronunciation
I have changed the pronunciations of Quenya and ñwarë which had the sequence is phonetically very implausible and for which there also is no justification in terms of sources or even logics since the qu graph translates as  (so where does the w come from?) and the ñ translates as  not .·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:38, 9 January 2013 (UTC)

Tengwar
Given that the phonemes correspond directly to tengwar it would be really cool if the consonant table could include the tengwa corresponding to each sound. I don't know if this is reasonably possible given the difficulty of using tengwar fonts. Maybe if we did the consonant table as an .svg image instead of a wikitable?·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 22:55, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I think it was not a good idea to remove the tema description, since this is really an interesting and important party of how Tolkien thought about phonology. The tengwar are based on point and manner of articulation and I think it is important to include this in the description of the phonology. Note that my description was based on the tengwar table not on the consonant table. I think it is ok to remove the temar from the consonant table, but maintain the prose description of the relation between poa and the tengwar.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:03, 11 January 2013 (UTC)