User talk:Ben AJ Harrison

Welcome to Wikipedia
There is a welcome template that I could paste on your page if I knew where to find such a thing!

Anyway, thanks for you article on Brian Clarke, referenced and all! Well done!

With regards the Stained glass article, Clarke does not warrant a potted biography stating how he started out and what he went on to. He either becomes one in a list of notables (which includes some very notables), or else his work is used to demonstrate a trend.

Amandajm (talk) 13:05, 29 May 2013 (UTC)

20th century stained glass
What you have written is useful, but entirely England-centred. You refer to an important German movement merely as a background for what happened in England. Would yo please divide the information into two sections i.e. 1. Developments in Germany were thus. 2. Developments in England were thus.

You'll find that artists' names are already given in the preceding paragraph. What you add requires incorporating with the present text, or vice-versa. It can be either way,but you cannot refer to Germany merely as a background to the UK. Can you please work through the two paragraphs and make something that is coherent out of them? Amandajm (talk) 05:58, 18 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your comments. I have divided the information as you suggest, making a longer paragraph on Germany and following it with a shorter sentence on England. I have brought the two mentions of Ludwig Shaffrath closer together. I realise that I am still repeating Johannes Schreiter's name. To stop the repetition of names, maybe the sentence "Important 20th-century stained glass artists include [...]" should be moved to the end of the section and changed to something like "Other notable 20th-century stained glass artists include [...]"? Maybe all the other paragraphs in this section should be reorganised/rewritten to make it chronological? The only change I've made to the other paragraphs so far is to add John Piper to the list of important 20th-century stained glass artists (as Piper designed major windows that Patrick Reyntiens, who was already in the list, produced). Ben AJ Harrison (talk) 11:09, 18 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Ben, please keep to the headings. Stuff on innovations that happened between 2000-2007 doesn't belong in the same short section as Charles Rennie MacIntosh 100 years earlier, and above the heading 20th and 21st centuries.
 * Regarding the list of names, I think that the artists on the list mostly produced symbolist works. Those that did not should be moved and put into the category with Clarke.
 * Biographical details such as who met who on a travelling scholarship don't go into an article that begins with Ancient Egypt and sums up the whole 400 years of medieval glass in two short paragraphs. It is too much. It's about achieving a balance. Regardless of how important Brian Clarke might be, he gets a mention, along with Chagall, van Doesburg, Powell, Hardman, and all the other hundreds of names that could be here, most of which are not. Please look at the whole article. There are plenty of options for adding detailed information in other articles, such as Clarke's biography.
 * There is an article called British and Irish stained glass (1811-1918). Can I suggest that you create a new article about late 20th century British Glass? Choose your time frame e.g. British and Irish stained glass (1970-2010) and write it.
 * Amandajm (talk) 11:21, 19 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Hello Amanda. Thank you for explaining in detail why you removed some of my edits, and for your suggestions. I did think that there was a point worth mentioning about Clarke pushing at the limits of what can be defined as stained glass, but if I do add this point I will do so either in his biography or in a new article, not squeezed into this article. I understand the points you are making, except for when you say, "Those that did not should be moved and put into the category with Clarke", which category do you mean? Ben AJ Harrison (talk) 13:56, 19 June 2014 (UTC)

Edit summaries, multiple consecutive edits
Hello, Ben. A couple suggestions for you to consider that will make it easier for us all to work together: Thanks in advance for considering these suggestions. Eric talk 11:59, 18 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Please make a habit of providing an edit summary when you make a change to an article. Doing so makes it easier for your colleagues here to understand the intention of your edit.
 * Plus, it will be easier for you and your co-editors to collaborate on articles if, instead of making multiple consecutive edits in rapid succession on an article, you use the "Show preview" button to view your changes incrementally before finally saving the page once you're satisfied with your edits. This keeps the page history of the article less cluttered.
 * Hello Eric. Thank you for your suggestions. From now on, I will definitely add an edit summary to all future major edits. In fact, having just read the edit summary help page, I intend to add short summaries to all minor edits too, so that I get into the habit. I have been using the preview facility, but I will try harder to minimise the number of edits I make, to prevent page history clutter. Ben AJ Harrison (talk) 12:46, 18 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Hi Ben, and thanks! I think you will quickly see the benefit as you accumulate more pages on your watchlist. Happy editing. Eric talk 15:05, 18 June 2014 (UTC)