Template:Did you know nominations/Gimli (Middle-earth)

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The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Theleekycauldron (talk) 23:09, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

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Gimli (Middle-earth)

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Fan art of Gimli
Fan art of Gimli

Improved to Good Article status by Chiswick Chap (talk). Nominated by LordPeterII (talk) at 16:52, 20 September 2022 (UTC).

  • Comment (not a review): In the lead, there's a bit about how "Scholars have commented that Gimli exemplifies dwarvish heroism and love of craftsmanship". I'm not sure this is clearly covered in the body of the article: I can't really find any reference to Gimli exemplifying heroism (there's a mention of an exchange between Gimli and the elf Elrond in which "dwarvish heroism is expressed in their veiled speech"; I'm not quite sure what this means exactly but it doesn't seem to say Gimli exemplifies heroism) or love of craftsmanship (a scholar references the "dwarvish love of hand-crafted workmanship" but this isn't assigned to Gimli in particular). I may be missing something, but flagging in case helpful. Cheers, Chocmilk03 (talk) 06:21, 22 September 2022 (UTC)
  • Erm, since Gimli was the only dwarf in the cited conversation where dwarvish heroism was expressed, it must have been him indeed. Like all dwarves he was into workmanship, which the (cited) gates of mithril and steel certainly exemplify. Chiswick Chap (talk) 20:12, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • @Chiswick Chap: Hi there, the lead says "Scholars have commented that Gimli exemplifies dwarvish heroism and love of craftsmanship". I think the body needs to point to these comments, if that's the case. The fact that a scholar says all dwarves are into workmanship doesn't mean a scholar has said Gimli exemplifies dwarvish love of craftsmanship; the fact that a scholar says a conversation between Elrond and Gimli expressed dwarvish heroism doesn't mean a scholar has said Gimli exemplifies dwarvish heroism. I hope that makes sense. It's also good to be mindful of WP:SYNTH; even if a conclusion seems obvious from the text, we should be careful about drawing it. "A scholar said that in the conversation between Elrond and Gimli, Gimli expressed dwarvish heroism" is fine, but saying Gimli exemplified dwarvish heroism needs to be supported by a source that says that. Cheers, Chocmilk03 (talk) 20:24, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • The lead explicitly says scholars, i.e. the claim is not in Wikipedia's voice and never has been, and this is supported by the cited text in the article body. I am not the DYK nom for this item and do not wish to take on that burden by default; if nom wants my help it will be available to him. I have pinged nom already below. Chiswick Chap (talk) 20:29, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • Sorry, I may not be explaining myself clearly (and will explain further in case it helps LordPeterII). I'm not saying the claim is in Wikipedia's voice. "Scholars say Gimli exemplified dwarvish heroism"; this isn't stated in the body. What is stated in the body is that a scholar says that in a conversation between Gimli and Elrond, "dwarvish heroism is expressed". That's quite a different thing. Similarly, scholars say Gimli "exemplified ... love of craftsmanship"; a scholar saying dwarves love craftsmanship isn't a scholar saying that Gimli exemplified it. If scholars indeed say Gimli exemplified these things, then that's great, but that isn't currently what the body of the article says. Anyway, I don't want to hold up the DYK approval and will leave it up to reviewer/nominator whether they agree with the point and think it needs addressing, I guess. Cheers, Chocmilk03 (talk) 20:36, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • I've removed the passage you are objecting to from the lead. Chiswick Chap (talk) 21:17, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • Withdrawing my approval since another, contrary review was done while edit-conflicting. -- MelanieN (talk) 19:48, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • Or the other way about, it seems that the other reviewer was equally willing to back down and accept your verdict! Chiswick Chap (talk) 20:12, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • I do stand by my comments. Melanie was first to submit her review, so quite possibly hers would have had precedence if she didn't withdraw. (My review was started before she submittted, I hope it's clear my review took me more than 6 minutes to write!) I've done a good number of DYK reviews, but have never been in a situation of dueling reviewers, so don't know how it would work. --GRuban (talk) 20:17, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • OK, as LordPeterII appears to be away, I've made the requested fixes. Chiswick Chap (talk) 21:17, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

General eligibility:

  • "Using past tense when discussing the plot or any of its elements (except backstory), rather than the historical present tense." - basically all of it. The backstory "was born in" is probably acceptable, but not the events detailed in LoTR.
  • Done.
    • "Labeling fictional characters with descriptors such as "deceased" or "formerly"" - "Glóin, a former companion of the hobbit Bilbo Baggins". How about "Gloin, a secondary character in The Hobbit..."? We may not need to introduce Bilbo at all, per the unnecessary detail part below.
  • Done.
  • Fictography – a character description that is written like a biography - this one I can accept bending somewhat, since we do need the born, too young for Ereborn, Aglarond, sailed into the west bits.
  • Noted.
Second, I would also minimize the sentences that don't mention Gimli, which there are many of. This is a different one of the Wikipedia:Good article criteria, specifically "3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail" For example,
  • the fifth paragraph about Amon Hen has five sentences and only mentions Gimli once, I'd radically shorten, something like "The company was divided, and Gimli joined Legolas and Aragorn in pursuing Merry and Pippin who had been kidnapped by Orcs." We can leave Boromir out entirely, though a crucial part of LoTR, he has nothing to do with Gimli.
  • Done.
  • "Gimli and the others continued their search for the hobbits, finding a resurrected Gandalf in Fangorn Forest. He led them to Rohan's capital, Edoras, where he roused King Théoden to war against Saruman." - the word "He" is confusing. I've read the book, so know you mean Gandalf, but considering that the article is about Gimli ... Honestly, I'd again drastically shorten, remove both these sentences outright, and go straight from Rohan to Helm's Deep, which is important to Gimli's story.
  • Done.
  • We can probably even leave Gandalf's death and resurrection out, it's confusing and has nothing to do with Gimli. Gimli witnesses Gandalf casting out Saruman, that's enough, elide Gandalf's story before then.
  • Done.
  • Seventh paragraph, "Gimli accompanied Aragorn ..." Again, drastically shorten to just the parts that touch Gimli. Something like "Gimli accompanied Aragorn on the Paths of the Dead, and the battles of Pelargir and Pelennor Fields. He took part in the final battle against Sauron, the Battle of the Morannon in front of the Black Gate. There he recognized Pippin Took's feet..."
  • Done.
We don't need to retell the plot of LoTR in this article, just Gimli's part in it. I can understand we want to make sure readers have the opportunity to read that plot, but for that I'd put a Template:Main at the top of this section, referring readers to The Lord of the Rings#Plot.
Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
Image: Image is freely licensed, used in the article, and clear at 100px.
QPQ: Done.

Overall: First, my great thanks on improving the article on one of my favorite LOTR characters! Please don't take my complaints above as an overall criticism of your work, just that these are our rules, we need to follow them, your work is great! Second, the GA criteria bits as above, I think they're very fixable. Third, User:Chocmilk03's concerns immediately above - I think they can probably be addressed by a bit of rephrasing, but they should be addressed. Thank you again, and I'll be very proud to see this in DYK. Baruk Khazâd! GRuban (talk) 19:26, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

  • @MelanieN, Chiswick Chap, Chocmilk03, and LordPeterII:OUCH. Train crash. I was writing a rather detailed DYK review, only to edit conflict with Melanie. Which would be alright if we both accepted, but I failed it, and I think I detailed why. Let's talk. --GRuban (talk) 19:29, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • GRuban, sorry for the mixup. It looks as if you and Chocmilk03 decided to do a full review of whether this is really a Good Article, while I accepted its promotion to GA status and just reviewed it for DYK. Is that really what we are supposed to do here - to second-guess whether it qualifies as GA? In any case, I will withdraw my approval, although I think we should retain my expansion of LotR to Lord of the Rings in the hook. -- MelanieN (talk) 19:48, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • Thank you! I agree with the expansion. I apologize as well, I could have marked that I was reviewing or something once I realized it wouldn't just be a quick pass or fail. Honestly, I didn't mean to re-do the GA review, I just read the article and recognized the WP:UNIVERSE criteria, which I was pretty sure were part of GA, and then had to look again. No one had touched this review since September 22, who knew two people would review it during the same 15 minutes? --GRuban (talk) 19:54, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • @MelanieN: Hiya! I thought the expansion was good too, have suggested wikilinking to further assist. I wasn't reviewing the article as such, but in case it's helpful, in the reviewing guide, it does say "The fact that an article has been accepted as a Good article should not be considered an assumption that the article meets these criteria". You don't need to do a full GA-level re-review for each article, of course, but similar to other DYK nominations, it's good to check that there aren't any issues with the article (for example, I've seen GA-approved articles before that had missing citations, grammatical issues etc). Cheers, Chocmilk03 (talk) 20:04, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • As LordPeterII appears to be off sick, I've made all the fixes requested above. Chiswick Chap (talk) 21:15, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
  • Toss the dwarf over the gap! Don't tell the elf. Approved with my compliments. --GRuban (talk) 21:35, 4 October 2022 (UTC)
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