Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Fantastic Adventures/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by SandyGeorgia 23:54, 3 April 2011 [1].

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Fantastic Adventures

Fantastic Adventures (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

• Featured article candidates/Fantastic Adventures/archive1

Nominator(s): Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 23:45, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Another science fiction pulp magazine started in 1939 -- there's at least one more to come after this. This one is a little different in that it mixed fantasy with science fiction, which was not common in those days. It lasted for over a hundred issues despite never really being a leader in the field. Artistic highlights include a galloping T. Rex and a phallic submarine. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 23:45, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Source review

• Be consistent in whether second authors are listed first name or last name first in References

  Done. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:06, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

• "Browne preferred fantasy to science fiction" - source says mystery/detective fiction

  I think the right ref for this may have been moved during editing; I've fixed it. He was primarily a mystery/detective fiction writer but given the choice between sf and fantasy he much preferred fantasy. There's a ref for this on p. 49 of Transformations, which I think you may be able to see online; I've reffed a little more precisely to make this clearer. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:06, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

• Very limited spotchecks found no overly close paraphrasing
• I thought you'd fixed your "interesting" state abbreviation? ;-) Nikkimaria (talk) 00:16, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

  Sigh. Fixed now; I searched Wikipedia for other instances of "Westport CN" and found I am not the only person ever to make that mistake; I fixed the other instance too, for good measure. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:06, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Looks good now, thanks! Good luck! Nikkimaria (talk) 15:29, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Support 'Comments -' (I haven't read all the way to the bottom but like what I see so far):

• This sentence is hard to get through: "Most of this material was of little lasting value, but Palmer was often able to get good stories from outside this group: August Derleth sold several stories to Palmer, and Ray Bradbury also sold a story to Fantastic Adventures—"Tomorrow and Tomorrow", which appeared in 1947, was his only appearance in the magazine, but in the opinion of sf historian Mike Ashley it was "among the best stories [Fantastic Adventures] published in the 1940s"

  Yuck. You're right, that's far too long; I split it into two, with a slight tweak; let me know if that works. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:10, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

• "With the April 1942 issue the price increased to 25 cents, where it remained for the remainder of the magazine's run," > remained and remainder is a bit repetitious

  Changed "remainder" to "rest". Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:10, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

• I've made two slight changes in the text. Hope you don't mind.

  Of course not; please jump in and fix anything you see. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:10, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Truthkeeper88 (talk) 21:20, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

• A lot going on in this sentence; might need some simplification: "Reynolds became more strongly associated with Astounding Science Fiction than with the Ziff-Davis magazines, but some of the radical political themes of his later work are evident in "Isolationist", which describes helpful alien visitors abandoning Earth to atomic war because of the hostility of the first Earthman they encounter."

  Split into two. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:23, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

• I made one other small correction. Am not seeing any other problems - another well-written article about a pulp sf mag. Nice work.

Truthkeeper88 (talk) 21:46, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review and support. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:23, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Support

• The lead does adequately summarize every major section of the article. Thank you for this refreshing change of pace.

  Thanks! Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:17, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• "Palmer was unable to maintain a consistently high standard of fiction" This is the opinion of a critic. It is not a fact, and should not be stated as such.

  I've added a qualifying phrase; I tend to avoid this sort of qualification if the assessment is more or less universal, as it is in this case, but I'm fine with putting it in if you think it's necessary. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:17, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• "though the emphasis on depictions of attractive and often partly clothed women did draw some objections." Objections from whom?

  Readers complained in the letter column; I've clarified. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:17, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• "Although science fiction (sf)" This initialism should either be capitalized to avoid confusion or spelled out in every instance. Should the reader really have to memorize an abbreviation for such a short phrase? I think not.

  This is very much standard practice in science fiction reference works, and I've used this abbrevation in a few other FAs. To me the main benefit is not shortening the text, it's varying the flow -- phrases such as "mixing science fiction with fantasy was not popular with sf fans of the era" would sound very clunky to me with the abbreviation expanded. I'd like to leave this as is, if you are OK with it. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:17, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  Struck, not a big deal. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 17:52, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• Bibliographic details is in desperate need of additional wikilinks. Cents? Bedsheet-sized? Thorpe & Porter?

  I've wikilinked cents, Leicester, and Thorpe & Porter; bedsheet was already linked in the first section, with an additional explanatory footnote, but it's an unfamiliar term so I've linked it again in this section. Let me know if you see anything else that needs a link. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library)

• Please replace the dashed lines with full lines in File:Fantastic Adventures issues grid.png. The image becomes blurry when it is scaled down.

  Here's a new version with the solid lines: File:Fantastic Adventures issues grid2.png. To my eye those lines are rather too strong; I think the dashed lines are less obtrusive. I think elements of the design that are intended to guide the eye, rather than provide information, should be less strong visually. Perhaps we could get the opinion of other reviewers on this before changing it? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:24, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  Yes, I'll defer to other reviewers, as it could be the case that I am going blind. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 17:52, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  It is a bit blurry with the dashed lines, but I looked at it with the new file in preview mode, and that's blurry as well. For some reason on my screen the numbers actually seem to pop a bit better with the dashed lines. But, basically I don't have a strong feeling about this. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 18:08, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

--Cryptic C62 · Talk 02:23, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review and support. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 21:52, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Support from Ruhrfisch. Interesting and well-written article which meets the FA criteria. I have a few quibbles that do not detract from my supoort.

• Comment to Cryptic C62 - "sf" is a pretty common abbreviation in the science fiction field.
• I would link John Jakes

  Done. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:40, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• Should this make it clearer that the slicks were not science fiction or fantasy magazines at all (The Saturday Evening Post was a slick)? Palmer's goal for Fantastic Adventures was to create a magazine which published fantasy fiction but was the literary equal of the quality magazines—the "slicks", as they were known.[4]

  Good point. I changed "as they were known" to "such as the Saturday Evening Post"; does that go far enough, or should I add something like "which were not focused on genre fiction"? Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:40, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  Works for me, thanks Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 17:28, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• Should the caption Alexander Kohn's cover for the March 1949 issue mention explicilty that this is the one Brian Aldiss thought had a phallic submarine (not to mention a topless mermaid)? By the way, isn't that floating robot at least somewhat phallic too?

  I expanded the caption; I added a ref because it's a slightly surprising comment, even though it's reffed again in the text. Yes, I think that robot is phallic too, but I don't have a source that says so. I suppose that would make it original research! Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:40, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• I looked in the Commons category and see File:MastersOfSleep.jpg is a cover that lists an L. Ron Hubbard story - since he is fairly well known, whould he be mentioned as a contributing author in this article?

  I don't think it's one of his most highly regarded works, but I tried to finesse this by adding that picture to the article and linking his name. If the result is too image-dense I'll cut it and mention him in the text. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:40, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  Looks fine to me, thanks, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 17:28, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Nicely done, Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 03:06, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Image review There are four images in the article, all of which are freely licensed. Three are magazine covers whose copyrights have expired and were not renewed. The table is made by Mike Christie and freely licensed. Ruhrfisch _><>°^° 03:06, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review and image review, and the support. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:44, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Support: Comments: A little out of my expertise, but I'll give this a go.

• There's a lot of opinion about the quality of each publication, but no stated source for those opinions. For example, "the first issue was quite weak," "One of the best early contributors was Nelson S. Bond," "The story was unimpressive," etc. Is this based on sales numbers or critical reviews? If reviews, who wrote them?

  This is a difficult issue. The problem is that there are no contemporary reviews. For later material, in the fifties, there are collections of contemporary sf criticism that sometimes cover stories in the magazines, but prior to 1950 it is very difficult to find anything at all. Hence one has to rely on the opinions of the historians writing about these magazines. In the assessment paragraph (the last paragraph before "Bibliographic details") I've included in-line attribution for the opinions given there. For comments such as the ones you pick out, the source is usually Mike Ashley, who is about the only historian to devote more than half a page to this magazine. The opinions are generally his, though I would say his overall assessment of the quality is shared by other commentators such as Paul Carter, and Brian Stableford. By sourcing specific opinions to Ashley in the citations, I hoped I was doing enough, but if you think more should be done I can add "According to sf historian Mike Ashley" as needed. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 15:15, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  Yes, this is a difficult issue. To be honest, when I read the article, I suspected that the opinions were coming from your sources, but other readers may wonder if the person who wrote the article was introducing their own bias. If you could find a way to source the opinions, that would be ideal. You would only need to introduce "historian Mike Ashley" once, after which you could simply refer to "Ashley". – VisionHolder « talk » 15:46, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  I've had a go at this; see what you think. I left an opinion in the "Browne" section unattributed, since essentially the same point is made in the publication history section, further up, but it could be attributed to Stableford and Ashley again if necessary. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:38, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  This is looking 1,000x better. However, before I can strike this point, I need to re-read the article. I'm in the middle of several other reviews at the moment, but will attempt to return to it later today. – VisionHolder « talk » 16:46, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• The captions for the cover art feel a little lacking to me. Although it's not mentioned in WP:MOS, I prefer captions to be informative, rather than simply telling me what I'm looking at. The image in the lead, for instance, isn't just any issue—its the one that saved the magazine. Personally, I think that could be summarized... but that's just my opinion.

  Yes, that's worth doing. I'd already expanded one caption per another review comment; I've expanded the first one now as well. That leaves the MacGirl one and the new Hubbard picture -- I don't see much to add there, but let me know if you think they can be expanded too. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:57, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  Yes, that looks good. The last one might be to explain what "MacGirl" is and the importance. – VisionHolder « talk » 15:46, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  OK, done. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 16:38, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  Excellent! – VisionHolder « talk » 16:46, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• Is "sf" the standard abbreviation for "science fiction". I would think it would be "sci-fi".

  Yes, "sf" is pretty standard, though one does see "SF" in the literature as well. Believe it or not, "sci-fi" is regarded as pejorative within the field, and is never used by any of the reference works. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:44, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

  Lol! I guess any term can become offensive over time if used to categorize. – VisionHolder « talk » 15:46, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• The first paragraph of the "Palmer" section seems to have a redundant citation (#8).

  Oops. Thanks for the catch; removed. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:57, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

• "Fantastic was initially bedsheet-sized, but was reduced to pulp-size with the June 1940 issue. It was initially priced at 20 cents. The page count began at 96; it increased to 144 when the size was reduced in June 1940." Maybe: "Fantastic was initially bedsheet-sized and had a page count of 96, which increased to 144 when the publication was reduced to pulp-size in June 1940. It was initially priced at 20 cents."

  Thank you; that's much improved. Changed. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 14:57, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

That's all for now. Good work! – VisionHolder « talk » 05:56, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.