Talk:Olvir Hnufa

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Olvir Hnufa was a Language and literature good articles nominee, but did not meet the good article criteria at the time. There may be suggestions below for improving the article. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
August 6, 2008	Good article nominee	Not listed

A fact from this article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on July 10, 2008.

The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that Olvir Hnufa, a famous 9th-century Norwegian skald quoted in the Prose Edda, was the great-uncle of the Viking Egil Skallagrimsson?

GA Review[edit]

This review is transcluded from [[{{subst:Olvir Hnufa}}]]. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Hello, I'll be conducting the GA review for this article. Overall, I believe the article to be an okay summary of an individual I gather is very little known and studied, but I do not believe it fulfills the Good Article criteria at this time. In particular I have concerns that the article is not as broad in its coverage as it can be; I do not mind short articles, but much is left unqualified and/or unexplained. Certainly more information is needed. Here are my suggestions for improvement:

The lead currently does not adhere to WP:LEAD, which states that it should act as a summary of the entire article. Currently, the lead is composed of background/family information as well as the theorized origins of Hnufa's name. I suggest moving all of this information to one or two separate sections and then summarize every individual section in the lead.
Although hersir and skald both have articles, they should be defined here, I think. What exactly did he do?
I have no sense of how this guy was/is notable. What makes him important? What is he remembered for today? What part did he play in Norwegian history? Keep these questions in mind while writing the lead.
Egil's Saga, Skaldatal and the Prose Edda need to be identified, as well. Not in the lead, perhaps, but certainly in the body of the article; "Egil's Saga, an epic Icelandic saga possibly written between the years 1220 and 1240", for example. These works are not like Beowulf in the English-speaking world; I've certainly never heard of them. Explain, define or simply introduce terms and works that the average reader might not recognize. It only takes part of a sentence to do!
There should also perhaps be a section on how Hnufa is known from these (and other) works. Take a look at Banquo, which has a "Source" section; how is he described in these different texts? Do they contradict each other? How did his image change over the years? What information in this article comes from what source? This needs to be made clear.

More specific concerns:

Is it possible to include how to pronounce the name? IPA, perhaps?
Is the image of Hnufa? One could draw that conclusion from the vague caption.
A lot of names get thrown around in this article. Who were these people?
Olvir and Eyvind joined their nephew Thorolf Kveldulfsson on a number of viking expeditions after the latter received a longship as a gift from his father Kveldulf. When? Where?
For reasons not revealed in the saga: what saga?
Olvir mollified the king's rage: how?
I have no sense of timeline other than when the Battle of Hafrsfjord took place. From what point to when does Hnufa's time at Harald's court take place, for example? Can it be more explicit? Years, time periods, anything?
Olvir tried to convince Harald to pay wergeld: pay what? Although I enjoy learning new words, it would help if I didn't have to click on another article every other sentence to find out what was going on. :) Explain, define, introduce...
I'm entirely confused about why the king believed Thorolf was a traitor. Why did their relationship deteriorate in the first place?
How many fragments of his poems survive? How important of a figure is he in poetry?

References

A majority of the inline citations come from primary sources. Per WP:RS, I suggest finding reliable, secondary sources (if they're available!) to help research not only the events of Hnufa's life, but also what is thought of him as a historical figure and poet.

This needs quite a bit of work, I'm afraid, so I will have to fail the nomination for now. I hope that my suggestions will prove fruitful and that the major contributors will continue to work on the article. If you have any questions or comments regarding this review, please contact me via my talk page. Best of luck! María (habla conmigo) 19:37, 6 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On a lark, I did a preliminary search for possible source material which may or may not help fill out the article:

Bragg, Lois. Oedipus Borealis. Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press, 2004.
Du Chaillu, Paul Belloni. The Viking Age. C. Scribner's Sons, 1890.
Pencak, William. The Conflict of Law and Justice in the Icelandic Sagas. Rodopi, 1995.

I hope this helps! María (habla conmigo) 19:57, 6 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]