Talk:Klaus Ebner/GA2

Klaus Ebner

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Result pending

The article mainly fails criteria 2. Although it looks well-referenced, but when I used Internet Book Database and Worldcat to search the ISBN codes 9788873511847 and 9497910982 (used by the footnotes 31 and 38), no information was found. Those sources are distrustful. The main sections of this article completely depended on the books published by Ebner himself and his own website, their reliability were dubious. And, I feel the article was writen in an advertisement style, although not very evident. --Ice Sea (talk) 15:36, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

After a second look ... maybe you should also question your databases or your verification procedure, at least partly: look what I found on Worldcat:

• La Catalana de Lletres 2004, include both ISBN

At least, the ISBN provided by the article was wrong.--Ice Sea (talk) 01:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes, got it now. I will fix that. --Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 08:41, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Comment to the ISBN numbers mentioned by Ice Sea

Footnote 38, ISBN 94-97910982:

• Book on the publisher's site
• Book on Google Books

Footnote 31, ISBN 978-8873511847:

• Italian online bookstore Bol.it (the book isn't available any more)

Note that the first book is from Spain and the second from Italy. Maybe the wordlcat catalog isn't firm here or publishers of these countries do not register all books. The Italian book is already out of print, maybe this is the reason why you couldn't find it.--Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 20:42, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

It seems that the book la catalana de lletres 2004 was only a florilegium, I don't think it provided effective introduce about him. And I would not agree that website from bookstore was a realible source.--Ice Sea (talk) 01:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

This book has not been mentioned as an "introduction" as you state. It is the outcome of this award, it contains a Catalan poem of Ebner (which you can even find on Google.books) and it is the proof of the "mentioning". Not more but not less. --Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 08:45, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Concerning the bookstore source: You wanted a proof that the book exists. Here is one. I know that Irina Walter from Austria is in possession of this book and the information comes right from there. I didn't know that book databases do not list it, and I have never had access to an Italian National Library - as an Italian book it will not show up in the German National Library I guess. My Italian is extremely basic so I am not able to search through Italian media; I know that this prize always causes echo in the Italian press, and there have even been presentations of the book in New York and Barcelona I believe. If there has been a press echo, the US colleagues should please research it and deliver the data. And by the way, I am astonished that it is so difficult to prove the existence of a book that someone has on the table (Irina in this case). In my opinion the information of this source should be sufficient. --Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 09:02, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Comment on "main sections ... completely dependent ..."

I cannot see your point. This article is about a writer, so it seems to me natural that it talks about his books. On the other hand, a multitude of sources stems from Austrian, German and Catalan literary magazines and newspapers: die Rampe, Literaturhaus Wien, Literarisches Österreich, Avui, the IBM Redbook, the book Lyrik der Gegenwart and also the Italian book of which you couldn't verify the ISBN, Avui, Diari Maresme, the Austrian National Library, the German National Library, Lesezirkel, Sterz, Literatur und Kritik, Magazine of Catalan Studies, and that's not all. In my opinion there is only very little information which would be based only on the author's website (the info on his family is an example, which seems to me very natural). I would not agree that the reliability of the information given would be dubious. --Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 20:42, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

But, in fact, some of his award-winning information was from his own website, no other sources. --Ice Sea (talk) 01:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

You are right. There is a good reason for the subsidies: the Austrian government does not publish the subsidies; I heard that some Austrian writers associations have requested this for years but without success so far. So at least for the subsidies, Ebners page (or indications in his books or in literary magazines - the primary source always remains the same) will remain the only (and the best) source. By the way, I don't think that anybody would pretend to having received such subsidies because he would risk to be sued (don't forget, these subsidies are give by the state's authorities!). If this source does not suffice or respect any Wiki rules, then we could delete the subsidy staff - in this case I want to see the opinion of other users and editors too! So please ... --Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 08:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

In case of the radio play award I will contact Irina Walter, maybe she knows another source. --Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 08:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Comment on "advertisement style"

If you feel that the writing style is an advertisement style then please help to improve it. Basically I am wondering about your allegation because users Peregrine Fisher and Yllosubmarine did a thorough proofreading and I would not expect them to accept an advertise style. I already mentioned on other places that I am from Germany and since my native language is not English I am not able to recognize such linguistic subtlenesses. Only native speakers like you can help to have an encyclopedical neutral style.--Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 20:44, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Comments from María

I was asked by Torsten to help finesse the article's prose, which I've done before, but before I do, let me state that I believe this reassessment is unwarranted. It's certainly not fit for community reassessment; Ice Sea, if you read the instructions at WP:GAR, you will see that community reassessment is for when there was a disagreement regarding the article's past GA review. You should have initiated an individual reassessment on the article's talk page. Furthermore, as Torsten has pointed out above, I don't see any glaring issues with the article that could not have been easily fixed by editors after a note on the talk page. Usually main contributors will take the time to address concerns without involving the red tape of a process like WP:GAR. To me, the sources check out, and although there are more primary sources than I would prefer, they are used where applicable. I'll gladly have a look at the article to remove any hint of an "advertisement style", but this reassessment really shouldn't be listed here. María (habla conmigo) 21:05, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm very sorry, I do not quite understand the rules here. If you think this debate is not legal, you may remove it from the list. And, like Torsten Wittmann, I'm not a native speaker of English.--Ice Sea (talk) 01:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Comment on the Internet Book DB

The Internet Book Database did not find the following books:

• "Die Klavierspielerin" by Elfriede Jelinek
• "Die Rättin" by Günter Grass
• "La Quarantaine" by Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio

All three are Nobel laureates for literatur! So if this DB doesn't even find the books of writers who have won the Nobel prize, how can you be serious on this DB? I would really like and expect you to choose reliable databases when verifying the reliability of sources. Thank you. --Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 21:08, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

The Internet BD was listed at Special:BookSources, so it could be trusted. And I do can find those books mentioned by Wittmann:[1],[2],[3], so I don't think his accusement of IDB was reasonable.--Ice Sea (talk) 01:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Maybe I was too quick on that. I was enraged (because I have contributed a lot on this article) and I apologize. Anyway, I am still not sure about the reliability of this DB. --Torsten Wittmann (Karlsruhe) (talk) 09:04, 29 October 2009 (UTC)