Talk:La Salute è in voi/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Asilvering (talk · contribs) 14:03, 14 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Rate	Attribute	Review Comment
1. Well-written:
	1a. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct.	The first two paragraphs of "Publication" both contain effectively the same content ("attention to science separates this from books that are simply manifestos") - consider reworking these? "an indispensable pamphlet for those comrads who love self-instruction" - typo or [sic] on "comrads"? "The printing contains a prominent typographical error in which an "i", displayed as "1"," - this sentence explains the printing error but not why the printing error would cause problems in this formula. It's been a while since high school chem, but I like to think "i" and "1" are different enough in meaning that I would notice the typo. There must be something I'm missing...? (Also: "prominent" as in highly visible? or should this be a word that more clearly means "important"?) "failed bombing of New York City's St. Patrick's Cathedral" - is there a reason not to say "attempted bombing" that I'm missing...? "The police insinuated possession of the handbook as evidence of the defendants' technical expertise and bad intentions, and La Salute è in voi was the most sensational of the prosecution's seditious books used to show the anarchists' intents." - I would CE this as "possession was evidence", but I think that wouldn't be quite right for two reasons: 1) the quote in the box on the right suggests this was more directly worded than "insinuated"; and 2) the second half of the sentence would better follow a first half that says something like "The police used the anarchists' possession of xyz [manuals/literature/whatever is most correct here] as evidence [...], and..." "they ended their message to supporters with "La Salute è in voi"" - can you clarify what this message was? a statement in court? said to a sympathetic reporter? something else? And, if it's reasonable to add, a half-sentence or so summarizing the message as a whole might be useful here. "detectives and historians have thought of the handbook as evidence of Galleanist conspiracy" - this clause is gluing together what looks like two separate sentences. Right now (at least to me) it appears to imply that S&V carried out the Wall St Bombing. I've done some easier/simpler fixes; feel free to change any of them as you like.
	1b. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.
2. Verifiable with no original research:
	2a. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline.
	2b. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose).
	2c. it contains no original research.
	2d. it contains no copyright violations or plagiarism.
3. Broad in its coverage:
	3a. it addresses the main aspects of the topic.	I'm left wondering why it was localized for an Italian readership, but the only information that is in this article about its distribution is for the USA. Is there anything that can be said about its publication/distro in Italy? Also, I gather that Cronaca Sovversiva is Italian-language, but based in the USA. But perhaps I'm wrong? Can this be clarified? ~~I'm intrigued by every comment that's left in the "application" section, if you're inclined to expand any of them.~~
	3b. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).
	4. Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each.
	5. Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.
6. Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
	6a. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content.
	6b. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.	~~Any reason not to have an infobox here? At any rate the image needs a caption.~~
	7. Overall assessment.

That's all for now. I'll be able to have a look at these books next week. -- asilvering (talk) 14:55, 14 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Reply

Thanks for the review, @Asilvering! I believe I've addressed the above, when you have a chance to take a look.

re: the nitroglycerin formula, I don't recall having seen the formula itself re-printed but I would figure the early 1900s anarchist contraband printer wasn't using super/subscript, so the letters and numbers were likely in a row. Either way, I'd consider this trivia and I'd just as soon remove the i/1 detail and just call it a typo if it's distracting.
re: S&V's parting thoughts, I've added a bit of clarification but I'll add that I would really like to track down this document. I tried looking into it a while ago and it traces to D'Attilio, which, as a conference paper, didn't do a great job of tracking his sources.
re: comrad, pretty funny. Yes, a typo. I had to turn off my spell check due to a Chrome bug with syntax highlighting but looks like I need it back.
re: infobox, no, since it's about an anarchist pamphlet, a full infbox seems like overkill. Also images don't always need captions if they're obvious, e.g., for the caption to say "Cover" when it is already clear to be a cover.
re: Application section hidden comments, I think I need to save that stuff for my rewrite of the S&V article :)

czar 03:14, 16 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

S&V's parting thoughts: he says it's in La Protesta Umana, which might not have been digitized when you checked last (gbooks did it in 2019), but it's definitely not in the "first" one (I must be misunderstanding him? unless they started over with numbers again after moving the paper to SF). Text search for the entire Chicago run on Hathi doesn't bring it up either. But context suggests he means a later issue, and those don't seem to be digitized. Here are the digitized ones, if they're new to you: [1] -- asilvering (talk) 05:34, 16 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, it's impossible for it to be in any of those, because they're all too early. So: ??. Ah well. -- asilvering (talk) 05:53, 16 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I found the headline uploaded elsewhere so I brought it over: File:Protesta Umana, June 1926.jpg. It's just the headline and I expect either the story below it or a separate Vanzetti handwritten letter to be the one they both "signed". I started a separate talk page section for that investigation, since it's closer to trivia.

Let me know if you want any scans—I have all the material from the article. czar 06:17, 16 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

No need, I've got them, or the library does. I just need to wait for the library to have librarians in it. -- asilvering (talk) 06:39, 16 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Last comments

Ok, this Larabee reference Ultimately, the idea that laborers without expertise in explosives could successfully create them from simple directions was impractical. that comes up in the lead and the main text struck me as odd the way it's worded here, but in Larabee's book it's even stranger. She says the book was "highly optimistic in its belief that untrained novices" could set people up the bomb, etc. But this is contrary to her own argument (as laid out in the intro to her book), which is broadly about how bomb-making books are not instruction manuals (at least, not exclusively) but rather a form of subversive cultural/literary expression. Your call on how or whether to address this - she does say so, so I suppose it's fair-game-for-wikipedia, but I'd just yank it. I do think it's important to leave in this sentence, though: Ann Larabee has written that the idea that untrained laborers could create bombs at home was and remains impractical, no more than an intellectual exercise. That's a truthful statement and doesn't assume anything about anyone's motivations.

Also, maybe it's just me, but "an indispensable pamphlet for those comrades who love self-instruction" strikes me as extremely tongue-in-cheek, so...

Similarly, I think statements like While the handbook's authors believed that amateurs would be able to build explosives by following simple directions should be worded to be about the handbook, not the authors, since we don't even know who the authors really are, let alone their beliefs. "While the handbook assures readers that..." or something.
"While its level of scientific detail regarding chemical handling technique..." - no objections to this sentence. But I do notice that Larabee's phrase is "it gave faith that" untrained people could make bombs. This is an interesting idea that might be useful in handling my two comments above. Or sprinkling into the article somewhere. Or for your S&V article when it comes to "why we can't mention the manual".
"the failed bomb components approximated that of a firework" - hm, this is the court testimony of a chemist, used more to say "it wasn't so dangerous as a bomb bomb". I'm not sure the firework bit is necessary. But it is worth saying something like "but the failed bomb was not of the handbook's design."
Okay, that's all of it. I'll leave this open for a bit for you to pick at, but those four items I've mentioned are hardly GA-killers, so do as you will and I'll come back to stick the green badge on this post all official-like when you're done, assuming you don't decide to vandalize your own article. Thanks for this, great fun to read and review! -- asilvering (talk) 02:07, 21 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I've struck the "impractical" line as being somewhat duplicative but kept the "indispensable pamphlet" for giving context of how it appeared when advertised. I kept the line about the "authors" because, between the handbook's introduction and what scholars have deduced about its authorship, the scholarly understanding is that the authors did believe (at least in kayfabe) that the pamphlet would serve as a practical guide. Believe I've covered the other points, but take a look? Appreciate the thorough review, @Asilvering! If the article can make it through your close reading, I think it might be more FA-ready than I imagined. czar 22:38, 22 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Oh I definitely didn't mean you should pull the "indispensable pamphlet" line! It's just so superlative it makes me think that they're at least half joking (especially since all the information can be found in other sources already). So the idea that they truly believed that anyone could pick up this manual and make bombs - maybe kayfabe, yeah. Good analogy. Grats on the GA! Was a pleasure. -- asilvering (talk) 01:32, 23 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]