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To begin with, the allegation that Brînzeu is "hearsay" exposes Anonimu(talk·contribs·deleted contribs·logs·filter log·block user·block log) for railing against sources he never read: the quoted text cannot be described as "hearsay" and "recollections", they are notes from Brînzeu's direct conversations with Roth, and they are a diary, written immediately after the fact, not "from memory" [let me emphasize this last point: a diary, not a memoir, as Anonimu implies; it even says so in the title of the book]. Yes, they were best friends, and not because I have made that conjecture myself, but because they are described as such by several sources, four of which we used in the text; BJT also has an entire article specifically dedicated to that. The exact relationship between them was also detailed by the Securitate, who had them both under surveillance together -- something that is also referenced in the text.
Anonimu also manages to contradict himself by claiming simultaneously that Brînzeu wrote "hearsay" and then tagging the source as "too close to the subject" -- which is it? and just what wikipedian is imposing their definition on what that friendship was, if not Anonimu, with this stealth tactic and tagbombing? (I want to emphasize that, per our policies, primary sources, including those "close to the subject" and ones written by the subject of a biography, are certainly not problematic in the articles themselves; so the very claim that a source is too close to the subject of a biography is ludicrous.)
Further: Calling a book you dislike for some (quaint) reason "unreliable" does not substantiate your point; the book has a preface co-signed by a professional historian, and was published with a reliable publishing house. All of this makes it reliable, in particular for recording Roth's thoughts on politics, as well as facts of his life. If you think more attribution is in order, go ahead and rephrase, Anonimu: as you well know, I don't object to constructive editing.
We do not normally exercise such absurd level of caution with other diarists documenting their friend's attitudes and beliefs. We do not doubt Mihail Sebastian as a source on Camil Petrescu's fascism, for instance -- this even though, unlike Brînzeu, Sebastian is harshly critical of the person whose thoughts he records. We do assume that these are pretty much the attitudes expressed by those people, since otherwise we would be in violation of WP:TRUTH.
The claim that Brînzeu is cited "excessively" is also grotesque: every paragraph of the text cites several sources, and Brînzeu only takes a central spot of those areas of Roth's life that other sources simply gloss over -- and it's natural that he should be a source for those details, since he was a witness to Roth's personal life, and a frequent guest or host of Roth's. Incidentally, at least part of his records from conversations with Roth, including the Madagascar plan which Anonimu relativized with his edits, are cited from other sources as well. Dahn (talk) 06:53, 20 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Brinzeu was not taking a transcript and Otto was not aware that his thought were being recorded, nor was he able to verify that his words were correctly recorded. Consequently, there is no meaningful distinction between a diary and memoirs when it comes to their quality as primary sources and their reliability. The fact that it was published by a reliable publisher doesn't mean that the editor takes on itself the factuality and reliability of the diary/memoirs; it only means we can assume that the editor did not add or remove content to the original manuscript. This of course means the work can be safely used as a WP:PRIMARY source, i.e. "can normally be used for non-controversial facts about the person and for clearly attributed controversial statements" with the caveat that this would apply to an article about Brinzeu and probably close family, not to a friend, acquittance, fellow guy under Securitate surveillance, etc.
I don't object to reporting personal opinions and even hearsay, as long as these are dully attributed each and every time they are reported. Unfortunately, this article has whole paragraphs were Brinzeu's unreliable (by definition) recollections are presented as simple facts. As long as this situation is not fixed, the tags must stay.Anonimu (talk) 10:31, 20 December 2018 (UTC)[reply]
First off, I don't think it is constructive to re-add the tags claiming that discussion need take place when you added them without so much as opening a topic on this talk page. For my part, I have already edited the text to precisely where it more clearly attributes NB as the source of the statements. Feel free to edit more if you're still not satisfied, or at least formulate some cogent critique of where you feel more should be done.
The claim that we need treat a diary the same as a memoir is extraneous, an attempt to gloss over the blunder of where you claimed the book was a memoir. As I have already noted, taking that sort of issue with a diary is remarkably contrived, and creates special pleading: a diarist, as long as he is viewed as reliable and quoted by historians as a source (both of which are the case here) may be used as a source for statements s/he heard uttered, just like a journalist may. There is absolutely nothing "unreliable by definition" about statements reported in a diary: Sebastian is not unreliable about Camil or Zissu, Anne Frank is not unreliable about her father's statements, Goebbles is not unreliabele about Hitler's idiocies etc etc. Again, if you feel more clear attribution is needed than what is currently in the text, go ahead and change the text.
Not to mention that, even with that objection, two of the tags are spurious: NB is not excessively cited, and the article is not based on a single sources; NB is by no definition unreliable, and is a source used by historians.
