Talk:The Portrait (short story)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): 1994sunsfan, Madeleineffckelly.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 11:09, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Edits Made, Planned

I just separated out the content in to sections. The plot summary itself needs some hefty revision, which I'll get around to in the near future. Also needed is a brief analysis section. Bonesnotblobs (talk) 19:02, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

• I've tackled the plot summary by excising it. I've added a few bits of analysis, and removed all the clean up tags. Hiding T 13:36, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

We (a group of college students) are currently trying to improve the quality of this page for a class project. The following insights are our opinions on how this article can be improved:

1. I have checked source 2 and 3 and they are both accurate. The external links are all true links and are directly related to the subject matter. Sources 4, 5 and 6 all lead to the relevant pages. In addition, all of these works come from reputable sources, so there is little doubt about their credibility. However, there are issues with the first source. I was unable to access it on my computer and this could mean that it is an incorrect link. We will need to change this source. However, when another group member looked at the link, they were able to access it. It appears that the link is to a version of the story itself, not to any sort of analysis. Whether it will be kept remains to be seen.

2. The topic is not sufficiently covered.

• We need to include a short bibliography of Gogol with a link to the proper Wikipedia page.
• Discussing how the story was received by the Russian public at the time it was written could be insightful
• We need background information for The Portrait, why and when it was written.
• More specifically, we should talk about Gogol’s decision to return to the story in 1842
• We should also probably talk about the Arabesques collection in greater detail
• I think discussing the social context of Russia at the time (briefly) may also be helpful
• We need a section on the Petersburg Tales as a whole and how The Portrait fits into this. It is less comedic than the others
• A section on Gogol’s influences with regards to The Portrait and some mention of Pushkin within this
• St John’s Eve was specifically mentioned and should be investigated
• A section on the genre that The Portrait would fit into and the rarity of Russian comedy
• A section on the moral core of the short story
• Some explanation pertaining to the importance of artistry for the Petersburg Tales and how this is most evident in this Story
• There needs to be a longer section explaining the plot of the story, done in sections because it is a long story
• Following this there needs to be a breakdown of the interpretations of this plot and why Gogol wrote it
• In a similar vein, it would be beneficial to talk about why Gogol broke from his traditionally comedic/absurdist style in this piece
• There needs to be a section concerning what this plot has influenced. The Picture of Dorian Gray comes to mind. How important this story is in the wider literary tradition
• There are not enough secondary sources and this is a problem for reliability, the secondary sources available pertain to adaptations of the story not interpretations or historical facts. This needs to be remedied.
• The section on adaptations needs further work to demonstrate what the adaptation says about the text and what it might say about those adapting it

3. I cannot find any passages in which objectivity is not sufficiently sustained. From my observation, the primary problems with this article have to do with structure, lack of sufficient citation/coverage, and grammar/style. 4. The article proceeds in a logical order, beginning with an introduction, moving into a summary of the plot, continuing with scholarly interpretation and critics’ reception, and concluding with sections on adaptations of the short story and a list of Nikolai Gogol’s works. However, everything feels overly condensed, especially the paragraph on scholarly interpretation and critical reception. I suggest we go into greater depth in each paragraph, breaking them into multiple paragraphs when necessary, but preserve the basic arrangement of the article. 5. There are many grammatical and stylistic problems. The lead (introduction) is a little short lengthwise, and paradoxically, a little long in terms of sentence structure. It sounds dangerously close to a run-on sentence. According to the criteria for a featured article, a lead should be two to four paragraphs in length, and though our topic may not require an extensive introduction, it should at least be longer than one sentence. Also, I do not like how the second paragraph starts with “it.” We should change it to “the short story” or maybe just “the story.” Additionally, the entire second paragraph is rife with terribly long sentences, and because of this the rhythm is fairly repetitive and dull. Therefore, I recommend switching up sentence length. There are several grammatical errors as well, such as the omission of a comma in the quotation "pure, faultless, beautiful as a bride” and the placement of the period in “sad, cynical view of human propensities". (it should fall inside the quotation marks). This grammatical error is repeated in almost all the quotations used. Lastly, as I mentioned before, the third paragraph is awfully jumbled, with many distinct ideas being expressed in the same cramped space. We may want to break this paragraph up into several, with one focusing on scholars’ interpretations of the work, another on critics’ receptions, and another on Gogol’s second version of the story, adding more as needed. 6. As of now, there are not any images included in this article. I suggest adding a few, such as examples of illustrations/artist adaptations of the short story (if available). Inclusion of appropriate media is a criterion of a good article, and is almost essential to achieve featured status. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 1994sunsfan (talk • contribs) 06:04, 29 January 2016 (UTC)