Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Shakespeare's Influence on the English Language

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. Majorly (Talk) 01:22, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Shakespeare's Influence on the English Language

Shakespeare's Influence on the English Language (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

This is an essay, not an encyclopedic article - it's drawing original conclusions. Much of the information here already exists in other articles anyway. Zetawoof^(ζ) 02:22, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. Rework to remove OR if neccessary but nearly the whole thing is sourced. The format is horrible, but the attribution is there. Its an interesting topic, and the article is in no way unsalvageable. pschemp | talk 04:16, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: I can't agree with you about sourcing. See my comments on the article's talk page.
• Delete and start over, with extreme attention to WP:V. Interrobamf 04:20, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Delete The format is indeed horrible as it's quite clearly an academic essay. Yeah, it is sourced... in the way one would source and academic paper. The way it's written makes it appear to be largely original research, with proper citations. In other words: it looks, and likely is, a college student's english paper. --The Way 06:13, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Delete, Stubify Potentially a proper article, but this is a very bad start - looks like someone was proud of their English Lit class essay and did a copy and paste and uh... photoshopped book cover job. Needs complete rebuilding due to comprehensive problems with tone Bwithh 07:02, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Delete Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought. An unencyclopaedic essay that draws its own conclusions. -- IslaySolomon | talk 09:04, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Delete, WP:NOT, WP:NOR, no encyclopedic value. --Terence Ong _{(C | R)} 10:59, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Strong Keep - Article may be poorly written and need cleanup but it is a valid concept, I have studied it in classes (it was a while ago) but nonetheless valid. Chris Kreider 12:36, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Weak keep if improved and renamed. (It's no worse than some 1911 encyclopedia articles I've worked on.) I notified Wikipedia:WikiProject Elizabethan theatre. --Dhartung | Talk 13:17, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Delete - it's just OR, clearly. Also too subjective a topic to really be encyclopaedic. Seb Patrick 13:20, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

  Too subjective? There are plenty of scholarly works on the topic. If an expert whom we can cite wrote about it, its a fit topic. Do you know anyone who denies he had an influence? We don't delte that which can be fixed here. pschemp | talk 13:35, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

• Even then, though, the article would surely have to be "Shakespeare's Perceived Influence on the English Language". I'm not saying I disagree that WS was the most important and influential writer in the history of the English language (as someone who studied him at Oxford, I'd be a fool to do so), and no, I don't know anyone who denies said influence (save for those who don't believe he was the sole author of his works, and that's a sufficiently large and significant debate that it can't be ignored). Even so, however, that doesn't mean that such people don't exist - and concepts such as "influence" are too abstract and subjective to ever be considered truly factual. Seb Patrick 13:45, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

• The title is neutral, since it doesn't claim that Shakespeare has a large influence on the English language, or that he had minimal influence on it. The title merely announces that the subject of the article is whatever influence Shakespeare may have had on the language, without passing judgment. It's the article that needs rewriting. Andrew Levine 08:11, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

• I'm in the "if it's too unsalvagable, delete and start over" camp I think, most of the time. But I think there's enough goodness here (yes, it's an essay from school) that it's worth a keep. Failing that, userify it and work on it more. But not an outright delete I don't think. ++Lar: t/c 13:34, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep there's the germ of a good article here, on an important topic but I agree in its current form it is weak. Improve the structure, remove rhetoric, develop some more depth in the ideas. Linguistically, Shakespeare used about ⅔million words. Something like a third of them are first (recorded) usage. He also developed some important elements like metaphor and its generative capability (extension). It's an important topic. Someone does need to do a number on it, though. Don't delete it before I've read it fully! Kbthompson 13:42, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Delete as original research. Will keep this on my watchlist and reconsider if there's a lot of cleanup and some reliable sourcing. AndyJones 13:53, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Weak keep Looks like an essay, but could probably be re-written into something useful. Also needs to conform to WP:NPOV (Favorite example: "William Shakespeare, the mastermind behind the English language, reformed it into the potential it has gained today.") Bjelleklang - talk 14:04, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Interesting article. If it need cleanup, then edit boldly. Can anyone seriously deny that Shakespeare greatly influenced the English language? Do you want 100 citations that he did? Edison 16:15, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Yes, please. Works where exactly how he did is explained, for preference. Thank you. Uncle G 16:29, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. Yes, it needs editing, but as noted several times above, the subject is important, and the content is not entirely useless for later editors who wish to improve it. Move to a title with standard capitalization if kept. - Smerdis of Tlön 16:22, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep Does resemble an essay, but on a notable topic and well-referenced. It should be wikified/encyclopedified, and possibly trimmed a bit, but not deleted. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:49, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, well-sourced and significant topic, with even more sources out there. A worthy daughter article to William Shakespeare. All it needs is some editing for structure and tone. Andrew Levine 21:06, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep valid topic, if you don't like the current content, edit it don't delete it. Carlossuarez46 00:40, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep encyclopedic topic. This article needs cleanup but it is definitely worth keeping. --Richard 00:49, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep as per Richard and others. - Samsara (talk · contribs) 01:06, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep - Although people at the time of Shakespeare (& the French!) didn't have baths, this article needs a good scrubbing to make it all nice & polished for ligitmacy. Keep. Spawn Man 06:23, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
• Definate KeepBalloonman 23:26, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
• Keep. This is a valid and encyclopedic topic. If you disagree with its presentation, no one is stopping you from being bold and doing something about it. {{sofixit}} RFerreira 06:18, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
• Clear keep, clearly can be fixed. - Jmabel | Talk 06:01, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.