Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 18:52, 24 February 2007.

[edit] Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia

Self-nominated article. I've completely rewritten this article over the past few months. It has gone through a peer review and the Good Article nomination process and was passed as a Good Article about a month ago. It was suggested that I nominate it for a featured article review. I've provided inline citations from a broad variety of references, obtained permission from the Beinecke Library for free use of historical photos, provided attribution is given, and have tried to cover every area of the topic as broadly and as neutrally as I could. The article includes information about Anastasia's characteristics, DNA testing on the Romanov remains and the controversy over whether Anastasia or Maria was missing from the grave, information about reports of a survivor, and a section about the impact the legend has had upon the popular culture. It also contains a section about the Romanovs' sainthood and the controversy related to whether they should be declared martyrs or passion bearers. It's a topic that is still of great interest to a large number of people and the importance of the subject matter has been rated as high. I think the article is well-written and covers the subject extensively, but I'm open to suggestions to improve upon it further.--Bookworm857158367 22:11, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

• Comment Please take care of the spaces between the punctuation and the refs.--Rmky87 23:32, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
• Comment This is an excellent article; I was reminded of my youthful fascination with Anastasia. Here are my suggestions (I am almost ready to support this article):
• You have a lot of quotations that demonstrate that Anastasia was fun, lighthearted and mischievious. Perhaps you could select a few of the best? After a while, they no longer add information to the article, they only make it longer (I would say that this is a particular problem in the "Life and Childhood" section).
• Your sections are also rather long - might you consider breaking them up or providing subheadings? One obvious suggestion is to preface the section on "Canonization" with a subheading.
• I would also cut off the "Cultural Influces" section with the 2004 novel. It seems choppy and insignificant after that. If you decide to keep the material, perhaps a list is the better way to go?
• This is a small thing. I noticed that your footnotes aren't all formatted the same way. Some have the author's last name first and some have the author's first name first. Some book titles are missing italics. Some have dates and some do not. Also, if you are planning on giving the entire citation first and then using only the author's name in subsequent notes, which I think you are, the first citation is incorrect. Etc. (You might also consider two-column notes since you have so many.) Awadewit 23:38, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

- Awadewit, you last point is partially my fault, had started standardising the ref formats when I saw the nom, was half way through the job when you posted you comments; hence they looked inconsistent when you viewed the article. Ceoil 23:00, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I support now, although perhaps the "Two bodies missing from the Mass Romanov Grave" section could be renamed "Romanov Grave"? As it stands, it sounds too much like a newspaper headline. Awadewit 12:29, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I renamed the subheading per your suggestion. I am a newspaper reporter, which probably explains why the original sounded like a headline.--Bookworm857158367 15:25, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

• Support An engagingly written, well cited, illustrated and informed article. Some minor suggestions:

• Agree that "Cultural Influences" should be cut at the 2004 novel.
• Have reformatted the citations, however was unable to determine to which of Massie's two books notes 20 & 23 referred to.
• Not overly fond of the section title "From mystery to legend", though this is a subjective call, of course. Ceoil 20:28, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Have tackled some of the suggestions made to improve on the article. I summarized the comments made about Anastasia's character in the first section on her Early Life. I also changed the sub-heading title "From Mystery to Legend" to "Reports of Survival" and broke up the section into a separate section on "Two bodies missing from the Mass Romanov Grave." I'll also attempt to fix the citations. Any other suggestions? --Bookworm857158367 04:23, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Update: I also fixed the citations from the Massie books. Both are from Nicholas and Alexandra. --Bookworm857158367 04:46, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

• Support This article improved a lot. And it is already can be featured article. And the imperial sisters article too. Astor Lam 08:35, 21 February 2007

• Weak oppose 1. Sentence "Anastasia was nasty to the point of being evil," requires a reference. 2. Footnotes should come immediately after punctuation without an intervening space. 3. If she did indeed write "Goodby" instead of "Goodbye" can you insert [sic] after the misspelt word? 4. Please duplicate the references through the "rape" section. 5. I am concerned by the image "Romanovsaints.png" - there is no source indicated and the artwork depicts the Romanovs as passion bearers, so it can not have been painted prior to 2000. Consequently, the painter can not have been dead for 70 years as the public domain tag asserts. 6. Is it necessary to repeat information twice in both notes and references (Dehn, Eagar, Gilliard, Sams, Shevchenko, Vyrubova)? DrKiernan 19:03, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

In reply:

1. This is supported by the reference at the end of the following sentence ("King and Wilson (2003), p. 50"). Its no problem to repeat the ref, but is it necessary to pepper the text with duplicates like this.

2. There was three instances of this, all fixed now.

3. This has been done.

4. Have added another source to support claims.

5. Take your point; file was taken from commons, but maybe Bookworm has detail of the image's origions.

6. It's within the guidelines stated at WP:CITE, and allows for both a clear an unmuddled "Notes" section, and for a concise "Sources" section that gives an overview of available resources. Ceoil 20:00, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

I didn't upload the icon image. It was already included in the Nicholas II article when I started working on the Romanov articles. I have no idea who, if anyone, would hold the copyright. I happen to own a copy of the image that was sold by a company in Las Vegas and I've seen the image featured on other web sites. It's widely circulated. If nothing else, I'd say it would be fair use. Ceoil appears to have fixed the other things you objected to or explained them.--Bookworm857158367 02:28, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

• Conditional support The image tag needs altering in that case. The article is excellent, fairly typical of the other work of yours I've seen. DrKiernan 08:19, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Point taken. I changed the image tag to fair use on all of the Romanov articles, including Anastasia's.--Bookworm857158367 13:56, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

• Comment What on Earth is a, "vagania"? It's in the article, and I'm hoping it wasn't added by a vandal.--Rmky87 05:23, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

It may have been, but I see someone else has rewritten that sentence now and taken it out. The term was already in the article when I started rewriting it. She did have bunions, so I must have overlooked the word as some medical terminology for that condition or for the side of her toes. I can't find it in the dictionary now when I look it up, so it probably shouldn't go back in.--Bookworm857158367 13:12, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

• Support. Comprehensive biographical article.--Yannismarou 19:33, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
• Support.--Dwaipayan (talk) 07:43, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.