Talk:Ilie Cătărău

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GA nomination?

@Dahn, the article looks fairly complete—would you be interested in (or have any objections to) nominating for Good Article status? czar 05:56, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

@Czar: No objection, and thanks! Dahn (talk) 11:15, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

@Dahn, would you have a moment to take a look at the open questions in Talk:Ilie Cătărău/GA1? czar 08:35, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Ilie Cătărău/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Ezlev (talk · contribs) 18:39, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I'll review this! Pings for Dahn, czar. I'll get to a preliminary review soon. ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 18:39, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

Okay, first things first. Action steps in this paragraph are bolded. Article is stable and appears free of copyvio per Earwig. Images are fine with the exception of File:Gigantul, Storck 02.jpg, which appears to be problematic per Commons:COM:FOP Romania. Images are relevant, but alt text is needed on all of them and the caption of the Bolshevik image could be rewritten to clarify relevance and improve readability. Relevant MOS guidelines appear to be met, with the possible exception of reference layout which I haven't yet looked at in detail. Section structure, while technically fine, seems counter-intuitive – why wrap everything in a "Biography" heading and resort to subheadings when the entire article is biography? I would recommend re-sectionating the article to create more level 2 headings. Happy to discuss any of these issues more – otherwise I'll do my prose-level reviewing once they've been addressed. ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 00:51, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! I've clarified the Storck license. Romania's copyright is 70 years p.m.a. and Storck died over 70 years ago so should be okay. Alt text isn't needed per the GA criteria but added nonetheless. Addressed the others. czar 02:21, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

Looks great, Czar – thanks for getting to those! Prose review to come, down below the progress box. From what I've read so far I don't anticipate a ton of issues, but it's a long article with some fairly complex sourcing, so there may be a bit of work to do. — ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 18:09, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

Oh, one more thing on images – I'm still not clear on the relevance of File:Front roumain allemand, bolchevicks manifestant devant le train de la mission.jpeg. Is Cătărău in the photo? Is it meant to illustrate some specific detail or event from the section it's in? ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 18:15, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

To my understanding, it's tangentially related—just a photograph of the movement in that period with no direct connection to Cătărău personally or any detail in the paragraph. Okay by me to remove it but I don't feel strongly either way. czar 01:25, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

Review added below the progress box, czar! Feel free to reply to my comments down there as you move through them. ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 21:57, 15 January 2023 (UTC)

Ezlev It is one of the extremely rare pictures showing Bolshevik activity in that area, at a time when Cătărău was in charge of it. I think it should be used, on such grounds. Dahn (talk) 11:17, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

This is looking good. I'm satisfied with the quality of the prose as well as the broadness and focus of the article. The remainder of my work on this GA review will involve checking on sources to the extent that I'm able, just to ensure compliance with requirements 2b, 2c, and 4 below, as well as looking again at ref layout – but don't worry, Dahn, I won't make you use citation formats! ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 22:21, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

Good to go as far as I'm concerned! Good work Dahn and czar! ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 03:41, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

Progress box

Good Article review progress box

Criteria: 1a. prose () 1b. MoS () 2a. ref layout () 2b. cites WP:RS () 2c. no WP:OR () 2d. no WP:CV () 3a. broadness () 3b. focus () 4. neutral () 5. stable () 6a. free or tagged images () 6b. pics relevant () Note: this represents where the article stands relative to the Good Article criteria. Criteria marked are unassessed

Early years

This section effectively navigates conflicting sources (I'm assuming good faith for offline and non-English sources based on a few spot-checks). I went on a tangent and ended up reading Zamfir Arbore, which also looks like possible GA material...

• Cătărău's involvement with the cause was a matter of concern, and... Need to specify who was concerned. The state? The secret police?

  Addressed

• Need to introduce the fact that Cătărău was involved in espionage for Russian contacts at some point before mentioning at the end of the section that his denouncement of alleged spies appears to have been a disinformation campaign ordered by Cătărău's Russian contacts.

  @Dahn, would you have context for this one? Is there a time when Cătărău is established as working with/for the Russians, or would there be a better way to introduce this detail about who ordered it? czar 02:22, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

  Resolved ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 22:17, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

Transylvanian attacks

• By then at beginning of section – by when? Need to specify either a date/year or an event
• Cătărău benefited from the callousness of Romanian intelligence services, who were still in the process of organizing themselves. Benefited how? Maybe callousness isn't the right word here?
• He was by then receiving his orders Same "by then" issue. Specify
• In 1913, he was even registered as a counterintelligence operative with the Romanian Land Forces, receiving monthly payments for his services. Even here suggests some deeper meaning – did this make him a double agent? Clarification would be helpful
• The first two sentences of the paragraph beginning Together with Kiriloff need a rewrite. The date should be moved out of the parentheses, and clauses currently separated by commas can be combined
• The last paragraph is fascinating, and the Bucharest University student association takedown of Cătărău is brutal. No notes.

  Addressed/clarified all above

Manhunt and cover-up allegations

• A manhunt began shortly after. Shortly after what? Briefly summarize the end of the last section
• This account was backed by Zamfir Arbore, who recalled that he and Stelian Popescu of Universul newspaper had visited Cătărău in Bucharest. Unclear pronoun. I believe he here should refer to Vladimir Purishkevich as mentioned in the previous sentence, but that needs to be checked in the source and clarified in the text.

  I interpreted this as Arbore visited Cătărău with Popescu because the paragraph says Arbore was in Cătărău's apartment. Dahn, which interpretation is correct? czar 03:39, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

  Resolved. Arbore indeed visited Cătărău with Popescu. ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 22:18, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

"Nationalist-Revolutionary Party"

• Shortly after these incidents has the same issue as the beginnings of other sections – ideal to briefly specify which incidents
• With his unexpected returns to still-neutral Romania implies that those returns have already been mentioned, which I don't think they have

  The last section mentioned that he "returned incognito to visit Bucharest and contact his sponsors"

• He spent his time there experimenting on small animals – huh? Is there more detail on this that can be included?
• waging a disastrous war on Austria-Hungary feels a bit editorializey in context

  Addressed. Dahn, any thoughts on the animal experiments? czar 03:39, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

Arrest and deportation

• Looks good to me! Made some copyedits.

Later life

• Wow, the second paragraph of this section is wild.
• Cătărău died before this could happen. Died when? Of what? Do we know?

  Dahn? czar 03:39, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

Czar Alas, no info is yet available of how and when he died, except for the fact that it was in a Transylvanian monastery -- this is not uncommon, since people associated with the old regime tended to disappear from records kept under communism. I came across a trove of paywalled sources on Arcanum, the Hungarian digital library, but I havent checked them yet for instances of Cătărău. Something may surface there. Dahn (talk) 09:58, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

Notes/references

• Sourcing seems appropriate. Formatting is acceptable if a bit messy – but unclear if that can be helped, and either way it's not a GA requirement.
• I'm going to do some spot-checks to supplement my AGF on sourcing for this article which is largely supported by non-English sources. I'll record them here for transparency.
  1. Contrafort published Enigma Ilie Cătărău in two parts: 1 and 2. These appear to be among the most heavily used sources in this article. Based on my look at a machine translation, the content cited here is supported there, and it is a publication of the Romanian Cultural Institute and appears reliable.
  2. I was unable to access Constantin 2011 as it is paywalled on the website of Magazin Istoric – not that I'd be able to read it anyway. I'm willing to AGF here as I'm doing generally, especially since I've researched the magazine and it seems to be a reliable source for this article.
  3. Ciobanu 2007 is accessible and (based on machine translation) appears to support the content it needs to. This also corroborates Constantin on several points.
  4. Monitorul de Suceava appears reasonably reliable for this purpose? A bit sensationalizey. Frankly it's the source I'm least confident in of those I've checked, but it appears to be used mostly in combination or contrast with other sources and a machine translation seems to support the necessary points.
• I'm satisfied with the sourcing, reference formats, and neutrality – which means I just need to wrap up this review and we're done!

• Ezlev Monitorul is a pretty standard local newspaper in Suceava County -- it is pretty sensationalist, at least now, but then again so is every Romanian newspaper. The author, Iacoban, is a rather well-known and award-winning writer (though he's not on my own reading list), active since the 1960s; his article, cited here, is from way before Monitorul (and just about ay newspaper in the world) had dropped in quality. It is therefore more old-school literary than clickbait sensationalist, and its literary quality is probably why it records every single rumor about IC (which is okay, I think, because those have cultural relevance -- whereas Iacoban actually claims that IC was a king in in Polynesia, our editorial voice renders this as a claim made about IC). Hope this helps. Dahn (talk) 07:10, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

Reply

Thanks for the review! I've addressed everything I could above. Dahn, as the article's primary author, can you take a peek at my edits and assess that they're satisfactory? I also pinged you above re: introducing how he began working with Russia. I agree that it really is a wild story! Usually we would review some portion of the sources for accuracy, but given that so much of it is sourced to Romanian sources, that becomes complicated. czar 03:39, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

• @Czar: Excellent meticulous work, for which I am grateful to you! Dahn (talk) 15:07, 23 January 2023 (UTC)

Indent

@Czar and Ezlev: I've recently edited the text to add more sources (ones I only recently accessed), address some of the remaining concerns, format the references to a more updated style (please don't ask that I use citation formats, they literally hurt my eyes, and they're not required), and rewrite bits for more clarity or context. I apologize for the delay in responding, and for the extra effort this requires of you. I have taken the liberty of removing the alt text -- it is only required if the images cannot be understood without it, or if it adds information that both objective and significant to the visually impaired (not the case here); simply adding one's impression of what the blind would see in the picture if they weren't blind actually does no service to the blind, and I presume is only advertised because it feeds machine learning (something which I for one have no interest in encouraging). Dahn (talk) 21:52, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

Dahn, thanks for this! I somewhat disagree on the alt text point, but it isn't a GA requirement and I won't push the issue. I'll take a look at the changes to the article. ezlev (user/tlk/ctrbs) 22:04, 22 January 2023 (UTC)