Template:Did you know nominations/Giovanni Fornasini

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Yoninah (talk) 19:55, 8 October 2018 (UTC)

Giovanni Fornasini

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... that Giovanni Fornasini (1915-1944) was an Italian priest murdered by a Nazi soldier during WWII, who has the rare distinction both of having been awarded Italy's Gold Medal of Military Valour and of being a candidate for sainthood in the Roman Catholic Church?
ALT1: ... that Giovanni Fornasini, an Italian priest murdered in 1944 by the Nazis, was awarded Italy's Gold Medal of Military Valour, and is a candidate for sainthood?

Created by Narky Blert (talk). Self-nominated at 00:29, 25 August 2018 (UTC).

Comment by nom. I wouldn't usually nominate a translated page, but this one is massively larger than the Italian original.

His distinction (the hook) may be unique. I haven't mined out it:Categoria:Medaglie d'oro al valor militare and it:Categoria:Servi di Dio italiani, but I have found no-one else who is in both categories.

It's an unusual case, because the sources are fragmentary. I am putting this forward in part as an example of how to write an encyclopedic article when the sources are a mess. Narky Blert (talk) 00:49, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

More concise ALT1 added. Edwardx (talk) 14:01, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

I like ALT1. Narky Blert (talk) 17:49, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

I also like ALT1 better, striking the other. (Next time, Edwardx, put it below, signed by you, not where the signature is Narky Blert's ;) - Interesting tragic life, on substantial sources, offline and Italian sources accepted AGF, no copyvio obvious. How about the image? (The last martyr with image got 18k+ views.)

I think I#ll comment some things now, others later, to not overwhelm:

I haven't seen an explanation of the sources before it even begin. How about in a footnote?
Our article is Catholic Church, not Roman Catholic Church, please use it consistently.
We don't need uncountable refs for one fact, three is my personal maximum.
I'd mention his parents before the brother.
I don't think we need in the lead a description of where Bologna is (I removed that), nor what canonisation is. Put it in the body, if you think we need it at all. Rather write more summary of his life in the lead.
I am almost sure that "He discovered a vocation" is a too close translation from Italian.
I don't think we need the link for singing mass, but may be wrong, and again, a bit too Italian?
Please watch out for repetition, such as many sentences beginning with "he", and too often "ordained".

In the end, I'll likely approve, but it's a bit too much not yet smoothe to do that now. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:00, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Addressing some (but not all) of Gerda Arendt's comments:

IMO the image is OK. Out of copyright in all the old Berne Convention countries; very unlikely to have been registered in USA, the usual problem country – I am convinced that Italy and USA were at war when that photograph was taken.
Catholic Church – done.
I don't like WP:REFBOMBING either. It is much easier to write a biography where there are one or two WP:RS sources: you can just cite those, and ignore the rest. Here, the sources are so fragmented that I felt it best to cite all the ones which looked reliable and independent of each other. (I rejected some which I judged to be copycats.) (Articles about well-known people can be very concise – here are the essential facts, now go and read the citations. Articles about little-known people are different – here are all the known facts, gathered together in one place for the first time.)
Brother before parents – good point, changed.
I chose "discovered a vocation" as the best English phrase, after rejecting "found a vocation". It isn't a translation.
I think we do need a link for "singing a mass". As a non-Catholic, I had to ask two friends (one Dutch, one Irish) who have Catholic upbringing what that meant. Once ordained as priest, he would have said mass every day, usually in private. The next step was to celebrate a said mass before a congregation. The next step after that was to sing a mass, a considerably grander affair, where the new priest was attended by assistants.

On a separate point, not yet raised (so I'm addressing it now, because I've got such a good answer to it). IMO the wide coverage gets him through WP:GNG. That said, being a Servant of God does not pass WP:NCATHOLIC; however, the Gold Medal of Military Valour is a highest award for valour, and that's an automatic WP:NBIO pass which overrides WP:BIO1E. Narky Blert (talk) 21:56, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Thank you. Just a few comments (tired): I have no doubt about his notability. I still don't need more than three refs for one fact. How about "celebrate a solemn mass" instead of "sing a mass" with an Easter-egg link? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:52, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Good point about the Easter Egg ("sang his first mass" was a translation from the Italian). I've changed it to "his first solemn (i.e. sung) mass", which has the advantage that readers can keep reading without getting sidetracked. I've also run the two sentences about his first masses together – they were about a progressive event.

(More later.) Narky Blert (talk) 19:21, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

(1) As so often, not trying to think of an solution meant that one appeared in my mind without conscious thought: I have rewritten 'Early Years' to remove the repetition of 'ordained', and to make it less staccato. (2) I have cut down the citations for each fact to three (usually by commenting out) in all but two cases. (i) His date of birth, because sources disagree. This problem was already pointed out in an editorial footnote, which looks the best place to do so. {ii) Alessandro Berti's spettacolo. I'm betting that it will never pass WP:GNG, so the extra citations are there to support "more than once" in one of the least important paragraphs in the article. (3) Canonisation vs. sainthood. I think I have my Catholic theology correct here, and that the distinction is important. Canonisation is an earthly recognition of what is already a spiritual fact. (As an analogy, I'm pretty certain from what an online friend (now no longer with us) told me, that her parents could have been recognised by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations. It's too late now, there are no living witnesses; and, they wouldn't have cared anyway, they just did what they felt they ought to do.) Narky Blert (talk) 22:09, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

As of now, I have no ideas for further edits. I will welcome further comments and suggestions which might lead to the article being made better.

Time for an outdent, I think. Narky Blert (talk) 22:09, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

thank you! - I am still not happy with the explanations of the sources, but give my blessing ;) - Another case with two birth dates is Inge Borkh, solved with a footnote. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:56, 30 August 2018 (UTC)

ps: I still suggest to add the image, will watch. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:57, 30 August 2018 (UTC)

No, thank you. An important, if not the most important, purpose of WP:DYK and WP:GA reviews is the constructive criticism which results in the proposer improving what they thought was a well-written article. Passing review is a bonus.

(I too am a fan of WP:NPOV editorial footnotes to explain difficulties which may never be soluble.) Narky Blert (talk) 11:30, 30 August 2018 (UTC)

@Narky Blert: Hello, I came to promote this, but the Biography section has a big note in italics on the top. Is that supposed to be part of the article, or some kind of comment? Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 11:19, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

See above, "explanations of sources". --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:22, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

I don't think this is standard writing in biography articles, and personally in my 10 years on this site I don't think I've encountered something like this before. Perhaps it could work as a footnote or (in an condensed form) as an in-body explanation instead? Narutolovehinata5 ^tccsdnew 11:26, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

If you look up a bit higher: making it a footnote is what I also suggested, but I won't do it for the author. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:11, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

@Narutolovehinata5 and Gerda Arendt: I have been brooding, not sleeping. I have now separated the italicised bits into a short explicitly-editorial introduction in the text and an editorial footnote. I'm still not sure that the wording is ideal; but I think that it's better, and that the article now reads more fluently.

If this promotion goes forward, and assuming that the calendar isn't already full: the best date for a DYK publication would be 13 October (check the lead and infobox). Yrs, Narky Blert (talk) 23:21, 6 October 2018 (UTC)

Thank you so much! - Ready for the sad anniversary, and even if the calendar was full, there should be made room, if you ask me. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:02, 7 October 2018 (UTC)