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Boenga Roos dari Tjikembang (novel)

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This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I would like to bring it to FA class and would like feedback regarding comprehensiveness, accessibility (considering how out of left field this is for most readers), and grammar.

Thanks,  — Crisco 1492 (talk) 13:41, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Some quick thoughts-

  • Don't be scared of redlinks. Union Dalia? Panorama? The 1975 film? If these are notable, throw out a link.
  • "Oh Aij Tjeng" Is the "Oh" part of his name? This is something with which I'm not familiar- Obviously, we'd refer to a John Smith as "Smith" after the first mention, but how should we be doing this here? (I note you use the phrase "the elder Oh".) I also note That you later spell his name as "Oh Ay Cheng"? These kinds of concerns are something which throw me as a western reader.
  • "Oh" is his family name (see Chinese name). Aij Tjeng/Ay Tjeng/Ay Ceng are variant spellings of his name which depend on what spelling system is used (and the book mixes and matches Ay/Aij). I use their given names mostly because Aij Tjeng's father is also "Oh". — Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:25, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • "As he examines the area, he sees Lily." He doesn't see Lily at the grave- he sees someone he believes to be Lily?
  • The term "Buddhist theology" is slightly loaded; that's a difficult concept to grasp. Is it what the source says?
  • Why The Victim of an "Contemptible Woman" rather than The Victim of a "Contemptible Woman"?
  • "(perhaps excepting Aboel Moeis' Salah Asuhan (Never the Twain, published the following year)" Two open brackets, one closed
  • "He finds only one character, the Columbia University-educated Bian Koen, as unrealistic, prone to emotionality unfitting of one with his education and life experiences." Oddly constructed sentence- could it perhaps be reworked?
  • Just a thought- quoting some of the English language poetry may be a nice way to break up the text. I like that sort of thing, but I know not everyone does.
  • "John Kwee; the latter cites four examples: a" Two colons like that makes for a complicated sentence, especially when you start to use semi-colons in the list. I'd recommend splitting the sentence.
  • "its "modern" message," What's the modern message? The comment about fate?#
  • "Faruk" Is this a pseudonym, or is this again showing my unfamiliarity with naming conventions?
  • "When Marsiti's grave in Cikembang is moved to Batavia, with empty spaces on either side for Aij Tjeng and Gwat Nio," You can't really say "when", as you haven't mentioned this yet. You'd have to introduce it by saying something like "When [whatever happens], Marsiti's grave..."
  • When you say the book's second printing was by "Panorama", does this have anything to do with the periodical of the same name?

Engagingly written- you do well to establish the significance of the work. J Milburn (talk) 22:17, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Sarastro:

No problems understanding this, and I think it establishes the context and background very well. A few picky prose issues, and watch out for redundancy. Otherwise, another fine piece of work. Sarastro1 (talk) 19:01, 25 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Lead

  • "The seventeen-chapter book follows a plantation manager named Aij Tjeng who must leave": Could we cut "named" here for flow, and replace it with some commas?
  • "Eighteen years later, after his daughter Lily dies, Aij Tjeng's would-be son-in-law Bian Koen discovers that Marsiti had a daughter, Roosminah, who greatly resembles Lily. Bian Koen and Roosminah are married.": A little confusing. It is ambiguous of whom Lily is the daughter, and why we have a "would-be" son-in-law. I'm assuming he intended to marry Lily, but some clarification would help here.
  • "Kwee intermixed several other languages, particularly Dutch, Sundanese, and English; he includes two quotes from English poems and another from an English song.": Mixed tenses here.
  • "an ode to njais, and a condemnation of the how they are treated.": Something has gone wrong here! And perhaps make it clearer who "they" are.
  • "it soon proved to be his most popular work": Do we really need "soon"?
  • "By 1930 there had been a number of unapproved stage adaptations": This does not really come across in the main body to the extent suggested here.
  • "The work was filmed twice, first in 1931 by The Teng Chun and then in 1975 by Fred Young": Redundancy?
  • The lead reads a little choppily, in the sense of jumping from one topic to another, but that may be unavoidable.

Plot

  • "but even more polished. He falls in love with her and begins forgetting Marsiti.": Polished how? And perhaps "and begins to forget Marsiti"?
  • Education, mostly (rather than sing, she can play the piano too, etc.)
  • "Not long afterwards Keng Djim calls Aij Tjeng and Gwat Nio to his deathbed, where he confesses that he has recently learned that Marsiti was his daughter from a native njai he had taken as a youth, and that Marsiti had recently died.": Recently…recently
  • "As such, he greatly regrets that he and Pin Loh had her chased away from the plantation"
  • "she firmly believes that she is destined to die young"
  • Done, although if you read the book you'll note "firmly" is well-deserved (she's downright morbid at times)
  • "and deals a psychological shock to Aij Tjeng and Gwat Nio": Can you deal a shock?

Writing

  • "as opposed to promoting tradition for tradition's sake": To avoid the repetition, what about "promoting tradition for its own sake"?
  • "However, he also wrote extensively on themes relating to native Indonesians": I'm not sure however is justified here, and is not always the best way to begin a sentence (although I'm guilty of this and worse!)

Style

  • "was more "modern" that most of the more formal Balai Pustaka publications": Should it be "than" rather than "that"?
  • "Boenga Roos dari Tjikembang includes parts that are in verse": This is a little cumbersome. I want to suggest "is partially written in verse" but I suspect that does not quite get what you want to say.
  • "A final piece in verse, also in English, is the lyrics that inspired Kwee to write the novel": I think this should be "are the lyrics" or "is the lyric". Maybe avoid it: "A final piece of verse, also in English, consists of the lyrics that inspired…"

Themes

  • "Building on this, Eric Oey of the University of California, Berkeley,": Does this literally build on the previous analysis by Nio Joe Lan? Otherwise, I would cut "Building on this".
  • "Aij Tjeng and Gwat Nio read into the two": I'm not too sure what is meant here.
  • "Sinologist Myra Sidharta, based on the same interrelations between Marsiti/Gwat Nio, does not suggest reincarnation": What is based on the interrelations? Maybe better as "considering the same interrelations" or similar.
  • "Sidharta suggests that the novel was written as an argument that the illegitimate children of njais would be able to develop as any other person, given the proper education": Was this not the prevailing view at the time? Sarastro1 (talk) 19:01, 25 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not in the Indies, no. The children of njais were bastardised and held a very low social position (Corrie in Salah Asuhan, for instance, was reportedly supposed to end up as prostitute). Think mixed-race children in 1920s America, perhaps. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:10, 25 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Comments by Wehwalt
Lede
  • Can nothing be done about that multilingual jam-up in the middle of the first sentence? Can some of it be moved to a footnote, or the infobox?
  • "Bian Koen and Roosminah are married." This sentence feels too abrupt in the flow of the paragraph. Suggest it be preceded by "In the end," or similar.
  • "Kwee intermixed several other languages" I think this is worth a "Besides Malay"
Plot
  • "Not long afterwards" The previous event was "after the marriage". I think we're getting a little too fuzzy here.
  • "After investigating" This sentence needs dividing.
  • Period added.
Writing
  • "Kwee had been raised in Chinese culture and schools " One really isn't raised in schools (well, not in the language anyway). Perhaps an "educated at" before "schools"?
  • "Boenga Roos dari Tjikembang is divided into seventeen chapters[7] and, in its first printing, 157 pages in length." Need a "was" near the end of that.
  • Are the stats on Kwee's other works really needed? It seems to me that sentence could be deleted without great harm.
  • "as opposed to" perhaps, "unlike"
Style
  • "Sumardjo criticises Bian Koen's emotionality unfitting of an individual with his education and life experiences." no idea what this means
  • "poetic verse into its narrative. One of these, an original work in Sundanese, is sung by Marsiti after confiding her dream to Aij Tjeng.[11] Two others … " I think there's a mismatch between the "poetic verse" and both "one of these" and "two others". How is poetic verse something you have one of, or two of? Perhaps instead of "poetic verse", "parts of poems" or "extracts from poems"?
  • How's "one example" (i.e. an example of poetic verse)? Marsiti's song seems to have been original and as such was complete, "If Those Lips Could Only Speak" was reproduced in full, and the other two were fragments/extracts. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:00, 29 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • "sinologist" this needs to be linked somewhere so the reader isn't wondering what his sinuses have to do with it.
  • Second sentence: you can't have multiple semicolons. I'd suggest a reworking of that sentence.
  • In lists yes, but since none of the entries has a comma I'll just use commas.
Reception
  • I'm confused by the title. I'd expect a section on reception to feature how the work was received. Instead, it focuses first on modern-day criticism, and then on adaptations.
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