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Jan Smuts's youth

[edit]

This article (part of a series on the life of Jan Smuts) has really come about solely through the work of User:Bastin8 and myself, so like fond parents, we are probably blind to its defects. It's been a bit of a lone effort, a fresh pair of eyes would be beneficial. Criticism of either substance or style more than welcome.

Xdamrtalk 19:29, 5 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I've done a quick copyedit, removing some redundancies and substituting some repetition of phrases, but it could benefit from a more through copyedit. Some comments:

  • Intro:
    • "...was appointed Field Marshall in the Second World War" could do with rephasing to avoid the "British or Boer or something else?" question it poses with relation to the rest of the sentence.
    • A lot of weasel words - 'played a leading part','helping to create','significant contributions' etc.
[Consider it best not to go into too much detail in intro - Xdamrtalk]
    • 'This article is about...' should be dropped. The title of the article tells you what it is about.
  • There are probably more articles that could be linked to for relevant information - I've added two in the intro, but the South African locations may have their own articles too, as may some institutions mentioned in the text.
  • 'Family tragedy was to change this destiny.' - a bit melodramatic for an encyclopedia article
  • 'In view of Smuts's loneliness, it is surprising that he did not make more of the social opportunities available to him.' - POV statement, should be cited or dropped (just an example - there are other POV statements)
  • Generally, there are a lot of weasal words 'very','extremely' etc. If there are sources that give more accurate wording I'd use those.
  • I recommend using the {{cite}} template for references - that's bound to come up in FAC
  • There are a lot of double spaces after full stops - I've cleared some, but you need to check that.
  • Some more citations are needed for various incidents
  • Standardize on Smuts' or Smuts's (I prefer the first but both are now acceptable in most written English - I suppose the recommendations for SA English would be most applicable)

Hope this helps Yomangani 12:45, 9 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks a lot for those suggestions, all very much appreciated. I'm interested to know what incidents/facts etc you think require additional citations. It should be no problem to add them as I have most of the standard texts; I thought we had things pretty much covered on that front, but if you think that we could do with more then I'll certainly do so.
Best wishes, Xdamrtalk 10:52, 10 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, sorry, I've just noticed the [citation needed] tags you inserted, should be no problem to have those sorted out.
Xdamrtalk 11:02, 10 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Just realised I didn't comment on the article itself (just what was wrong with it, sorry). Overall it was a good read, well-balanced, with no obvious holes in the history and enough detail to fill out his character development without overdoing it. If you were going for FA status it would probably be judged to be too short, and more-or-less every statement would need citations, but I would think it would certainly be promoted it to GA status if it was put forward after the review. Cheers, Yomangani 11:21, 10 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
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