Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of cultural references in The Cantos

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. There is a general consensus that secondary sources, such as those presented by Ficaia, are sufficient to meet WP:LISTN, despite a single objection from the nominator. There are certainly legitimate concerns about WP:OR and WP:V. However, for a notable topic the bar for deletion on those grounds is very high, and based on this discussion there is no general appetite for WP:TNT. King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 01:08, 4 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

List of cultural references in The Cantos

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We have only two articles on Wikipedia named "List of cultural references in Foo". This is one of the (the other is the List of cultural references in the Divine Comedy). Both suffer form the same major problem: failing WP:OR and WP:GNG (ok, two problems). They have no footnotes, just general list of references that may or many not be relevant. They fail WP:NLIST. They are fascinating, as notes for someone's PhD, but I don't think they encyclopedic in the current form. Note that this was a former featured list, demoted in 2009 due to failing WP:V (no inline citations) and WP:OR. It hasn't improved since. PS. Imagine, each article about any piece of fiction could have an ORish subarticle on "List of cultural references in...". Like, "list of cultural reference in episode 12, season 6, of Star Trek: The Next Generations"... we dodged a bullet we only have two such articles, honestly. WP:NOTTVTROPES comes to mind, too... _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:01, 22 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Fictional elements, Literature, and Popular culture. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:01, 22 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Lists-related deletion discussions. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:02, 22 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: This is an incredibly important appendix to what is a very important literary work. Deleting this page would be catastrophic for Wikipedia’s cultural section. This and its main page were written by Filiocht, who I remember well and (without risk of outing him) was a respected authority on Ezra Pound. To even consider deleting any of his Wikipedia works because they don’t meet some rule dreamt up since they were written is plainly absurd. Are works by William Shakespeare to be burnt because their spelling and grammar don’t meet today’s recognised standards? Adding the page to the main page would make it ridiculously long and deter people from reading it, if it’s such a problem (and I don’t believe it is) then start a category around The Cantos.Giano (talk) 12:41, 22 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
WP:ITSUSEFUL does not trump WP:OR. If you think it is valuable, and I don't deny it can be, consider transwikifying it to Wikibooks, for example. Such content is simply not within the scope of Wikipedia. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 09:09, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Giano makes a good case for keeping it. Also its a valid spinout article, valid information, the main article would be too long with it in there. Dream Focus 13:43, 22 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The list doesn't look like other lists, in the sense that it lacks inline citations. (The list of references verifies the material in the list.) If it had inline citations, it would presumably need them for each item, would be longer and uglier than it is, and would include a formidable raft of footnotes. It would be a tortured victim of the bed of Procrustes that is the wikipedian passion for uniformity. Treating a list such as this in that way would defy common sense and make it unreadable, IMO. Do we really want to choose between doing it over with the inline references (Procrustean stretching), which is anyway unrealistic now that Filiocht is long gone, and deletion (Procrustean lopping-off of limbs)? I note the OP's suggestion that if we keep this list, we're essentially encouraging people to write List of cultural reference in episode 12, season 6, of Star Trek: The Next Generations (I actually think that should be "Generation", without the "s"), because... well, I suppose because every work of fiction is as valuable as every other, and Pokemons are, to the principled Wikipedian, as good as Ulysses. I disagree. I only wish we had a List of cultural references in ''The Waste Land'', and I don't hold with discouraging people from creating such lists. I'll quote WP:Commonsense: "Being too wrapped up in rules can cause loss of perspective". PS, full disclosure, Giano alerted me to this discussion. He knows I'm interested in Filiocht's work. Bishonen | tålk 15:44, 22 May 2022 (UTC).[reply]
~~Keep~~ Strong KEEP per "...this was a former featured list"; it was once considered that this was a prime example of encyclopedic content. It is understood that standards have changed, insofar that we now have WP:NOTLIST (which does not appear to be relevant here, as it is not a standalone article but a branch of one) or WP:OR upon which I shall expand. Yes, it might be argued to be OR to compile a list as there cannot now be found a source or sources for the information in that format, however, each entry is likely to be verifiable - which remains the base for which the inclusion of content is judged; It is not important that content is sourced but that it could be if the effort was made. ps. My disclosure is that I am a Bishstalker. LessHeard vanU (talk) 11:58, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I fail to understand the logic that this is WP:OR when the information is taken from indexes and such in the listed sources, from which a list is made ensuring that WP:COPYVIO is not an issue. By the logic of saying that rewriting the sources sufficiently that plagiarism is not a problem is Original Research, then we had best delete the content of the encyclopedia - starting with the Wikipedia article - as being so. Obviously this is ridiculous, and this discussion is straining the credibility of the project. LessHeard vanU (talk) 16:22, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I don't think we have to worry about this type of article in general, I think it's sufficient to use the normal requirements. For WP:GNG/WP:LISTN: Are there secondary sources which discuss the topic "cultural references in The Cantos"? Was a WP:BEFORE search done? What were the results? Do the sources listed in the article discuss that? For e.g. Ulysses I expect such sources would exist, for a specific Star Trek episode, that's hard to imagine. And if there were, then by all means, let's have such an article in that case. As for WP:OR/WP:V: Having no inline citations is no grounds for deletion. Is there a good reason not to assume in good faith that the given references will support the content of our list here? In addition, if a topic, like e.g. Adonis, is discussed in the text of The Cantos, than that's verifiable by the primary source itself, that's not original research. Only if the reference is oblique that would require a secondary source. Lastly, I own an annotated edition of The Divine Comedy, which should contain references to most if not all the topics present in List of cultural references in the Divine Comedy. I assume something similar exits for The Cantos. So I can't see the problem there. Daranios (talk) 19:58, 23 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Daranios Even if this concept is notable, the current execution merits WP:TNT. This is simply not how our modern Manual of Style dictates articles should look. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 09:10, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
@Piotrus: If this is a problem of style rather than content, then I argue that WP:TNT is never applicable. None of the serious examples of problems in that essay refers to mode of presentation, and neither have I seen this in WP:Deletion. Daranios (talk) 10:39, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Leaning delete. Perhaps this was "featured list" material in a different time in the development of this project, but it is rather an overaccumulation of cruft. It would be better suited to a fan wiki for Ezra Pound. References that are truly significant in literature can be worked into The Cantos (as many are), but this, frankly, is just too much, to the point of indeed becoming indiscriminate. BD2412 T 06:35, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Keep based on my reasoning above, until I see a good reason why this should fail WP:LISTN despite the presence of a number of secondary sources. Daranios (talk) 10:39, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Keep I don't like the precedence suggested here, and as a co-conspirator on the Ezra Pound bio, would hate to see a list like this, which I see as untangled weeds spun out to die, merged. Ceoil (talk) 12:15, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - Weeds spun off to die should, well.. die. This is pure WP:OR. - GizzyCatBella🍁 21:49, 24 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@GizzyCatBella: Would you care to explain why you think "This is pure WP:OR"? Having come to a different conclusion, I can assure you that it is not at all obvious. Thanks! Daranios (talk) 10:32, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

A lack of footnotes is usually a telling hint. - GizzyCatBella🍁 16:42, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@GizzyCatBella: By that logic we should delete everything on Wikipedia which does not have an in-line citation. While having those is preferable, that cannot be our goal and I don't think that's supported by policies anywhere. Or to quote WP:OR: "all material added to articles must be verifiable in a reliable, published source, even if not already verified via an inline citation" and "Articles that currently name zero references of any type may be fully compliant with this policy—so long as there is a reasonable expectation that every bit of material is supported by a published, reliable source." We don't have in-line citations here, but we do have sources. Do you have a good reason to suspect that those do not cover the content of the article? Let's make a trial with the first entry in the list, Acoetes. I don't have access to the sources given besides what's available on Google books. And that tells me at least that the Annotated Index to the Cantos of Ezra Pound, p. 1, covers that for the most part. As do other sources not listed in the article like this, this, or this. So this section can be verfied, no problem with WP:V or WP:OR there. Do you have a good reason to suspect it is otherwise for other sections? Daranios (talk) 20:26, 25 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Daranios "Do you have a good reason to suspect it is otherwise for other sections?". How is this not a WP:THEREMUSTBESOURCES argument? _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 10:30, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Piotrus: Huh? There are eight+ sources present in the article. I have just shown for one randomly chosen example that they do indeed cover content of our list here. I have provided three more sources for that randomly chosen example. How is that in any way a WP:THEREMUSTBESOURCES argument? Daranios (talk) 14:22, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

WP:BURDEN says that once content has been challenged, it should not be restored without a proper footnote-style reference. WP:AGF allows us to keep such content, for a while, but eventually, it has to be improved to meet our modern standards. We believe we were much more forgiving to OR in the past. Now that our attention has focused on this article, either it is rewritten to meet those standards, or deleted (or maybe moved to someone's userspace if they want to work on it in the future). - GizzyCatBella🍁 14:38, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting! Per WP:BURDEN "...If you think the material is verifiable, you are encouraged to provide an inline citation yourself before considering whether to remove or tag it." Have you checked with User Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus whether they had attempted to provide the citations, or that they were aware of this duty, or indeed you were when you quoted just part of it. Obviously, as there are sources noted then the question of verifiability is moot. Why was this article put for deletion before this step was taken. LessHeard vanU (talk) 15:22, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Any annotated edition of The Cantos will contain explanatory footnotes or internal commentary for many if not all of the cultural references included in this list. Here are 3 examples: (1), (2), (3). 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 14:56, 26 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Delete. This fails WP:OR. It reads like part of the scientific apparatus of Pound's work, but Wikipedia is not for original research - this is a core policy which cannot be overridden by local consensus. And nothing above explains how this is not OR, i.e. based on secondary sources. Sandstein 16:11, 30 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

And what about all the annotated editions? Some contain introductory essays to each Canto, some use footnotes, but they all make an effort to explain Pound's references for the student. Any number of sources could be added here, as there's basically a cottage industry in lit studies of "explaining" Pound. 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 19:14, 30 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Then start referencing this, as required by WP:V. Unreferenced content can be removed, and should not be restored, after challenge, unless referenced. Consider every unreferenced sentence in that article challenged. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 08:22, 31 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I have started referencing the article. Note that this (1) critical edition has a long index, with entries on most if not all of the items currently in the article. 𝕱𝖎𝖈𝖆𝖎𝖆 (talk) 08:41, 31 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Per my response to GizzyCatBella and WP:BURDEN, that would have been your job before listing the article. There were the sources listed at the end of the article, which would have made clear that the content was available. LessHeard vanU (talk) 14:36, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Delete, original research through and through. Stifle (talk) 09:16, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

See immediately above - the sources are available, in a format that reflects the article. LessHeard vanU (talk) 14:36, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Verification is not sufficient to disprove OR. For example, we have "Meyer Anselm – Banker – Canto LXXIV (referenced)". Ok, I AGF that the cited source explains that such and such person, named in that Canto, is a banker. But that's a historical reference, not cultural. Does that source goes into a WP:SIGCOV-level discussion of how the mention of Mayer Anselm in is related to culture? Bottom line, while this article represents an undeniably useful analysis of a literary work, useful is not a criteria for inclusion in Wikipedia (WP:ITSUSEFUL). In order for this to be kept, we have to show that the topic is notable (that there are reliable works that discuss "cultural references in The Cantos"), and that our discussion is based on such work and not on primary sources or mentions in passing (per WP:SYNTH). Right now, there are weak signs that the first criteria is met (but I stress, weak), and I see zero signs that the latter is. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 18:32, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. WP:LISTN seems to be clearly met, and Ficaia's recent edits have gone a good way to resolving concerns (unconvincing concerns, I think) about WP:OR (so WP:HEY applies too). I'd also note that an article like this doesn't actually need to be independently notable in the first place per WP:SIZESPLIT, as it's made of encyclopaedic material that couldn't comfortably fit in the main article on the topic. Finally, whether these are all specifically cultural references and how to treat items that are better described as historical is an interesting question, but not one that has any bearing on whether this should be deleted. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 19:46, 1 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Keep These kinds of guides are something that Wikipedia is getting good at offering. For these large tomes that massively culturally significant, these types of lists really help to the reader, navigate the text, which is true calling. The list is is eminently notable. scope_creep^Talk 10:38, 3 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't get too hung up in the names. There is several for them, but there definently more than two articles in existance. scope_creep^Talk 10:39, 3 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.