Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/William Morrison "The Bard of Mallusk" (2nd nomination)

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 no consensus. After more than a month, and three relistings, it doesn't look as though a clear consensus will be achieved. Deor (talk) 02:36, 16 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

William Morrison "The Bard of Mallusk"[edit]

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Non-notable poet. A local hero, to be sure, but notability does not seem to extend beyond the Mallusk area where he lived. No indications that his poems were ever published except by the people of Mallusk as part of a memorial. (No quorum on last nomination. Trying again.) WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 05:02, 9 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. NorthAmerica¹⁰⁰⁰ 05:36, 9 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Poetry-related deletion discussions. NorthAmerica¹⁰⁰⁰ 05:36, 9 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Ireland-related deletion discussions. NorthAmerica¹⁰⁰⁰ 05:36, 9 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - Definitely seen as something of a hero by the locals. Plenty of local media coverage, but can't find anything to prove actual notability. JTdale ^Talk 12:07, 10 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep Local coverage is coverage, in my estimation, and this is an apparently published poet from the 19th century, so links to other sources will be hard to find except in archives. It would be ideal to have better cites to the sources where his poems were published (Antrim-area newspapers), but I doubt if we'll find those online because of their age. LaMona (talk) 17:50, 13 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Per WP:ANYBIO, a person is deemed notable if
2.The person has made a widely recognized contribution that is part of the enduring historical record in his or her specific field

so local coverage may be coverage, but it is not sufficient to denote wide recognition. Also, it is not clear that Morrison's poems were published other than in his own hometown newspaper. WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 18:09, 13 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, NorthAmerica¹⁰⁰⁰ 17:18, 16 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

WikiDan61 Using what I read as your strict interpretation of that criterion, only folks who are famous world-wide would be included. That would eliminate a whole heck of a lot of WP. The other possibility is that being known in the US becomes the criterion for "wide recognition" which I think would be a mistake. On the other hand, being published in what, at the time, were newspapers that were the main sources of information in an important part of a (at least now English-speaking) country (e.g. the area of Northern Ireland) might be deemed as "widely recognized." I prefer a wider interpretation of "widely recognized" to include parts of the world that we might not all have within our vision. LaMona (talk) 03:22, 21 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment I am not so small-minded to require "known in the US" as a criterion for inclusion. Northern Ireland is a relatively small country: if Morrison's writings were published in a newspaper read throughout the whole of Northern Ireland, that would be evidence of wide recognition. The article gives no indication of that. The sense I get from the article is that Morrison's poems were published, if at all, in his hometown newspaper. Evidence to the contrary will convince me to change my vote on this issue. WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 13:46, 21 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I am not able to time travel to 1870's, however it does look like Belfast_Telegraph was a major northern Ireland paper, even at that time. It's a bit hard to apply current concepts to those days, when a physical newspaper traveled by horse and buggy to reach its readers, and when distances were measured very differently from what they are today. There probably was no newspaper common to the entirety of Ireland in 1870's, which at that time was a single political unit, although most likely physically unreachable by any single news publication. The Telegraph today is very much a regional paper, not a "local" one, even winning awards as such. However, that is complicated by the later separation of the two "Irelands" such that what we know of as "Northern Ireland" now has political and social barriers dividing it from the rest of the island. I don't know if it is available in the Republic known as "Ireland". LaMona (talk) 17:29, 21 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, NorthAmerica¹⁰⁰⁰ 10:41, 24 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment @LaMona: To clarify, Morrison was born in 1881, and would have had the height of his activity in the early to mid twentieth century, so we need not travel back as far as 1870 to assess his notability. WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 13:09, 24 November 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep useful info on published poet with valid sources. What more can we ask for?: in-line sources would be good. but notability seems clear.ShulMaven (talk) 21:09, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
- Comment @ShulMaven: What more could we ask for? Being published is really not the bar we set for any author or poet. We need evidence that any independent source outside his hometown fans ever published a single word about Mr Morrison. Were his poems analyzed or reviewed in any anthology, other than those produced by his hometown fans? So far, I have seen no evidence of such. Without such independent sources, any analysis of Morrison's poetry becomes WP:OR, and if we remove that, we have an article that basically states "William Morrison was a poet who became known as the Bard of Mallusk." No other fact in the article is verifiable by any significant source. WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 21:24, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

WikiDan61 I do see your point. On the other hand, I googled "william Morrison" + Mallusk) and they are naming parks and writing articles about him now, 40 some odd years after his death. To my judgment, being loved and remembered that way within a region seems to confer notability. ShulMaven (talk) 21:34, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

@ShulMaven: Localities name parks after local heroes all the time, making for some local notability. But that's not the same as global notability. And the naming of a park still provides us with no source material from which to generate a verifiable article. WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 22:02, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

global notability isn't in question, certainly it is not required. This is a more borderline case. A minor local poet, although with a name as common as William Morrison it is difficult to know how widely he may have been he was published; by no means are all 20th century poetry magazines searchable. But the reason I hesitate to delete is that he clearly is attracting attention in the Northern Ireland neighborhood where he lived. It's not a memorial page, it's not a vanity page, it's a page put but because people in a small corner of the Anglosphere appear to pay some attention to this man's writing.ShulMaven (talk) 22:31, 1 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, SpinningSpark 15:59, 2 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Delete - There appears to be some RS coverage on the subject, but even if this article did meet WP:GNG it seems like a pretty clear case for WP:DYNAMITE. NickCT (talk) 16:42, 2 December 2014 (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.