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Template:Did you know nominations/The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save For Sacnoth

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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 AirshipJungleman29 (talk) 09:45, 8 August 2023 (UTC)

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The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save For Sacnoth

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  • ... that Lord Dunsany's story "The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save For Sacnoth" features "probably the most original method of dragonslaying ever devised"? Source: The page cites John D. Rateliff's doctoral thesis "'Beyond the fields we know' : the short stories of Lord Dunsany", found via Google Scholar. Page 53 states "The preliminary adventure of the fight with Tharagavverug which takes up the first third of the tale, while it reflects Dunsany's whimsy, also ranks as probably the most original method of dragonslaying ever devised."
    • Reviewed:

Converted from a redirect by CohenTheBohemian (talk). Self-nominated at 13:32, 1 August 2023 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save For Sacnoth; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.

  • welcome to dyk, CohenTheBohemian! i enjoyed reading this story. thanks for writing the article and nominating it for dyk.
    • general: article is new enough and long enough.
    • policy:
      • article is neutral. earwig shows nothing of concern, although i believe that is largely because earwig does not appear to be able to retrieve any of the relevant sources. spot checks of the only three sources i have access to (anderson, schweizer, and tompkins) did not reveal any close paraphrasing.
        • the article includes the quote "one of the finest short pieces of its type", but the schweizer source actually includes an additional qualification, describing the story as "one of the finest short pieces of its type in English".
        • i am not sure if the word "true" should be used to describe the type of sword and sorcery stories that this one is being compared to, as it seems to impart a value judgement that i could not find in the schweizer source. schweizer instead appears to use the words "modern" and "usual" to describe that type of sword and sorcery story.
      • some information in the first sentence of the lead does not appear to be cited anywhere in the article. i believe this can be addressed by either providing a citation in the lead, or mentioning this information in the body and citing it there.
      • plot section:
        • i had interpreted "instead of eyes they had little flames that flickered in their sockets, and knew them to be the fevered dreams of Gaznak" to mean that the flames were the "fevered dreams", rather than that the creatures that resembled human women were "dream spirits".
        • i had not envisioned the "narrow way between two abysses" to be a bridge. if it was, wouldn't it have been described as something like a "narrow way over an abyss"?
        • i had only counted the killing of one dragon after leothric encountered the strange women but before the killing of wong bongerok. if you are counting thok's brother lunk, the story notes that lunk "fled lumbering away". am i missing another?
    • qpq: not required.
    • hook:
      • hook is under 200 characters, interesting, and cited.
      • i am not sure i understand why "For" is capitalized in the hook (and the article title). mos:titlecaps says that prepositions with four or fewer letters are not capitalized in titles, but also notes that, in some instances, words not being used as prepositions are capitalized. specifically, it notes that a particle of a phrasal verb, and the first word of a compound preposition, are capitalized. "For" is obviously not being used as the first word of a compound preposition here, so is "save for" considered a phrasal verb? merriam-webster considers "save for" an idiom, and our article on english phrasal verbs makes a distinction between phrasal verbs and idioms. alternatively, cambridge appears to treat "save for" as a compound preposition, which would mean that "for" is the second word of a compound preposition, and should not be capitalized.
      • the quote in the hook is presented in such a way that suggests that we agree with the assessment, even though it only appears to be based on one source, a doctoral thesis. may i suggest adding "what has been described as" after "features", and making a similar change in the article? i'd also welcome a different rewording if you have a better alternative.
    • points outside of the dyk criteria:
      • there seems to be some extra vertical space at the top of the article.
      • the caption parameter in the infobox is not needed if no image is displayed.
      • i think, to someone who has never read the story, it is unclear whether the phrase "his people" in the lead refers to leothric's people or gaznak's people.
      • to me, stating that "Leothric goes to Gaznak's tower" suggests that the events described afterward occurred after his arrival at the tower. would it be more appropriate to replace "goes to" with "heads to", or something similar?
      • this is admittedly really nitpicky, but i don't recall the story ever referring to the eye affixed to the sword as "Sacnoth's eye". it generally refers to it as the eye of tharagavverug, or the eye in the hilt of sacnoth. i thought it was interesting that the author appeared to have deliberately not referred to the eye as belonging to sacnoth, so i was a bit surprised to see it being described as such in the plot summary.
      • i think replacing "his dreams" with "the wizard's dreams" would make it more clear that leothric was not seeing his own dreams.
      • i would suggest either adding something like "with elements" before "such as Wong Bongerok", or replacing "is often humorous" with something like "has humorous descriptions".
dying (talk) 21:57, 1 August 2023 (UTC)
    • Thank you for your detailed comments, and I'm glad you enjoyed the story!
      • "one of the finest short pieces of its type": I've added "in English"
      • "true" sword and sorcery: This bit is based on Rateliff's thesis as well; I've changed it to "typical" which is also his phrasing but seems good to me.
      • information in the lead: I assume you mean publication information; I've added a publication history section to include it.
      • (Plot)
        • women with flames in their eyesockets: The whole sentence is "Perhaps Leothric had been tempted to tarry had they been human women, for theirs was a strange beauty, but he perceived that instead of eyes they had little flames that flickered in their sockets, and knew them to be the fevered dreams of Gaznak." Per the bolded bits, I think the article is OK as it is.
        • the way between the abysses: I've made a slight rewording
        • number of dragons slain: oops, fixed
      • (Hook): Good points. How about one of these? Personally I prefer the first as it's a bit snappier, but I think both are fine.
      • capitalization of "For": Because it's consistently spelt that way (both in title and story text) in the Project Gutenberg edition. But all the other sources make it a small "f", so I'm not sure. (ETA: The first edition is on the Internet Archive - the title is block capitals, but it's a capital F in the story [1] [2])
      • quote in the hook: changed.
    • Outside of DYK criteria
      • extra space: Fixed, I think
      • caption parameter: cut
      • "his people": rephrased
      • Eye issue: rephrased
      • his dreams: rephrased
      • humor: rephrased
    • I hope that cuts the mustard, if the title is sorted. — Preceding unsigned comment added by CohenTheBohemian (talk • contribs)
      • yeah, CohenTheBohemian, that was a great story. i'm still thinking about it, so i'm not surprised that it influenced so many major writers. i actually read the story knowing pretty much only what you mentioned in the hook, so i didn't really know what to expect, aside from an unusual slaying of a dragon. at one point, i thought it was a hilarious parody of the genre! i can't imagine what it would have been like to read that story before the genre was established. so many new ideas! i thought it was funny that, in retrospect, even dunsany himself could not explain all the originality that he used in his story.
        • oh, "typical" is also a good choice.
        • yes, i meant the publication information. apologies for being unclear. the new section addresses it well.
        • i admittedly wasn't sure about my initial interpretation of the strange women. i had raised this point to see if you were aware of this interpretation, or of any sources discussing this part of the plot in detail. after my first reading of the plot summary, i reread that part of the story multiple times, and could easily see how it could be interpreted differently by different readers.
          i think the key is that it appears to be ambiguous what "them" refers to. you had thought that "them" referred to the strange women, while i had thought that "them" referred to the flames. thinking about it even further, its possible that dunsany was using "them" to refer to the scene in general, as the whole fortress pretty much disappears upon gaznak's death, possibly because it was all simply a dream of gaznak. i spent some time trying to find a source that would confirm any of these interpretations, but found none, so i am fine leaving your description as is.
        • note that alternative hooks are generally introduced with a bolded name in the form of "altx". see, for example, this nomination, where an alternative hook was presented as hook alt1, and an alternative based on that was presented as alt1a. this makes it a lot easier for people to refer to the hooks unambiguously, and for a reviewer to clearly communicate to promoters which hooks have been approved. "alt0" generally refers to the original hook, so i would suggest calling your new hooks either "alt1" and "alt2", or "alt0a" and "alt0b". (don't worry about being unfamiliar with all this stuff; i know this is your first nomination.)
        • i agree that the first of the new hooks is snappier, though i think the word "may" is overused at dyk to avoid making any definitive statements that would require solid sources to support it, so i would suggest using the second one, but would also approve the wording of the first.
        • unfortunately, the rules regarding how to title articles is so complicated that perhaps even the eye of tharagavverug could not help one through the tangle of policies and guidelines. i believe that the current practice is to generally not honor the capitalization of a title used by the work itself (or that used by any reliable sources) if it conflicts with the manual of style. this is, admittedly, not an obvious practice, and people often overlook adhering to it until the issue is pointed out. see, for example, this error report filed regarding the title of a featured article with a capitalization error that apparently went unnoticed until the article was featured on the main page, possibly because a promotional image for the work did not capitalize the title according to wikipedia's rules.
          taking this into consideration, i believe mos:titlecaps would determine the capitalization we should use for this article's title. my reading of the guideline is that it advocates against capitalizing "for" in the title of this work. do you have a different reading of the guideline? (as an aside, there are different standards for personal names and trademarks, which makes things even more confusing. see, for example, wp:lcitems and mos:tm.)
        • i like how you rephrased the lead. it reads better than anything i had come up with.
      by the way, i don't know if you were previously aware, but i recently realized that the text of the story is available on wikisource, here. obviously, linking to it is not required for dyk, but if you're interested, one way to do so is to add the code "{{wikisource|The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save for Sacnoth}}" at the top of the external links section. dying (talk) 07:11, 4 August 2023 (UTC)
  • Isn't it a brilliant story? This was published in 1908, but it's so far ahead of its time. Just the image of Gaznak riding about on his comet seems like something off a 70s rock album cover... It's so eerie and bewitching. And then the ending says "and maybe it never happened!" I'm lucky to have re-read it.
    • Thanks for your positive feedback and compliments!
    • I've added numbers to the new hooks. I'm OK with either alt1 or alt2, unless someone else has an strong opinion. "may" was only used once in July, so it doesn't bother me too much.
    • Re the strange women: I hope I didn't come across as snarky; I just meant to show my thinking. I think you're right that they are definitely just dream figures, like everything else in the castle. Anyway, glad it's sorted.
    • Re the article title: I was wrong; MOS:TITLECAPS is unambiguous, and I've moved the page back. Your eye is sharper than Tharagavverug's.
    • I've replaced the Gutenberg link with the Wikisource as it's more user-friendly, thank you. CohenTheBohemian (talk) 13:02, 4 August 2023 (UTC)
      • CohenTheBohemian, i wouldn't be surprised if there was a rock album cover like that, inspired by dunsany. interestingly, when i was reading the story, the description of the forty-line spell had made me think that dunsany was making fun of tolkien's poems. after reading your article and realizing that not only did dunsany predate tolkien, but that tolkien was inspired by dunsany, i had wondered if tolkien had the spell's description in mind when writing many of his poems.
        • apologies, i had used the italics in "altx" to make more clear that the 'x' was a variable, and not to be reproduced like the "alt" part of the name is. the name should be bolded and not include any italics, like this: alt5. (also, i've taken the liberty to remove the extraneous "}}" from your comment, following the guideline mentioned at wp:tpo, as the extra curly braces closed the {{DYKsubpage}} template early.)
        • oh, wow, you are right about "may" being used only once in july! this surprised me about as much as gaznak lifting his own head out of harm's way did. anyway, i love it when someone ostensibly less experienced than i am in a certain area schools me badly in that same area, so thanks for pointing this out. i must be overcounting them in my mind. i withdraw my concern then.
        • no worries, i hadn't taken your words as snark. if i had come across as having done so, i apologize. i, too, had just meant to show my thinking.
        • i just noticed that the "probably" in alt0 (and the quote from the cited source) somehow turned into a "perhaps" in alt2. was this gaznak's doing? if not, i am assuming that this was just an accident.
      anyway, the only other outstanding issue is that the alternative hooks still capitalize "For", but since i am assuming that this is just an oversight, i'll go ahead and approve the hooks. (i am guessing that you'll want to standardize the capitalization in the article itself as well.) dying (talk) 04:58, 6 August 2023 (UTC)
  • alt1 and alt2 approved, with the caveat that "For" should be replaced with "for" in either hook, to reflect the recently moved article's new title, and "perhaps" should be replaced with "probably" in alt2, to conform with the sentence from the source quoted above. dying (talk) 04:58, 6 August 2023 (UTC) [struck, as the statement has been superseded below. dying (talk) 02:05, 8 August 2023 (UTC)]
  • The Tolkien-Dunsany connection is even tighter than that. Dunsany's first couple of books are all about his made-up mythology, which I'm pretty sure inspired Tolkien too, and definitely influenced Lovecraft's alien gods and some of his early stories.
    • Thanks for the math help!
    • I actually laughed when I read "this surprised me about as much as gaznak lifting his own head out of harm's way did." Cheers!
    • No worries, I didn't detect any snark from you either.
    • Here are two fixed hooks, renumbered for clarity. I've fixed capitalisation in the article as well as here. The probably/possible issue is because I originally misquoted the source, but it's now corrected here and in the article. My preference is for alt3.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by CohenTheBohemian (talk • contribs)
looks good, CohenTheBohemian. to try to avoid confusing promoters, i am adding an updated statement of approval below, and striking my older statement above. dying (talk) 02:05, 8 August 2023 (UTC)
  • alt3 and alt4 approved. nominator expresses a preference for alt3. dying (talk) 02:05, 8 August 2023 (UTC)
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