Talk:Jean Sibelius

Infobox

re: adding an infobox on the composer's birthday

The topic of an infobox for Sibelius has been discussed in the past. So Bach, Beethoven, Stanley Kubrick. For the latter three, things have changed since the first discussion. We could run an RfC, but do we really have to?

Checking the mood first. Who would support a simple infobox as proposed in 2015 when we celebrated him, and who'd oppose showing at a glance when and where he was born and died, and the list of his works. Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:26, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

Why even bother. You already know how it'll turn out. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 13:19, 9 December 2021 (UTC)

I'm by no means experienced in this particular topic area, but I figured I'd throw in my two cents that this seems like a useful and tasteful infobox. Sibelius' places of birth and death aren't mentioned in the lead (nor his age at death, though one could of course calculate it themselves from the dates). These are all facts of general interest, in my opinion, but they wouldn't be particularly appropriate to include in the prose of the lead. The fact that Sibelius has a "list of compositions" article also means that the infobox circumvents the subjectivity of a handpicked "notable works" section. ModernDayTrilobite (talk • contribs) 15:00, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

I would like to invite Nikkimaria to respond as the person who reverted the change and El cid, el campeador who coordinated the 2020 discussion. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖

The arguments from the previous discussions still seem relevant - and as noted there, what happens on other articles is not. Nikkimaria (talk) 23:29, 10 December 2021 (UTC)

Which arguments, please? Seem relevant to whom? The infobox for Beethoven was installed by the arbitrator who wrote the infoboxes case, as the community consensus, and that seems relevant to me. The easiest way - the least time-consuming for everybody - to end this discussion would be if you self-reverted, and we all could turn to back to creating content. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:42, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

Or, even simpler, we could leave things as they are. Again, what happens on other articles is not a relevant argument. Nikkimaria (talk) 15:49, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

Kindly tell us which of the arguments of the 2020 short collection of opposers you found relevant. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:37, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

The comment of Ssilvers in particular, and those of others seem relevant to your argument. Nikkimaria (talk) 20:58, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

Ssilvers added a general comment which he had added to many other discussions before. It seems not relevant to this particular proposal of a minimal infobox following the examples created by Brianboulton, such as Percy Grainger. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:30, 11 December 2021 (UTC)

I'd support a minimal infobox (for the life of me, I have never understood why Wikipedia beautification became a contentious issue, but I digress) for Sibelius, as Gerda has outlined in the example (although I'd add Sibelius's signature as a welcome and fascinating design touch, as well as switch to the famous photo that inspired the Finnish banknote that the lede references). In general, as technology changes and people have less time/interest in reading long articles (even ledes!), an infobox that provides the basic details is most welcome. Just my thoughts, and I won't be commenting again: I have Kullervo to raise to FA by its 130th. Silence of Järvenpää (talk) 02:03, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

ModernDayTrilobite, I think these are good arguments. The lede does not contain this info, and the list of works should be prominent near the top of the article, and the Infobox is a good place to keep it. — Insertcleverphrasehere^{(or here)_{(or here)(or here)}} 22:54, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

It is hilarious that Gerda, who has repeatedly forced infoboxes into hundreds of articles against the spirit of the Arbcom cases in this area, accuses me of repeating myself. Since someone has archived my comment, I'll post it again here, as it is highly relevant, unlike Gerda's rote demand. Also, to use Brian Boulton's name, without Brian here to speak for himself is despicable.

While sports and politician bios can benefit from infoboxes, most articles in liberal arts fields, as here, do not. See arbitration report: "Infoboxes may be particularly unsuited to liberal arts fields when they repeat information already available in the lead section of the article, are misleading or oversimplify the topic for the reader". I disagree with including an infobox in this article because: (1) The box would emphasize unimportant factoids stripped of context and lacking nuance, in competition with the WP:LEAD section, which emphasizes and contextualizes the most important facts. (2) Since the most important points in the article are already discussed in the Lead, or adequately discussed in the body of the article, the box would be redundant. (3) It would take up valuable space at the top of the article and hamper the layout and impact of the Lead. (4) Frequent errors creep into infoboxes, as updates are made to the articles but not reflected in the redundant info in the box, and they tend to draw vandalism, fancruft and repeated arguments among editors about what to include. (5) The boilerplate infobox templates create a block of code at the top of the edit screen that discourages new editors from editing the article. (6) It would discourage readers from reading the text of the article. (7) IBs distract editors from focusing on the content of the article. Instead of improving the article, they spend time working on this repetitive feature and its coding and formatting. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:00, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

"Since the most important points in the article are already discussed in the Lead, or adequately discussed in the body of the article, the box would be redundant" -- this statement always has been, and always will be, incorrect and worthless. The whole POINT of an infobox is summary, and being redundant isn't an issue. There's zero reason 'being redundant' in this case is bad. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 05:59, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

To be honest, I've never felt particularly compelled by this numbered list of anti-infobox arguments. In addition to the point Melodia raises against argument (2), I would also dispute several of the other claims it makes. Argument (3) is completely subjective (personally, I prefer the layout with an infobox included); I'm skeptical of argument (5), as in my experience infobox code is typically very intuitive to read and easy to scroll past; and as for argument (6), I'd contend that readers seeking an infobox and readers seeking the article prose are largely non-overlapping groups. Someone interested in an infobox, if there is no box, will most likely search out specific pieces of information rather than read the article in any kind of thorough fashion. ModernDayTrilobite (talk • contribs) 17:36, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

Ssilvers, I had hoped that you would simply answer the question if you'd oppose showing the information of birth and death and the list of works. The statement about me forcing infoboxes in articles is wrong (how "force"? ... which articles? - could you even name one, besides those I wrote myself? ... when? - because I left the waste of time of infobox arguments in 2015/16 for health reasons), and the way you remember Brian is completely different from how I remember him: a generous person, seeking comprromise. He wrote the Signpost essay Infoboxes: time for a fresh look? in July 2013, which would be a good basis for our conversation here, and he introduced his idea of a short infobox (which he sometimes called identibox) as a compromise later that year, inviting me on my talk to comment. The question today is if we follow that suggestion: "Hi Gerda. Can you suggest, informally on my talkpage, your ideas for the format of an "identibox" that might be suitable for classical composers?" It has been found suitable for Handel (2014), Beethoven (2015), Bach (2015), Schumann (2017), Philip Glass (2010!), to name a few, all stable, none by me, - so why not Sibelius? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:14, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

I support having an infobox for this page. It would not be "oversimplifying" or "misleading"; it would simply summarize the subject in a way that's easier to read than in the lead. Addressing Ssilvers's bullet points:

(1) There is literally nothing in the infobox that would be out-of-context or unimportant. It would also feature some things that aren't in the lead; for example, if a reader wants to find out how old Sibelius was when he died, it would be much faster to read it in an infobox than to have to do the math by looking at his birth date in the lead.

(2) No it wouldn't be. The infobox is simply a convenient box of information for readers who want to read that information—such as age, place of birth, or years active—faster than they can in the text of the article. It summarizes the subject in a nutshell.

(3) There is no basis for this claim. The lead is still going to exist and be perfectly readable.

(4) The lead section is just as prone to vandalism as the infobox, but I think we can agree that leads shouldn't be done away with just because of that. As for fancruft and arguments about what to include, simply because a handful of editors can't agree on what should be in an infobox doesn't mean we should burn the whole thing down and ruin the experience for all readers.

(5) How does it discourage anything? Editors can just scroll down to the section they want to edit and click [edit source] or, better yet, they can simply use CTRL+F to find the part of the article they want to edit.

(6) There is no basis for this claim. There's no reason anyone who intends to extensively read about Sibelius's life and career would be stopped by the infobox. Also, a good number of people who read Wikipedia aren't there to exhaustively read; in fact, no one should use Wikipedia as a reliable source for a research paper or anything else. Many of us just come to pages like these to get a quick look at the basics of who someone is, just like the "In a nutshell" templates. The infobox serves those readers very well. Wikipedia was created for the readers—many of whom find infoboxes useful—not the editors.

(7) This is simply false. On any page, only a handful of edits relate to the infobox.

The bottom line is, regardless of whether some editors like infoboxes or not, many readers do appreciate the brevity and convenience of infoboxes, and that should be respected. Songwaters (talk) 00:10, 19 December 2021 (UTC)

I'm personally very much for the inclusion of an infobox, and I'm genuinely surprised that there is this much controversy over doing so to multiple pages. I have read the arguments against doing so, and it mostly strikes me as pretentious and very impracticle. AnyGuy (talk) 13:27, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

It was included. Perhaps someone should close this. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 14:45, 15 December 2021 (UTC)

Thanks, Gerda Arendt! [1] Yet, I agree with Nikkimaria's cutting of the music periods (Romanticism, modernism). [2] I reverted a new user edit that changed Hämeenlinna to Tavastehus (all major sources—I have 15+ books in my library—say Hämeenlinna). [3] I changed the infobox photo; the new one is higher resolution + quite famous (it was on the Finnish 100 marka). [4] I'm still looking into getting a signature (reached out to Jonadrews) but haven't yet heard from him. After that, I think we'll be done! Warmly, Silence of Järvenpää (talk) 03:31, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

Thank you! I replaced the inclusion of the infobox by a link to it's addition, to not confuse the inclusion count. I also agree that "period" and such are not needed. I like the image, and good luck for the signature. On Beethoven's birthday ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:39, 16 December 2021 (UTC)

Discussion

I sent out some alerts as I did at the Kubrick discussion. @Ssilvers: Please focus discussion on content rather than contributors.
Disclosure: Gerda Arendt asked me to monitor this discussion for civility. Regardless, I have no interest in the substantive outcome of this debate and don't consider myself WP:INVOLVED.
At this point, I might suggest any interested party formulate an RFC. If there is no consensus for an infobox, then I would recommend a moratorium on further discussion of adding an infobox to this page. –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 17:56, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

MJL, thank you, but as explained above: another RfC would be another time sink, and how many more RfCs do we need to call the infobox wars over? ... which has been proclaimed in 2018, "... there haven't been infobox squabbles in ages. I personally use them all the time now for biographies and operas. ... the general attitude from both perspectives seems to have settled on live and let live.. Let's try, please. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:14, 13 December 2021 (UTC)

Gerda Arendt: I came across this discussion by accident. As the one who has probably spent most time and effort on developing the article, it would have been helpful if someone had pinged me. As for the infobox, I saw no need to add one myself as I believe all the essentials are summarized in the lead. That said, I would not oppose inclusion of the mini box suggested as it does include one item of useful information, namely a link to the list of compositions which was developed so well by Silence of Järvenpää. So please go ahead. Then Sibelius will be in the same league as Beethoven!--Ipigott (talk) 15:02, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

"Violinist" in lead

Hi all, would there be any objection to me removing him labeled as a "violinist" in the first sentence? Considering that he gave it up before age 30 (and then proceeded to live 60 more years!) and is not known for his violin playing, the inclusion seems WP:UNDUE and non-defining. Aza24 (talk) 07:17, 23 December 2021 (UTC)

I also wonder if such categories on him being a violinist should be included, but they seem less in need of removal than the characterization in the first sentence. Aza24 (talk) 08:42, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

Aza24 I agree completely and have always found this claim an annoyance. It certainly disappointed and haunted him, as Sibelius himself conceded to various early biographers, but he was no virtuoso. And I don't think playing some chamber music in the 1890s as a student really counts. Fact of the matter is, the violin wasn't his career. I'd support removal of the claim. Silence of Järvenpää (talk) 16:32, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

Absolutely agree; I removed it. While he played the violin, it's non-defining, and undue, as Aza says. Antandrus (talk) 17:58, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

Thanks to you both, I've removed the corresponding categories as well. This just happened at the Schoenberg talk page ([1]) recently, making our decision stronger, I think. Aza24 (talk)

Infobox image

Gerda Arendt and Aza24: I agree that a short description under the photo is appropriate. However, there's just no way that's Sibelius in 1890 (in comparison to other photos and paintings from that period that show him looking much younger)! Rather, this looks to be Sibelius in, I estimate 1901–1905, around the time of the Second Symphony and the Violin Concerto. I did a bit of digging and found a link to the U.S.'s Library of Congress: https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/99403967/. Seems they give the date as about what I suspected: "Portrait photographs and engravings of musical personalities. Illus. from: Die Musik, 1902-1903, supplement." I don't know if this is conclusive evidence, but at a minimum we should probably change the description to be "The composer in the early 1900s." Silence of Järvenpää (talk) 16:27, 31 December 2021 (UTC)

I think that may be as conclusive as we're going to get; photograph dates are notoriously tricky to pinpoint, so at least we have some rationale for the caption. The only other solution I can see is maybe some Sibelius biographies have the picture and include a date? Aza24 (talk) 23:25, 31 December 2021 (UTC)