Template talk:Beowulf

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Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms

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Maria Dahvana Headley

I just added Maria Dahvana Headley to this template, as last night she won the 2021 Hugo Award for Best Related Work, but Chiswick Chap reverted it, citing concerns over the number of translators that could end up being added as a result.

While I agree that we should keep such lists limited, I think recipients of major awards for their translations should merit inclusion (Headley also won the 2021 Harold Morton Landon Translation Award for her work). I also agree that listing only major works with their own articles (i.e. works notable in their own right) is a good principle — that the article has not yet been created does not detract from the translation's own notability (per at least criteria 1 and 2 at WP:BOOKCRIT).

Thoughts on restoring Headley to the list in the template? — OwenBlacker (he/him; Talk; please {{ping}} me in replies) 12:29, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Thoughts? It'd be totally inappropriate. She is not a mainstream translator of Old English, and it'd be both weird to list her when we're not listing many distinguished (not just notable but far beyond that) translators and scholars, and dangerously recentist - the last thing we want is for all translators since 2020 to be listed, ignoring the rest. We also have a major problem if we think we're going to list every translator here, there are many hundreds. But since we agree that we list only major works, then we should at once remove names of translators who do not also have Beowulf works below their name, i.e. the criterion for listing a person is that their name is required to group multiple works. When there's just one work, it can stand alone as there's no point creating groups of one. Headley is listed in the List of translations of Beowulf and in the List of winners of the Harold Morton Landon Translation Award, among other places, so she is readily accessible. If anyone believes it's worth the effort, then they can write an article about her translation and we can place that here. I've actually quoted and cited her, too, in my Translating Beowulf article so I'm not trying to suppress her or anything, just aiming to keep things in proportion, and that includes countering recentism. (Has anyone studied how many earlier translations won prizes? Probably there are several.) I'll trim the list now, it's clearly a danger. Chiswick Chap (talk) 12:40, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree, but I can certainly sympathise with your reasoning. Given this is clearly an area where you edit far more than I, I shall defer to your opinion 😊 — OwenBlacker (he/him; Talk; please {{ping}} me in replies) 12:45, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]