Talk:The Rector of Justin

The Rector of Justin has been listed as one of the Language and literature good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Review: September 17, 2025. (Reviewed version).

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A fact from The Rector of Justin appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 20 June 2025 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that the choice between The Rector of Justin and Herzog for the 1965 National Book Award for Fiction was described as "a conflict of philosophies" about life itself?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2025/June. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/The Rector of Justin.

Wikipedia

Did you know nomination

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 SL93 talk 19:26, 15 June 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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Comment or view
Article history

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... that the choice between The Rector of Justin and Herzog for the 1965 National Book Award for Fiction was described as "a conflict of philosophies" about life itself?

Source: [The Rector of Justin] was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction, losing to Shirley Ann Grau's The Keeper of the House and Bellow's Herzog, respectively. [1] The Rector of Justin still received positive reviews, but at the end of 1964, Francis Brown (The New York Times) drew a distinction between The Rector of Justin and its awards-season competitor, Bellow's Herzog. He explained that the choice between the two reflected a fork in the road for American literature: "There is a conflict of philosophies: belief that life has a purpose, or if it doesn’t, at least the living of life can have some joy to it, contends with insistence that there is nothing to life but the living of it, and that even that is absurd." [2]

ALT1: ... that MGM proposed casting Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn for a film adaptation of Louis Auchincloss' novel The Rector of Justin, but the film was never made? Source: Walter Wanger optioned the film rights for MGM. [3] He recruited George Cukor to direct, Samuel A. Taylor to write the screenplay, and Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn to play the leads. However, Tracy was in poor health and the film was never made.Curtis, James (2011). Spencer Tracy. Hutchinson. pp. 821–23. ISBN 978-0-09-178524-6.
Reviewed:

Created by Namelessposter (talk). Number of QPQs required: 0. Nominator has fewer than 5 past nominations.

Namelessposter (talk) 17:45, 23 April 2025 (UTC).[reply]

@Namelessposter: Wow. This is rated as a good article. The hook is an interesting fact about the book. Approved. Moondragon21 (talk) 13:36, 23 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

General: Article is new enough and long enough
New enough: Long enough:

Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Adequate sourcing: Neutral: Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:

Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
Cited: Interesting:

QPQ: Done.

Overall:

- @Moondragon21: Thanks for the kind words! I just wanted to front one matter: there are two Earwig flags. I don't think the Oppenheimer Tablet essay is actually an issue since the Earwig flag is mostly a block quote, but the MacFarquhar New Yorker flag is a more nuanced matter since it's principally based on quotes from her interview of Auchincloss. I just want to make sure that we're all on the same page about how to move forward. Namelessposter (talk) 17:15, 23 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  - @Namelessposter: You're welcome. Those passages are quotations so I don't think that is an issue for this DYK. Moondragon21 (talk) 12:26, 24 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

GA review

Passed. Bgsu98 (Talk) 13:48, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This review is transcluded from Talk:The Rector of Justin/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: Namelessposter (talk · contribs) 15:32, 25 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewer: Bgsu98 (talk · contribs) 02:47, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Hello… I will do this review; it sounds very interesting, although I am unfamiliar with this book. I hope to begin in the next day or two. 😃 Bgsu98 (Talk) 02:47, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

Is it well written?
A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:

B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:
Is it verifiable with no original research, as shown by a source spot-check?
A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:

B. Reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose):

C. It contains no original research:

D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:
Is it broad in its coverage?
A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:

B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):
Is it neutral?
It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:
Is it stable?
It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:
Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?
A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content:

B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:
Overall:
Pass or Fail:

Comments (9/16/25)

This article is extremely well written. In fact, you could have probably bypassed GA and sent it straight to FA instead. Either way, I have only a few comments:

The first paragraph of Synopsis: Personally, I would replace the two dashes with a comma and a semicolon, but that may be a stylistic preference.
What is meant by "laddish"?
"Griscam sends their two sons..." Minor nitpick, but is the wife not involved in this decision as well? I'm sure the sentence is technically correct, but a singular subject "sends their" just reads a little awkwardly.
The photo with President Bush: I would wikilink National Medal of Arts. I would expand the caption to include mention of President Bush and Laura Bush.
In Timeline, I would wikilink noblesse oblige.
In Inspirations, I would wikilink Gilded Age.
In Themes, I would include the acronym (WASP) after the first usage of White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, since that acronym is used repeatedly throughout this section.
"Auchincloss said when he was growing up..." I would add "said that when he was growing up..."
In Critical response, I would wikilink National Book Award for Fiction.
In The end of an era, I would remove the parentheses from the last sentence of the first paragraph.
You use the term "Groton" and "Grotonian" to refer to alumni. Which is preferred? I would pick one for consistency unless it's used in a direct quotation.

Namelessposter (talk · contribs): As you can see, most of that is very minor. Let me know when you have had a chance to address these, and I will do the image and source reviews as soon as I have a chance. Please let me know if you have any questions. Bgsu98 (Talk) 15:17, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Many thanks, @Bgsu98 - coming from you, that means a lot. I've already incorporated all but one of your comments; the only open question is laddish, see below.

"Laddish" means... not quite fratty, but the people who will eventually become fratty, I think. (Wiktionary: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/laddish.) Happy to discuss possible replacements. "Macho" is probably fine, since it incorporates the maleness of the term, but it feels bit too seriousness: when I think laddish I think insouciance more than impetuousness. Aspinwall comments several times on how the Justin students get very rowdy and disrespectful if not controlled properly.

A couple other notes:

The book says Griscam's wife wasn't really involved in the decision to send the kids to Justin. "I was taken aback that she, in such 'private' surroundings and the mother of two Justin boys, should take so sharp an attitude, but I reflected that the family as well as the household decisions were probably left to her husband. Mrs. Griscam seems to live as a kind of guest, however critical a one, in her own home." To reflect this more clearly, I changed "Griscam sends their" to "Griscam insists on sending his."
Groton's website is agnostic on "Groton alum" versus "Grotonian." (https://www.groton.org/academics/library; https://www.groton.org/alumni/awards.) The article only uses "Grotonian" once so I just took that one out.

Namelessposter (talk) 02:47, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Image review (9/17/25)

All images have appropriate licenses and captions.

Namelessposter (talk · contribs): All images need appropriate alt-text. See MOS:ALTTEXT for more information and let me know if you have any questions. Bgsu98 (Talk) 11:36, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Source review (9/17/25)

I did a spot check and am going to sign off on this source review. I also ran the article through the date format bot, and tagged a source from The New York Times as requiring a subscription. I would recommend wikilinking the source publications, but that is beyond the scope of a GA.

Namelessposter (talk · contribs): I am going to go ahead and close this GA as passed. I still recommend you add alt-texts to the images, but I don't think that is required for GA. It is for sure required for FA should you decide to pursue that route, and this article is of a high enough quality that it should do well at FA. I will also run the article through the archive bot when I'm done here, but I would also recommend archiving your on-line sources. Again, not a requirement for GA, not good practice nonetheless. Please let me know if you need anything else. Bgsu98 (Talk) 13:49, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.