User:Csalehi68/sandbox

Article Critique

I visited the Aksel Sandemose page on Wikipedia, and found three aspects of it worth commenting on: the very sparse information given in regards to his life, the brief mention of his literary works, and the overall lack of information, citations or effort put into his page."

Lack of Information About Aksel's Life

The author of the page failed to actually mention that Aksel's given last name was not Sandemose. It is in a link at the top of the page that gives no actual information in regards to why it is placed there at all. Sandemose is the name he donned when he began his literary career. Nielsen is his given last name. After only minimal effort was put into searching I found that Aksel fathered five children, and two of those were not with his wife. The author makes mention of his grandchild, but did not otherwise allude to his family life. He boarded a schooner and left home at the age of seventeen. This was only the first of his flights from home over the years, and later in life that occurred due to financial failures and connection with World War II. There are many other events that were not mentioned that would have given more depth to the character of the 1963 Nobel Prize candidate that would not necessarily promote bias.

Brief Mention of Literary Works

In 1963 Aksel was one of six candidates for the Nobel Prize for Literature and this is mentioned very quickly and briefly on the page. It makes mention of his most famous work from which the "Laws of Jante" originated, but does not even give a brief description of the "Laws" or mention that they are discussed to this day. He is only known to history due to his literary works and should be given more of a spotlight on his page due to this fact.

Lack of Citations and Overall Information

There were only three citations on this brief page, and these were used once each. After reading an article about Aksel and his Law of Jante it almost makes the article have a feel of intent in regards to its starkness. The laws that still have some significance in current times when dealing with Danes have been spouted to come from Egalitarian societies. The stories behind his book and what later transpired because of it are not mentioned in the article at all. The page claims that Aksel worked as a "teacher, journalist, sailor and lumberjack in Newfoundland", but does not given any sourcing to show that this is true.

Summary

Overall, the feel gathered after visiting the Aksel Sandemose page is of having visited a page created as an afterthought. There is the feel that there is so much more behind the story but the information given is so sparse that it would generally get overlooked or be considered not worth the effort of searching for more. There were three citations given that were used one time. The whole life of this man was glossed over in the course of a paragraph. I added in a citation, edited a line or two, and added in two more lines mentioning that he had children and the Law of Jante. This article could use much more assistance.