Uncyclopedia:Pee Review/George Washington Carver

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George Washington Carver

Mnbvcxz 20:36, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Humour:	4	To me it just wasn't very funny or satirical. There seems to be only one joke, that Carver did nothing much. It gets old.
Concept:	7	Notable person; should have an article on him.
Prose and formatting:	7	Quite well-written; a few typos. It should be "a charlatan", and you should correct the spelling of "considereing" and "distingished". Just typos, very minor.
Images:	7	Good images; the one of Carver in his lab really does look like he's huffing.
Miscellaneous:	5	I found this a bit slow, a bit dull.
Final Score:	30
Reviewer:	----OEJ 13:02, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Endnotes

Bear in mind that this is just my personal reaction after reading the article. It's just an opinion.

I almost felt like I was reading a serious article debunking myths about Carver. Most of the material is present in Wikipedia or in Barry Mackintosh's articles, and the presentation here is relatively straightforward. Even when there is exaggeration -- as when the real allegations of "improper association with a white woman" is escalated to attempted rape -- it seems pretty humorless.

It would seem to me that there are several paths that could be taken to make this more satirical and, possibly, funny.

For instance, it could shove the "doing Nuttin'" line into the ridiculous. "Although he said he invented 50,000 ways to use peanuts, 14,000 uses for sweet potatoes, and 5,000 ways to use skee-balls in soups and salads, Carver's research methods usually involved snoozing the day away under his desk. To avoid being awakened he stuck peanuts in his ears. (Beneficial use number 23,497 in his list.)"

Or it could satirize the myth-busters while sneakily admitting that they are in many cases correct. "Whiteboy writers like Barry Mackintosh have denigrated Carver's genius with claims like 'Hell, I could have threatened to resign from Tuskagee's faculty every year! That's easy. And Carver never invented peanut butter, or peanut oil, sweet potato gumbo, or anything. He was just a do-nothing loudmouth.' Then they rush off to their next KKK meeting, fearful of coming in late and annoying the Kleagle."

And you really should think up some humorous and/or obscene uses for peanuts and sweet potatoes, which you can then either attribute to Carver or claim were stolen by Carver from the real inventors.

But in my personal opinion this needs a healthy infusion of satire and/or humor. Of course this is just the lousy opinion of a lousy, lousy man. ----OEJ 13:29, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Reply

Thanks for the review. My original intention was to belittle/mock Carver's achievements; however, when I discovered that he actually did nothing, it threw me off a bit. Its rather difficult to belittle the achievements of someone who has literally done nothing. (Well, I could say his laziness caused something to be uninvented, but that is a bit absurd.)

I think the article is probably too dull right now, even by the 'overreacting-against-everything-being-complete-gibberish' standards that are now common on Uncyclopedia; I was trying to avoid making it too nonsensical. I probably overshot it by good bit bit. In my opinion, the "ideal" level of silliness is mostly dependent on how much silliness the reader has been exposed to recently; the more silliness/nonsense someone is exposed to, the less funny s/he would find more nonsense.

Do you think I can fix the article by adding more exaggeration, or would I need a re-write to fix it?--Mnbvcxz 03:07, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I think what changes you go for at this point depends on what you really want to do with the article. If I were writing it I might consider what grabs and tickles my imagination: Carver as a nut who invented everything from yogurt-covered peanuts to transdimensional travel, but who -- due to paranoia -- never wrote anything down and therefore gets credit for nothing? Carver as a glory-hogging academic who really never did create anything? Carver as the victim of vicious slander by racist revisionist historians? Carver as a mythological figure who never really lived at all, but was created by anti-racist revisionist historians? Carver as a tragically misunderstood artist who hated science but was forced to experiment with peanuts and sweet potatoes in order to buy his painting supplies?

I guess what I am thinking is, transform Carver and the details of his life, but do it in a way that you yourself find interesting. (If you choose a story path coldly and logically but it does not really fascinate you, then it is almost guaranteed to be a labor to write and probably dull to read as well.)

I've done a number of twist-the-truth biographies. One of the most straightforward is Samuel Johnson. The most personalized (first-person "autobiography") is Patrick Henry. What these articles do is take real biographical facts (like Henry's "give me liberty or give me death" speech) and exaggerate them, often in silly ways; they also mix in completely fictional stuff (like Henry's youthful gun-running). However, I always recommend trying to find elements of unity in both the real and the fictional facets of the story. Sometimes something you write in the first paragraph of an article surfaces later and becomes a major incident in the character's life -- that's another good way of making an article seem connected and cohesive. Sometimes you can identify (or create!) a lifelong interest or obsession which can resurface again and again at various times in the character's story -- Carver's painting might be a good example. Or his deep and perhaps literalist Christianity.

Anyway, I'm sounding very bossy and authoritarian here, I think. You are a skillful and aware writer, and I think you can find your own ways to make the article more satirical and funny. Good luck! ----OEJ 15:14, 23 May 2008 (UTC)