Idiomatic Python compared

[snippsat]

But is it a strongly held sense of the pythonic community that long methods or functions are a *code smell* ?

Yes,in general should avoid long function/method.
Do one thing well in a function/method is usually a good advice.
Many of us have pointed this and given refactoring advice numerous of times,
when people here have posted like 30+ up 300 lines in one function.