The NST reported today that its group editor Brendan Pereira had resigned. According to some, it is because of a plagiarised article written by Mr Pereira.
While I do not weep for, nor rejoice in, Mr Pereira's resignation, (and I actually got into a debate with Rocky's Bru's owner and his commentators because of bigger issues of Dr Mahathir and journalistic bias, rather than to defend this Brendan Pereira chap who is a spin-doctor, people I don't like;) I am concerned about the application of this 'plagiarism' concept.
If applied too broadly, it would suffocate the creativity of writers - one manifestation of which is to creatively mimic or imitate the style and spirit of another's writing, perhaps because the imitator wishes to borrow the same frame of mind/ethos generated by the imitated writing. That might not be very 'original', but it's a way to be creative, nonetheless.
Besides, if we were to give credit too all literary styles we have borrowed, then our writings would be so heavily annotated as to be not feasible to write in the end. After all, which living writer is not influenced by past literary masters?
To me, Mitch Albom's article about how the world changed since 9/11 conveys a particular 'state of mind' or 'mood'. Maybe, Mr Pereira wanted to borrow that 'state of mind' or 'mood' when he wrote about Dr M's attack on Abdullah, that's why Albom's literary style and expressions were borrowed. (Whether the 'borrowing' was successful in conjuring the same 'mood' or not is a different question.)
Rocky Bru's evaluation was, "Some say imitation is the greatest form of flattery. I call this plagiarism."
He did not offer SPECIFICS as to why is plagiarism, and how to differentiate between plagiarism (especially when it is applied in the context of creative writings, not academic research) and imitation (acceptable).
That's what worries me.
While I'm not knowledgeable enough to explain or enumerate what constitutes unacceptable plagiarism and acceptable imitation/mimicry, I just hope we remember that there is a difference between the 2 concepts - which neither Rocky's Bru nor Screenshots (who began the charge) bothered to explain.
Like the concept of 'sedition' under Malaysian laws, I personally felt that this concept of plagiarism has been applied quite bluntly in this case by Mr Pereira's personal foe, ie. turned into an offensive weapon, rather than purely out of respect for journalistic integrity.
I just hope we bear in mind that there is a need for a careful distinction between the 2 concepts, and for a more sophisticated appreciation of literary styles and creative writing. The following is one perspective.
----------------------------------------
NWP Publications
The Quarterly Fall 2002
Creative Copying, or in Defense of Mimicry
By Rebecca Dierking
http://www.writingproject.org/cs/nwpp/print/nwpr/448
"...First, the difference between mimicry and plagiarism is intent. The student who takes information from a source and says, “Hey, this is my stuff. I am sole possessor of this knowledge” is plagiarizing. He has stolen the work of another—usually research, facts and figures—and has published that information as his own.
Mimicking, on the other hand, is deliberate as well, but the intent is not to say, “Hey, this is my own work” but rather to say, “Hey, Williams is an awesome poet, so I’m going to try to write like him in a few poems and eventually maybe some of it will rub off on me and be a natural element of my writing style.”
...And even professional writers subconsciously (or consciously) are guided by the writing of other professionals they admire... Writers reflect (insert “mimic”) their reading material.
So why is mimicry okay? It’s acceptable because the writer is integrating into his own writing elements of the style of another writer that he admires. His goal is to make his writing better. He would not mimic a bad writer; he mimics those writers who are making an impact on him personally or who are achieving a style he finds worthy.
Mimicking, unlike plagiarizing, is an approach by which the author tries to better himself, to become more skilled. Just as a student musician is influenced by the playing or composing style of those he admires, a student writer is also influenced by other writers.
..I think it is important that these young writers understand that writers have always drawn on the work of other writers. Shakespeare himself stole plots from mythology, history, and even his contemporaries. No one seems offended by these borrowings. Rather, we are awed by his ability to transform the mundane into the sublime.
...but in creative writing there are somewhat different rules. You can’t take someone else’s words and use them as your own; that’ll still get you in trouble. However, if you use their idea or technique to improve your own, it’s okay.”
--------------------------------------------
While I do not weep for, nor rejoice in, Mr Pereira's resignation, (and I actually got into a debate with Rocky's Bru's owner and his commentators because of bigger issues of Dr Mahathir and journalistic bias, rather than to defend this Brendan Pereira chap who is a spin-doctor, people I don't like;) I am concerned about the application of this 'plagiarism' concept.
If applied too broadly, it would suffocate the creativity of writers - one manifestation of which is to creatively mimic or imitate the style and spirit of another's writing, perhaps because the imitator wishes to borrow the same frame of mind/ethos generated by the imitated writing. That might not be very 'original', but it's a way to be creative, nonetheless.
Besides, if we were to give credit too all literary styles we have borrowed, then our writings would be so heavily annotated as to be not feasible to write in the end. After all, which living writer is not influenced by past literary masters?
To me, Mitch Albom's article about how the world changed since 9/11 conveys a particular 'state of mind' or 'mood'. Maybe, Mr Pereira wanted to borrow that 'state of mind' or 'mood' when he wrote about Dr M's attack on Abdullah, that's why Albom's literary style and expressions were borrowed. (Whether the 'borrowing' was successful in conjuring the same 'mood' or not is a different question.)
Rocky Bru's evaluation was, "Some say imitation is the greatest form of flattery. I call this plagiarism."
He did not offer SPECIFICS as to why is plagiarism, and how to differentiate between plagiarism (especially when it is applied in the context of creative writings, not academic research) and imitation (acceptable).
That's what worries me.
While I'm not knowledgeable enough to explain or enumerate what constitutes unacceptable plagiarism and acceptable imitation/mimicry, I just hope we remember that there is a difference between the 2 concepts - which neither Rocky's Bru nor Screenshots (who began the charge) bothered to explain.
Like the concept of 'sedition' under Malaysian laws, I personally felt that this concept of plagiarism has been applied quite bluntly in this case by Mr Pereira's personal foe, ie. turned into an offensive weapon, rather than purely out of respect for journalistic integrity.
I just hope we bear in mind that there is a need for a careful distinction between the 2 concepts, and for a more sophisticated appreciation of literary styles and creative writing. The following is one perspective.
----------------------------------------
NWP Publications
The Quarterly Fall 2002
Creative Copying, or in Defense of Mimicry
By Rebecca Dierking
http://www.writingproject.org/cs/nwpp/print/nwpr/448
"...First, the difference between mimicry and plagiarism is intent. The student who takes information from a source and says, “Hey, this is my stuff. I am sole possessor of this knowledge” is plagiarizing. He has stolen the work of another—usually research, facts and figures—and has published that information as his own.
Mimicking, on the other hand, is deliberate as well, but the intent is not to say, “Hey, this is my own work” but rather to say, “Hey, Williams is an awesome poet, so I’m going to try to write like him in a few poems and eventually maybe some of it will rub off on me and be a natural element of my writing style.”
...And even professional writers subconsciously (or consciously) are guided by the writing of other professionals they admire... Writers reflect (insert “mimic”) their reading material.
So why is mimicry okay? It’s acceptable because the writer is integrating into his own writing elements of the style of another writer that he admires. His goal is to make his writing better. He would not mimic a bad writer; he mimics those writers who are making an impact on him personally or who are achieving a style he finds worthy.
Mimicking, unlike plagiarizing, is an approach by which the author tries to better himself, to become more skilled. Just as a student musician is influenced by the playing or composing style of those he admires, a student writer is also influenced by other writers.
..I think it is important that these young writers understand that writers have always drawn on the work of other writers. Shakespeare himself stole plots from mythology, history, and even his contemporaries. No one seems offended by these borrowings. Rather, we are awed by his ability to transform the mundane into the sublime.
...but in creative writing there are somewhat different rules. You can’t take someone else’s words and use them as your own; that’ll still get you in trouble. However, if you use their idea or technique to improve your own, it’s okay.”
--------------------------------------------
10 comments:
If it's mimicry, Brendan should have prefaced his commentary with a note to say his piece is ala Mitch.
If no one had pointed out the similarity between the two works, then some of us would clap-clap and say "terror-la brendan wa so good la". That's the test for plagiarize. And Brendan? He's the group editor, good grief.
We are not talking about copyright infringement here. Faham?
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/plagiarizing
It's not copyright infringement, yes, but it's also not academic writing. My question is, whether the same standard should apply to CREATIVE writings. The term 'plagiarism' is commonly used in the context of ACADEMIC, SCHOLARLY works, and these bloggers have not shown how it should be applied in a different context of creative writings.
In other words, is it wrong to copy in CREATIVE writings?
So, for people to apply the ACADEMIC definition of plagiarism is to miss my point.
One interesting question is, what if BP has copied the styles of MANY writers, not just Mitch's. So far, Jeff Ooi has only managed to find out that BP copied MA's style, but that doesn't mean BP didn't copy others'.
Now, if BP copied others', then, based on your logic, he would have to attribute to those others AS WELL. Now, what if he has copied not 10, but 50? 100?? Would he have to "preface his commentary with a note to say his piece is ala" these 50/100 authors? Wouldn't that make literary, creative writings a burdensome task?
And if we make your idea that people must attribute a RULE, it would mean that any failure to attribute would be WRONG. Which means, before ANYBODY can publish ANY writing, s/he would have to make sure she has:
1, read ALL WRITINGS EVER written by writers before her, and
2, made the CORRECT attribution with SPECIFIC references to SPECIFIC expressions used by a particular writer before this.
So, while it only took 2 hours to write her piece, she would have to spend at least 2 days/weeks (MONTHS, for new/young writers??!!) in the library to dig out all the books which has ever inspired her before, and to find the exact PAGE, among the 200 page novel, where a particular expression has been used before.
Would she have to also research into whether a particular style used by author X was actually a modification author Y's previous style, or a mixture or cross-fertilisation of author Y's, Z's and ABC's styles???
Because when it's a RULE, non-compliance with the RULE makes it a WRONG. So, she MUST be COMPREHENSIVE.
And then, her writing would read something like this:
----------------------------
"ONCE UPON A TIME, [ala Aesop, Grimm's Brothers and Andersen, page 1 of The Lion and the Fox (123 AD), page 1 of Snow White (1879), page 1 of The Mermaid (1898), respectively; later modified by Stephen King in page 2 of The CLowns (1996), JK Rowling in page 2 of Harry Porter - The Sorceror's Stone (1999)...] WHEN THE STARS WERE ALIGNED [ala Copernicus, page 4, Mystery of the Universe (1456); Gallileo, page 41, ALignment of Stars (1502); Lim Tsu Xiang, page 8, Fei Hua Lien Pien or Useless Speech (678 AD, Tang Dynasty), page 69, Ibn Khaldun, Al-what-awar al-don-no al-justu Mach (1001 AD)], I FELL IN LOVE WITH THIS LADY (OMG!!!!! ala Shakespeare, in Act 1 scene 4 verse 19 of Love's Labour Lost (1600); Act 2 scene 3 verse 9, Romeo and Juliet (1601); Act 2 scene 3 verse 9, Mid-Summer Night's Dream (1601); Act 2 scene 3 verse 9, Romeo and Juliet (1601); Act 1 scene 1 verse 91, Twelfth Night (1602); Jane Austen, page 78, Pride and Prejudice (1789); page 123, Emma (1790), page 145, Sense and Sensibility (1791); Charles Dickens!!!
(what?!?! only charles dickens?! there are, like, 150 years more of attributions to go!!! Man, I think I better give up writing love stories then, since it's such a popular genre, so many zillions of authors have written on it...
hang on, but then that's not much difference for the suspense genre either... maybe horror? detective? well, not zillions, but at least a million also... sigh...
i know what i should do already - GIVE UP CREATIVE WRITING and become a full time academic!! at least, you have LESS attributions to make for academic research papers!!!!!
------------------------------
If that was a RULE, soon, all creative writings would look like a thick PhD Dissertation (or worse!! because there has been SO MANY authors in recorded history, around the world!!), and 90% of the pages are taken up for 'attributions' and 'footnotes'.
It's a question of PRATICALITY, ultimately. So, it's enough to just criticise him of not being original enough. If heads have to roll and punishments meted out, IMHO, you can say goodbye to literature/creative writings as we know it...
Like me I'm sure there are others who have felt uncomfortable on the undisguised glee shown for Brendan's discomfiture. It took someone like you to give 'voice' to that. Despite the divergence of opinion which can never be bridged even after a lifetime of argument, there is only a fine line between the stance that you have taken and that of the others. It all depends on one's own prejudices and preconceived opinion of the protagonist/s.
As for myself, (I do not know Brendan or how he even looks like) I tend to agree with your premise on this issue.
The Malaysian,
1, 'undisguised glee' - looks like mob rule to me... the orgy of attacks on this BP chap is just madness.
2, give 'voice' - just trying to put some sanity into it. but i'm not that clear about the whole concept either, just trying to ask questions.
3, 'fine line' and 'subjective' - i agree it's a fine distinction, but we all might learn something if we think thru the concept collectively.
n there's a reason y people don't want to do that - because they have already adopted THEIR position, have THEIR own agenda, so it's no longer open to debate.
interesting enough, a blogger has uncovered that even Albom himself had been accused of Plagiarism.
Tuesday, May 17, 2005
Albom inquiry under fire
http://www.detnews.com/2005/metro/0505/18/B01-184092.htm
i think it just shows how undesirable it is to apply that concept in the context of creative writings.
4, i'm glad that u tend to agree with my premise on this issue, but i just want to say that getting people to agree with me is not my aim, (voicing my views is enough satisfaction) though it's a bonus.
5, it's interesting that u saw it fit to distance yourself from BP. some have suspected that i was 'the plagiariser himself'!! it's a very peculiarly malaysian habit. to them, the whole world seems to be run by conspiracy theorists. how mature.
good day.
h juslo:
I came here after re-reading your comments ( a minority!) at RockyBru's, and I can appreciate the position you have taken. Independently I had also debated this "plagiarism" issue at my own blog -- and I said it was a close call like 50-50 evenly split. And doing a solomon?, I said many bloggers (I did too) had emailed Mitch Albom himself and wished for a response as to how he "views" the case involving Brendan Pereira.
PS: AS asides, take it from someone in the 4th estate that Rocky and Jeff (even AKJ though more subtle and hence less discernible) writes on anything to do with NST, Kali and Brendan must be read with large doses of salt. Clearly they already have prejudiced premises (my educated guess becos of largesse flowing from the olde regime?...) I'd better rest my case in case one M. Chang comes on board ...if you catch my drift. This closing may show my inclination/perjudice, so I admit I'm as fallible as the sext scribe.
desiderata,
welcome, my rare visitor (every visitor is rare, haha). thanks for the comments.
first, agree with your comments about Rocky and Jeff (seldom read AKJ). that's the impression i got too - sore losers, sour grapes. the level at which they conduct their battle with NST/current regime shows that they r very personal. in my book, that's the same as IMMATURE.
i've taken a look at your thoughts posted on your blog. but i disagree with your reasoning about recklessness; although, i don't really care about people's 'verdicts' so long as their reasonings i can agree with.
"My own verdict on Brendan's endeavour is that he's guilty of recklessness in failing to at least say "I'm inspired by Mitch Albom's write etc, etc ....". On the charge of Plagiarism, it's a dicey decision at best, which means I sit on the fence, and return a "hung" verdict."
here's my further thoughts on this issue:
http://www.aisehman.org/archives/2006/11/you_cant_miss_i.html#comments
i'm reposting some of my comments here mainly for my own record. for your consideration, if u care to read.
ciao!!
---------------------------------
Aisehman,
"But lifting the sections I mentioned nearly word for word?"
There's a concept of 'fair use'. You use bits and pieces (but not all or substantial) of another's work, and mould your own work based on it. That's acceptable, even in american copyright LAW. So, it's acceptable to borrow bits and pieces.
- I don't know about Malaysian LAW;
- I don't know if 'fair use' should be applied in the context of 'borrowing' styles, but my point is exactly that we need to take a more WIDE-RANGING, IN-DEPTH look at the matter. It's not that simple - and it shouldn't be.
Attributing source - agree that it would have been BETTER if he did, but the question now is whether it's WRONG if he didn't. In other words, whether it SHOULD BE/IS a RULE that,
- in CREATIVE WRITINGS (not academic, factual), and
- when borrowing LITERARY STYLES, STRUCTURES and EXPRESSIONS,
attribution MUST (instead of 'should') be made.
I DON'T have an answer to that myself - I think it's not that well-defined, (maybe because people don't bother about literary borrowings/'plagiarism' that much because it's not copyright infringement, people (especially lawyers) can't make much money on it.)
Which means to a large extent, it has to be a POLICY question - what would be the PRACTICAL EFFECT if we make this a rule.
My worry is, it would make creative writings a burdensome task, just like academic writings - where people have to follow a thick 'handbook' to pepper their writings with FOOTNOTES attributing their 'inspirations' and 'influences'.
Again, ALL writers have been influenced by literary masters (and minnows too!!) of the past, so it's almost impossible to come up with totally 'original' writings, and therefore ALL writings would have to be 'attributed'.
That would be suffocating.
True, copying/imitating/less than original is NO GOOD, but we have to be PROPORTIONATE in our disapproval. Many literary critics earn their livings by analysing whether certain literary styles/expressions have been borrowed or applied WELL/CREATIVELY. If not, (like BP's piece,) just condemn it as UNORIGINAL, POOR IMITATION, CHEAP.
But PLAGIARISM?? Heads have to roll?? That's a bit too strong, and scary to me...
Posted by: Juslo at November 3, 2006 04:43 PM
If I may just jam your page with another point?
One interesting question is, what if BP has copied the styles of MANY writers, not just Mitch's? So far, Jeff Ooi & Co. have only managed to dig out that BP has copied MA's style, but that doesn't mean BP didn't copy others'. There might be more.
Now, if BP copied others', then, based on 'The Attribution RULE', BP would have to attribute to those others AS WELL. Now, what if he has copied not 10, but 50? 100?? Would he have to preface his commentary with a note to say his piece is ala these 50/100 authors? Wouldn't that make literary, creative writings a very burdensome task?
And if it becomes a RULE, it would mean that any failure to attribute would be WRONG. Which means, before ANYBODY can publish ANY writing, s/he would have to make sure she has:
1, read ALL WRITINGS EVER written by writers before her, and
2, made the CORRECT attribution with SPECIFIC references to SPECIFIC expressions used by a particular writer before this.
So, while it only took 2 hours to write her piece, she would have to spend at least 2 days/weeks (MONTHS, for new/young writers??!!) in the library to dig out all the books which has ever inspired her before, and to find the exact PAGE, among the 200 page novel, where a particular expression has been used before.
Would she have to also research into whether a particular style used by author X was actually a modification author Y's previous style, or a mixture or cross-fertilisation of author Y's, Z's and ABC's styles??? How about looking into other creative mediums as well, such as screenplays for films, theatres, radio plays, and even paintings??
Why NOT?? (because 'stealing' comes in many forms and sources, right??) and WHERE does it STOP???????
Because when it's a RULE, non-compliance with the RULE makes it a WRONG. So, the author MUST be COMPREHENSIVE.
And then, her writing would read something like this:
----------------------------
"ONCE UPON A TIME, [ala Aesop, Grimm's Brothers and Andersen, page 1 of The Lion and the Fox (123 AD), page 1 of Snow White (1879), page 1 of The Mermaid (1898), respectively; later modified by Stephen King in page 2 of The CLowns (1996), JK Rowling in page 2 of Harry Porter - The Sorceror's Stone (1999)...] WHEN THE STARS WERE ALIGNED [ala Copernicus, page 4, Mystery of the Universe (1456); Gallileo, page 41, ALignment of Stars (1502); Lim Tsu Xiang, page 8, Fei Hua Lien Pien or Useless Speech (678 AD, Tang Dynasty), page 69, Ibn Khaldun, Al-what-awar al-don-no al-justu Mach (1001 AD)], I FELL IN LOVE WITH THIS LADY (OMG!!!!! ala Shakespeare, in Act 1 scene 4 verse 19 of Love's Labour Lost (1600); Act 2 scene 3 verse 9, Romeo and Juliet (1601); Act 2 scene 3 verse 9, Mid-Summer Night's Dream (1601); Act 2 scene 3 verse 9, Romeo and Juliet (1601); Act 1 scene 1 verse 91, Twelfth Night (1602); Jane Austen, page 78, Pride and Prejudice (1789); page 123, Emma (1790), page 145, Sense and Sensibility (1791); Charles Dickens!!!
(what?!?! only charles dickens?! there are, like, 150 years more of attributions to go!!! Man, I think I better give up writing love stories then, since it's such a popular genre, so many zillions of authors have written on it...
hang on, but then that's not much difference for the suspense genre either... maybe horror? detective? well, not zillions, but at least a million also... sigh...
i know what i should do already - GIVE UP CREATIVE WRITING and become a full time academic!! at least, you have LESS attributions to make for academic research papers!!!!!
- And that's only for THREE sentences...
------------------------------
If that was a RULE, soon, all creative writings would look like a thick PhD Dissertation (or worse!! because there has been SO MANY authors in recorded history, around the world!!), and 90% of the pages are taken up for 'attributions' and 'footnotes'.
I'm exaggerating, I know. But the point is, sometimes there are good reasons why certain ideas should not become 'rule', and this is a good example.
To me, it's a question of PRATICALITY, ultimately. So, it's enough to just criticise him of not being original enough. If heads have to roll and punishments meted out, IMHO, you can say goodbye to literature/creative writings as we know it...
Just my humble opinion...
Posted by: Juslo at November 4, 2006 09:02 AM
Poor juslo, he had just brought this debate to a ridiculous level! If I were the blog owner I wouldn't even publish and let such silly arguments tarnish my blog.
But in a way it's good to expose people (or people's thinking) for what they really are...
Of course there are universally accepted phrases: like the one I used earlier "until the cows come home"; "at the end of the day"; once upon a time; "don't take any skin of my nose"; don't make an iota of difference";"in any case...
Go back read brendan's article - are we talking about such phrases??
And why should albom bother to response? It wasn't him who did the stealing.
And it doesn't matter who or which paper commit the crime - a case of WHAT and not WHO is right or wrong - which incidentally is another universally accepted phrase which I don't need to attribute to anyone, vous comprende?
The same goes to "crime doesn't pay"...need I go on?
Posted by: adam at November 4, 2006 01:18 PM
to my friend adam, at November 4, 2006 01:18 PM:
"Of course there are universally accepted phrases... Go back read brendan's article - are we talking about such phrases??
The same goes to "crime doesn't pay"...need I go on?"
i'm afraid if u want to make attribution a RULE, u WILL HAVE TO GO ON.
u, or some 'Board of Universally Accepted Prahses', would have to be set up n publish a handbook to AUTHORITATIVELY LIST DOWN which is/not "Universally Accepted Prahses", for ALL writers to check.
then, u'll also have the question of WHO is qualified to determine what is/not a "Universally Accepted Prahse"? we'll have a whole profession debating on that.
"vous comprende?"
non, je suis desole, je ne comprends pas. parlez-vous anglais? merci beaucoup.
("no, i'm sorry, i don't understand. can u speak english? thanks a lot.")
http://www.french-at-a-touch.com/Words-Phrases/basic_phrases_links.htm
"Vous avez des origines françaises? Pourquoi pas une descendance française?"
("Do you have any French in you? Would you like some?")
http://yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au/~mongoose/french/romance.html
p.s. i can see that throwing a few french phrases around "had just brought this debate to a higher level! If I were the blog owner I would definitely publish and let such brilliant arguments elevate my blog."
--OOOOPPPSSS!! i nearly forgot to attribute!!!! (don't want my head to b chopped off now, do i??)
the above sentence is ala adam, at November 4, 2006 01:18 PM, http://www.aisehman.org/archives/2006/11/you_cant_miss_i.html
(oh, hang on - is that sentence comprised of 'unversally accepted phrases'?? it's a shame that mr adam's latest 'Handbook of Universally Accepted Prahses' has not been published yet...
;P
Posted by: juslo at November 7, 2006 10:18 AM
juslo:
I re-visited here Dec 1, 2006 which being the lust month's dawn, Desi feels a li'l poetic after re-visit by mGf dreamerI!
I apreciate your re-postings as originally flagged at aisehman; it educates those in the writing field like Desi (earning B&B for some 3 decades now!), so I think it's all worth your "rare" efforts.
I urge that you Post more often?
I know time is always a constraint but my finding at Blogsworld is that hardly 10% writes are worth more than a glance of the first paragraph. Just my 3sen's assessment and I hope none of your "rare" readeres come over to Desi's Place to "flame" or demolish my BIG abode (BIG as opposed to Datuk Z' small house of 4 storeys!:)
Cheers, Happy Blogging!
hey desiderata,
no no - don't think what i said could be considered 'educating', just exchanging ideas here.
n my ideas r really just work-in-progress, still trying to ask questions mostly, rather than giving answers.
n thanks for the encouragement. i wished i could blog more often too, but really, at the moment, i don't have much to say which is different from what has already been said by others.
if i have any new post, i'll come to your/other blogs to make comments accompanied by a link to my name. (ie. if no 'link' to my name, it means there's nothing new.)
ps - no comment about the '10%,first paragraph' point... ;P
imagine if Oasis or Quentin Tarantino would have to make an 'acknowledgement' note somewhere in their works EVERYTIME they borrowed/stole someone else's style.
it would b very impractical, n therefore i think it shouldn't b a requirement that u must acknowledge your inspirations.
T. S. Eliot didn’t do it. so, it shouldn't b wrong for other writers not to do it.
(no intention of engaging in a debate here, just to let u have the article n tell u my humble view.)
ciao.
------------------------------
January 10, 2007
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1055-2538011,00.html
Beg, steal or borrow — but can you do it better?
Michael Gove
It’s a pity that T. S. Eliot didn’t live to hear the new top 40 on Sunday evening. Or watch Kill Bill on BBC One, later the same night. While it’s hard to imagine the American émigré, ardent royalist, High Tory, Anglo-Catholic critic and poet who passed away 40 years ago thrilling to Eric Prydz’s remix of the Pink Floyd classic Another Brick in the Wall, or luxuriating in the epic flow of blood unleashed by Uma Thurman’s samurai swordplay, he would have appreciated what they were up to.
Eliot, as a biography by Craig Raine out this month reminds us, was, in poetic terms, a creator of mosaics as much as a painter of new canvases. Much of his poetry, including his masterpiece The Waste Land, involved the rearrangement of existing material, the weaving of echoes and influences, to create something new out of something borrowed.
And that, in their very different ways, was what Eric Prydz and Quentin Tarantino did. For both of their works rely on reworking other artists’ originality — Prydz manifestly stands on the shoulders of Roger Waters, while Tarantino’s film borrows massively from the library of several Japanese directors.
Eliot, in his own fashion, acknowledged the debt that his poetry owed to others. In his essay on the English dramatist Philip Massinger Eliot argued: “Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal.” And even that acknowledgement was itself a piece of literary larceny. As Raine points out, Eliot lifted the thought from an essay by George Saintsbury on Laurence Sterne, where Saintsbury had written: “When a man of genius steals, he always makes the thefts his own.”
And yet, despite the sanction of Eliot and Saintsbury, the accusation that an artist has plundered his ideas from others still carries a toxic charge. In his novel Atonement, Ian McEwan made extensive use of the writer Lucilla Andrews’s memoirs of wartime nursing. When the scale of his debt was made public late last year, he was accused of outright plagiarism. Although a number of distinguished writers rode to McEwan’s defence, the allegation still hung in the air, with the suggestion lingering that somehow McEwan had been guilty of a sin against the Spirit of Art.
But as just one evening’s immersion in the BBC’s output demonstrates, modern culture is a carnival of creative borrowing. It’s not just Eric Prydz — much of contemporary dance music relies on sampling not just chords and riffs but huge chunks of other artists’ back catalogues. Even when the borrowing is less transparent, the debt can still be audible. The echoes of the Beatles are apparent in the work of Oasis, and the influence of the Kinks on Blur is equally notable.
In cinema, there are few directors who reference other works quite as devotedly as Tarantino, but as the recent releases of films as diverse as Starsky & Hutch and Poseidon show, our Quentin is not the only Hollywood figure quarrying the Seventies for inspiration.
So why, when there is so much creative plundering going on, does the allegation of plagiarism still have the capacity to taint an artist? Perhaps because our aesthetic antennae twitch with irritation when the only flash of inspiration in a work comes from another’s hand. What should matter is not how much is borrowed, but how much is added.
The problem with Kill Bill is not that Tarantino obviously enjoys Japanese cinema, but that all he produces is a pallid, shlocky Hollywood version of the genre, a vulgar pastiche. Claiming originality for Kill Bill, next to the films from which it borrows, is like lauding Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas as a worthy successor to the Colosseum.
The superiority of Blur over Oasis, a superiority underlined by Damon Albarn’s continuing creativity, while the Gallagher brothers rest on their royalties, lay in Blur’s subtle capturing of the inspiration of past bands, in contrast to Oasis’s cruder appropriation of pubby nostalgia.
In that context we can see that, even if Ian McEwan did lift whole chunks from Lucilla Andrews’s memoirs, this borrowing was then embedded in a wholly original, and wholly impressive, new novel. In a similar way, even though The Waste Land is pregnant with the echoes of other writers, no art before achieved an effect quite like it.
Which is why I’d urge anyone tiring of the creative cannibalism that characterises modern popular culture to turn to Eliot — to appreciate how a real genius uses the work of others. Eliot respected the tradition he worked in so much that he took the greatest care to fashion something even better from it. It was a desire to honour the past, not exploit it, to tend the graves of dead artists, not rob them, that inspired Eliot.
The heart of his success as an artistic innovator, therefore, rested on that temperamental conservatism that made him, in his personal life, a Royalist, an Anglican and Tory. I wonder if that’s a lesson Eric Prydz, Quentin Tarantino, or even Liam Gallagher, are yet ready to learn . . .
The repeated trials are very trying
Channel 4’s offshoot, More4, or as I’ve learnt to call it Michael Moore4, is trumpeting next week’s drama The Trial of Tony Blair at every available opportunity. The production, which is sold as a “satire”, rests on the premise that the Prime Minister, at some future point, might find himself arraigned before some international body for the “crime of aggression” he committed in invading Iraq.
The appetite for putting Mr Blair in the dock for having the temerity to remove a dictator still seems inexhaustible. Previous generations would be mystified. From our bombardment of the Danish fleet in 1806 to Churchill’s sinking of the French Navy at Mers el-Kebir in 1940, British Prime Ministers have been more than ready to take pre-emptive action to avert potential threats.
But rather than reflect on that lesson, those who shape our culture would rather vilify politicians who are prepared to take risks for our freedoms. And hours are devoted to discussing the rights and wrongs of Saddam Hussein’s death, while scarcely a moment is found to honour the memory of all those he slaughtered before he was toppled. It’s an attitude that is beyond satire.
Razor question
Many thanks to all those readers who suggested that the answer to my razor problems (having to replace not only the blades but the holder every few months to keep up with the manufacturer’s innovations) is to opt for an electric, rather than a wet, shave. But that kind suggestion begs another question. Which is more environmentally costly? Generating a mini-mountain of razor waste or using electricity to power my daily shave? No wonder David Bellamy and Bill Oddie have beards.
Michael Gove is Conservative MP for Surrey Heath
UPDATE:
apparently, this Brendan chap has written some of the followings, 'further evidence' of his plagiarist habit:
"In Pereira’s writings in The News Straits Times, 3 July 2006, titled “Life played out on a football pitch” against the original work of “Whatever it takes: In pursuit of the Perfect 10” published by CNN on 10 April 2006.
CNN.com
“Sports remain a great metaphor for life’s most difficult lessons. It was through athletics that many of us came to understand that fear can be tamed.; that on a team the whole is more than the sum of its parts; and that the ability to be heroic lies within. - Susan Casey, former managing editor of Sports Illustrated Women.”
Brenden Pereira
“SPORT remains a great metaphor for life’s most difficult lessons. It is through football that many of us came to understand that fear can be tamed; that for a team the whole is more than the sum of its parts; and that the ability to be heroic lies within.”
“ANGOLA - Greater Goal: Healing a War-Torn Land” written by Henning Mankell and published by National Geographic, June 2006.
Nationalgeographic.com
“But it is in the very nature of soccer to be unpredictable. If it were not the case that underdogs can sometimes defeat the predicted winners, soccer would be uninteresting.”
Brenden Pereira
“It is in the very nature of soccer to be unpredictable. If it were not the case that underdogs can sometimes defeat the predicted winners, soccer would be uninteresting. The same goes for life.”
"
http://bigdogdotcom.wordpress.com/2007/05/03/the-serial-plagiarist/
http://malaysia-today.net/blog2006/index.php?itemid=4371
WORD BY WORD COPYING. to me, this IS plagiarism. lazy even - why copied everything? why not rephrase? i cant c why he should copy those sentences wholesale since they were not that great anyway.
but i still think his piece imitating mitch albom still does NOT count as plagiarism, bcos there's some creativity in weaving albom's words n expressions together, n he had rephrased/rearranged the original piece n so on. unlike that piece, the latest 'evidence' above is just blatant copying.
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