Monday, April 04, 2005

Plagiarism

This bothers me on so many levels. I was doing research, aka screwing around and looking up info on my favorite authors, when I came across something quite disturbing in Author A's bio. Her work had been plagiarized. More disturbing yet, it had been plagiarized by Author B. I grew up reading Author B's work. Fervently. And LONG before I even found Author A in the stacks. There were PAGES of Author A's work, verbatim, copied into Author B's book. A mental disturbance, I believe, was blamed. Author B was having rough times.
Okay.
I know you cannot copyright a CONCEPT. I also know that ideas will be regenerated and regurgitated ad nauseum until the market is flooded and bloated. Vampires? Yep. Loads of them. Witches? They'll have their turn. This is all fine and good.
But the thought of taking another author's words and inserting them into my own? *shuddering* It's like literary in vitro. And my mind is fertile enough as it is.
I was shocked by this. Both by the authors involved, and amazingly, by the concept. It has never crossed my mind. Thank God.
Grins*

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