The plan for today was to do a new Author Spotlight. But, since in the last 24 hours my last Author Spotlight managed to get accused of plagarism and then admit to it…well, I just feel like sighing.
If you somehow missed this - and, if so, I can only assume you don’t own a television or read a paper - the story goes like this:
1. Kaavya Viswanathan, a then-Feshman at Harvard, got a six-figure two-book contract. Her debut - How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life - came out in March 2006.
2. I’ve been waiting for this book and did an Author Spotlight on it here. Thanks to the blog entry, I’ve gotten some unbelievable number of hits from people looking for Kaavya Viswanathan on various search engines. Just so we’re clear - I don’t know her. So, those people who emailed me to ask me how Viswanathan was taking all this? Uh, really, I swear I don’t actually know her. I only know about her and her story thanks to the glories of the internet and newspapers. That’s it. No secret code here.
3. The Harvard Crimson came out with a story saying Viswanathan had been accused of plagarism (Article #1). That was Sunday.
4. By Monday at 6:00 p.m. The Harvard Crimson’s report changed (Article #2). Now it said Viswanathan’s publisher was “certain” passages were borrowed.
Publishing giant Random House is “certain” that a novel by Kaavya Viswanathan ’08 contains “literal copying” from its own author’s works, according to a letter obtained by The Crimson.
“We are continuing to investigate this matter, but, given the alarming similarities in the language, structure and characters already found in these works, we are certain that some literal copying actually occurred here,” Min Jung Lee, the assistant general counsel of Random House, wrote in an April 22 letter to Carol Ross, the general counsel of Little, Brown, which released Viswanathan’s debut novel “How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life” this month.
5. By 7:32 p.m. on Monday, Viswanathan made an admission. The Harvard Crimson article (Article #3) this time announced that Viswanathan had apologized for “unintentional errors.”
“When I was in high school, I read and loved two wonderful novels by Megan McCafferty, ‘Sloppy Firsts’ and ‘Second Helpings,’ which spoke to me in a way few other books did. Recently, I was very surprised and upset to learn that there are similarities between some passages in my novel, ‘How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life,’ and passages in these books.
“While the central stories of my book and hers are completely different, I wasn’t aware of how much I may have internalized Ms. McCafferty’s words. I am a huge fan of her work and can honestly say that any phrasing similarities between her works and mine were completely unintentional and unconscious. My publisher and I plan to revise my novel for future printings to eliminate any inappropriate similarities.
“I sincerely apologize to Megan McCafferty and to any who feel they have been misled by these unintentional errors on my part.”
6. Over 500 additional blog hits later, I still don’t know this young woman. I now know she “borrowed” parts of her work from another author’s work. This makes me sad. It’s scary. It’s bad for writers, readers, booksellers and publishers. I’m also guessing that those of us turning in books soon will go through each line and panic that we “inadvertently borrowed” it from a book we read years ago and then buried the memory deep in our subconscious.
I wonder how Viswanathan’s finals are going.
I wonder if Megan McCafferty got a six-figure deal for her debut.
Again, I sigh.
UPDATE via PW:
An apology by Kaavya Viswanaathan, author of How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life and a promise by publisher Little, Brown to immediately begin revising sections of Viswanaathan’s book that closely resembled portions of author Megan McCafferty’s Sloppy Firsts and Second Helpings will not be enough to end the dispute over Viswanaathan’s “unintentional” copying from McCafferty’s work.
While McCafferty publisher Crown is expected to issue more details about the issue later today, Random House spokesperson Stuart Applebaum called Viswanaathan’s explanation about how she came to use passages from McCafferty “at best disingenuous and at worst literary identity theft.” He noted that there are approximately 40 cases where Opal mirrors passages from McCafferty’s works. Although Applebaum declined to comment if Random will file a lawsuit against Viswanaathan, he said “Crown and Random House support our author in seeking a proper and full resolution to this matter.” McCafferty is one of Crown/Random’s rising stars. After releasing her first two books as trade paperbacks, Crown/Three Rivers has just published Charmed Thirds in hardcover. There are about 350,000 copies in print of the three books.
More sighing…
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Go visit http://pbackwriter.blogspot.com/. She has a link to an iinteresting commentary abou this subject. I think it’s at the end of the today’s entry.
by Sandy L April 25th, 2006 at 8:11 amOh wait, the link is in the comments section. Please someone, get me more caffeine!
by Sandy L April 25th, 2006 at 8:12 am(((hugs)))
by Jordan April 25th, 2006 at 12:49 pmCopied from a snarky blog, but I loved the analogy so much, I figured I’d paste it here!
Note the current number of close matches is up to 29!
by Walt April 25th, 2006 at 12:59 pmIt’s actually up to 40. I just posted an update. Apparently the other publisher is not accepting the apology and moving on…
by HelenKay April 25th, 2006 at 1:44 pmI just finished watching Nightline, and their take was “hey, don’t blame the poor little teenager, it’s a time-honored Harvard tradition” and they proceeded to list the Harvard alumni/professors accused of “internalizing” the work of others. I’m hoping they were going for the tongue-in-cheek approach, but what a novel defense. *g*
After reading the first couple of passages mentioned, I thought perhaps it was shaping up to be a witch hunt. There’s a certain commonality of language that’s going to be shared by those of an age/background/lifestyle. But then I read a couple more, and then read her statement, and I sighed, too.
And it astounds me people think they’ll get away with it.
by Shannon April 25th, 2006 at 11:21 pmIn the future, there’ll be some repository of knowledge where an editor can input a Word file and out pops all the previous references.
Hey, if the number of “internalizations” hits 100, will she be invited to be on Oprah’s show??
by Walt April 26th, 2006 at 11:29 pm[...] As noted in my sidebar, a couple of bloggers I read already had posts up about this, describing some of the news events of this case. The Harvard Independent, the newspaper on the campus where Viswanathan still attends, is covering the case pretty closely and has an interesting update. While the summary of the Indy’s can be referenced here, the latest article has some insight worth reading. [...]
by Cuppacafe » Blog Archive » It’s all in the packaging April 27th, 2006 at 11:00 amNot sure if you’ve seen this already, but apparently there are “similarities” to at least two other books:
http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=513213
by Alyssa May 2nd, 2006 at 12:57 pm