LJ Idol, Week 30: "Involuntary Theft"

[dslartoo]

One of the really hellish things about being a voracious reader is that it invariably colors your own writing whenever you put pen to paper yourself

Comments

[pixiebelle]

They say it's so easy to forget something you read, but still accidentally steal it. It's still there, in the back of your mind... and it comes to you like it's your own idea. That thought worries me as I write too.

I do read books in my genre though, just because I that's what I enjoy reading as well as writing.

[dslartoo]

I don't think that I could ever quit reading the stuff I enjoy. I just get too much pleasure from it, even if I do involuntarily crib from it once in a while. The point is to be interesting and unique in execution, then I don't mind being derivative. :)

Thanks for coming by!

cheers,
Phil

[jem0000000]

Nothing I write is original. I've given up worrying about it. :)

[dslartoo]

Heh, that's definitely one way to deal with things! Thanks for coming by. :)

cheers,
Phil

[jem0000000]

You're welcome. :)

[ellakite]

When I find the time, I'm going to post a piece which states unequivacobly that at least one of the "Greatest Writers of All Time" was an unabashed plaigarist.

So you're in damned fine company! ;)

And I know my own works are derivative... but as long as I bring something new to each piece, put my own personal spin on things, I can hold my head high. I hope you can do the same.

[dslartoo]

I suspect this may actually be rather a more prevalent thing in the field than I might think. It really is involuntary, as a few other commenters have noted too.

I do hold my head high because I know that I'm always doing my damnedest to create good, interesting, my-own-spin work, and I never *consciously, deliberately* crib from anyone else. Just a word or two creeps in now and again.

Thanks for dropping by!

cheers,
Phil

[halfshellvenus]

Funny, I've shared two fandoms with another writer who has this same problem. She usually avoids reading other fanfic while writing her own, but every now and then it still happens-- one of the really specific character-showing details from one of my stories ended up in one of hers, same fandom. She calls it the "magpie" problem, and what she hates about it-- just as you do-- is that the remembered things seem like they've risen up as original things. Just enough memory to register the idea subconsciously, but not enough to file the source and context with it.

You might find this amusing: my son has always been a voracious reader-- lots of books, lots of genres. He has a little bit of photographic memory, but he doesn't have this problem (I don't think). But his Language Arts teacher gave him one of her Top Writer awards a few weeks back, and he was honestly baffled as to why. He reads so many books, by so many adult authors (some of them seasoned and truly gifted), that he has no concept at ALL of how other 12-year-olds write. He

[dslartoo]

"Magpie problem" -- I like that. Will have to remember it for later usage. Heh, there I go again. No, seriously, though, you definitely get what I mean, then -- using somebody else's work, even unconsciously, just bugs me.

Your son sounds like he's got his head on straight. I wish him tons of luck; this isn't an easy field. :)

Thanks again for dropping by!

cheers,
Phil

[m_malcontent]

I am in the other camp. Shakespeare almost never formulated his own plots. (And a convincing argument can be made that there are no "new" plots...just new combinations. A revenge tale is a revenge tale.....)

I use stuff I read...even down to a specific turn of phrase I love but I make sure to make it my own as best I can.

I remember a Robert B Parker, Spencer book.....that had a great line about liquor "that brown liquid not women or boys but only hunters drank"....It stayed with me....then I read it again in Faulkner and laughed.

I don't think in reading their collective works many people would accuse Parker of "ripping off Faulkner"...but the end result was I got to read a great line 5 years before I would have otherwise.

[dslartoo]

That's an interesting viewpoint -- you just like the great lines, you don't particularly care where they might have come from. I'll have to remember that.

Also, I figure if Neil Gaiman can do it intentionally (he has one of his characters in "Sandman" using a quote from John Milton) then I can do it unintentionally. I just prefer to not do it at all when I can. I don't mind creating derivative plots or characters, as long as I make them interesting and unique. :)

Again, thanks for coming by!

cheers,
Phil