Literary theft and literary exploitation

By T. Gooneratne

In The Practice of Writing, a series created especially for readers of MONTAGE, award-winning novelist, poet and critic Yasmine Gooneratne considers aspects of literary composition from a writer's point of view.

One of the saddest and most frustrating things that can happen in a writer's life is the deliberate theft of his creative work. Plagiarism (or literary theft), defined as the act of purloining another person's literary works, or introducing passages from another person's writings and offering them to the public as one's own, is a crime that is punishable by the law. Most creative writers in this country, unaccustomed to placing a monetary value on their own work, and modestly reluctant to request acknowledgment of 'borrowings' from their work, or payment for its publication, do not realize this. A plagiarist is a thief, quite as culpable as the vicious criminal who kidnaps a child and demands payment for that child's return.

It has been my misfortune to be twice victimized by plagiarists. I shall outline these two occasions briefly here, in the hope that my fellow-writers will profit from my experiences.

Some years ago, an essay of mine on Leonard Woolf's novel, The Village in the Jungle (1913), was published in a British journal, The Journal of Commonwealth Literature. At about the same time, this novel was prescribed as a text for O/Level students. Soon after that, I received a letter from a stranger. The writer of the letter, a school-girl who had successfully passed her O-Levels, was writing to me about my 'notes' on The Village in the Jungle, which, she said, she had found so useful that she was writing to thank me for having published them. Since I had published no 'notes' or study-aids of any kind on the novel, I made inquiries, and found that my essay in JCL had been reproduced without my permission by a local 'tutory', and was being sold (with notes appended, which had been composed by an academic of my acquaintance) to students who were taking Literature as a subject for that year's O/Level examination.

My reaction to this information was, first, surprise. Then anger. And finally, frustration. I realized that I had been exploited and my work stolen, but since a senior colleague was clearly implicated, I was reluctant to challenge him, either personally or through the law. I know better now.

The second incident occurred quite recently. While I was teaching overseas, enlightened educationists at Peradeniya and at other universities had begun putting poetry written by Sri Lanka's writers on their English Literature courses. Unknown to me, a poem of mine ('The Peace-Game'), which I had published in Sri Lanka in 1970/1971 and which had been frequently anthologized overseas, had been set, together with poems by other Sri Lankan writers, as a text for the A/Level examinations. A telephone call from a fellow-writer alerted me to the fact that her work and mine were included in a book that was currently on sale, titled Critical Approach to Poetry for Advanced Level. Had my permission been asked for the inclusion of my work? It had not. Had I been paid for such inclusion? I had not. Was I going to do anything about it?

What I did was to buy a copy of the book, and read it carefully. No university teacher objects to quotation from his/her work in a student's essay, or even in a published book, as long as (a) it is accurately quoted, and (b) the source of the quotation is duly acknowledged. I found 'The Peace-Game' reproduced in Critical Approach to Poetry for Advanced Level, with typographical errors throughout that distorted its meaning and effect. In his purported analysis of the poem, the 'co-author and editor' of the book had provided facts and information which were completely incorrect and misleading as to the source, background and inspiration for my work. I sent a letter of complaint to the address provided. When it brought no response, I sought a lawyer's advice.

It was only after a formal Letter of Demand had been was sent to 'Mr Hector Alahakoon of 33/B Walpola, Ruggahawila, Samagi Pedesa', the person advertised as co-author and editor of the book, by my lawyer, noting that his client's work had been distorted and mutilated, causing 'immense prejudice to her honour and reputation', and that legal action would be the next step taken by his client, that the literary thief responded. Even then, having first asserted (despite his status as 'B.A., M.A., PhD., Former Vice-Chancellor') that he knew nothing about 'copyright' (!), he had the impudence to state that copyright laws are not operative in Sri Lanka.

It was, predictably, the demand of Rs. 1,000,000 in damages that finally brought him to heel. Pleading his advanced age and dependence on others to be factors that should be taken into account, he eventually offered to delete his account of my writing from his book.

Legal procedures have been set up in many countries for the protection of authors who have been victimized in this way. Sadly, such procedures, involving consultations with lawyers, the writing of letters of demand, and appearances in court, are often too expensive for writers to engage in, and the thieves escape unpunished. Copyright laws exist in Sri Lanka and elsewhere, so it is wise to do everything one can to protect one's work from literary predators How can writers protect themselves? One method is the copyright line, which you can insert on the title-page and on the final page of your manuscript before sending it to any one to read or publish. A copyright line includes your name and the date.

It looks like this: Copyright@Tilak de Silva 2010. A second line of defence is to find yourself a lawyer, who can represent you in your dealings with plagiarists and other forms of low life.

Some useful advice on plagiarism was offered on the net in 1997 by an American author, Harvey Bluedorn. At times, says Mr Bluedorm, we become so familiar with another's work that we unwarily imitate it. Sometimes we cannot so much as recall the source of our ideas. Though it would be good, for numerous reasons, if we could mentally catalogue all of our sources, we nevertheless cannot.

Many thoughts become so repeated that they become general knowledge and their source can never be traced. Often enough others give us a "free thought" - or so we consider it, and we feel no obligation to credit its source. We often hear things with no source cited, and we therefore presume - correctly or incorrectly - that it is general knowledge.

Largely because the verbal citing of sources interrupts the oral communication, we do not feel as much obligation to cite our sources orally as we do in writing. And, at rare moments, the same thought may occur independently to more than one person. Because of such variables in our ways of communicating, nobody in their right mind begrudges an occasional "borrowed thought" which fails to fully acknowledge its source.

But "borrowed thoughts" can be simply, clearly and easily distinguished from the wholesale appropriation of another's ideas without paying them their credit due. "Borrowed thoughts" are rare and scattered in a single work, never of any length, and scarcely ever verbatim. Plagiarism is often repeated in a single work, comes in blocks which follow the outline of the source, and imitates the manner of expression - sometimes using the very words - of the source. An honest conscience, MrBluedorm reminds us, cannot borrow upon another's labours and extend him no credit.

The deliberate plagiarizing of ideas is akin to the sin of kidnapping. In fact, that is exactly what the word "plagiarize" means - "kidnap." "And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to death." (Exodus 21:16, compare Deuteronomy 24:7; 1st Timothy 1:10) When you take another man's ideas, born of his own mind, and you use them as if they were your own children, you destroy another man's house and leave him without his child. You steal the heritage which God has given that man. So much did God consider intellectual property to be private property, that He even protected the copyright of His own revelations. "I am against the prophets, saith the Lord, that steal My words every one from his neighbor." (Jeremiah 23:30) Only those prophets authorized by God may use God's words. None others may borrow them to establish their own credibility.

The world may see plagiarism as a small thing of no consequence. But we should see plagiarism for what it truly is - thievery in the sight of God.