Literary Clusterfucks 2013

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9BwWKXjVaI

The interesting thing about plagiarism in contemporary poetry is that there's loads of it (fella called If a Lightman writes about it a lot and does some detective work on it). Probably because so much poetry is published but so little read, plagiarism can easily hide.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/sep/09/poetry-plagiarism-copying-maya-angelou-ira-lightman-will-storr

“oh gosh I was practicing this extremely advanced thing called intertextuality and forgot the appropriate attributions...”

hanging’s too good for these charlatans

young adult publishing is the cutting edge these days

https://www.vulture.com/2019/01/ya-twitter-forces-rising-star-author-to-self-cancel.html

Fun

Something similar happened in YA a while ago—a book got tagged as racist before it was released due to some cocnerns about appropriation or something. pvmic and all, but i find these rigid ideas of what people have the right to represent actually terrifying.

geez, treesh, won't you think of the children?

these ppl are so fucking stupid

god help us all

What’s maddening is that it grows from a legitimate form of critique. Some forms of representation do reproduce harmful ideas, even if on the surface it doesn’t look that way. Publishing has elevated certain stories over others, and correcting this imbalance is definitely a valid editorial objective.

But I just think when it comes to these flare ups, people are using this form of critique as a cover for vapid point-scoring. And they’re also taking too rigid a line—overlooking the distinction between what might be problematic, and worth discussing, and what is like, morally unacceptable speech that needs to be swiftly codemned.

The discourse is completely reactive and the pattern is always the same—one person is “called out” and dragged before a (metaphorical) firing squad. And then when they or others complain this an unbalanced response, they get accused of tone policing or comparing someone’s career being derailed to real injustice—which is of course usually isn’t what’s happened

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/feb/02/zadie-smith-political-correctness-hay-cartagena

I love zadie smith. Didn’t read the article yet but probably otm

Didn’t read the article yet but probably otm

I love you Treeship, but new board description?

Good idea, yeah. Your quote’s been on there long enough.

Yeah, that was the partly the reason...

you're such a treeship, treeship

This is just... wow: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/02/11/a-suspense-novelists-trail-of-deceptions/amp?__twitter_impression=true

Seriously.

Though for all the horrifying, jaw-dropping lies, the point at which I had to take a break was the mention of the friend who wrote a story featuring a charming manipulator named Tom Rigbey.

Halfway through and wow... Will withhold judgement till I finish it but: it's amazing how much one person can get away with

xp haha

good read but not surprising I don’t think? I just assume the literary world is set up for guys like this

I adore highsmith but what a terrible and boring legacy at this point

good read but not surprising

i work in publishing and yep lol

woah I'm 95% sure I did my year abroad at oxford at the same time as this dude at the same college

The oblivious, upbeat father at the end is a great touch.

was thinking of Jeffrey Archer right up until the piece mentions him in passing but this lad ends up making him look like an honest grafter in comparison fair play

Surely he deserves to have all this attention lavished upon him. Surely this tale of mythomania hasn't been told countless times already. Surely this won't vindicate his behaviour and further contribute to his tedious legend.

the process is tedious and demoralizing but necessary imo

the company who published and promoted his book come off looking particularly bad here. who at that company decided to publish the book?

this dude's book sounds pretty terrible

NY article was an amazing read, tho

Didn't like the way some of his actions were explained away as some weird Ripley copy.

Lol @ Craig Raine.

yowww that article is fuckin wild

The book sounds like hot garbage but i guess that’s what the American reading public hungers for so whose fault is it really

maybe the real psychopaths... are us

gone girl deserves better copycats than this and the girl on the train

This guy sounds more like a pathological liar than a con artist. Some of these lies had the effect of burnishing his reputation but he was really sloppy about it. And other lies he took farther than he needed to if he was just trying to become a powerful editor

I haven't read the article, but this guy's book is a dumb domestic thriller novel not a memoir, right? Who gives a fuck if he's a liar?

maybe you should i dunno read the article

it's good!

Like if I found out that Harlan Coben was lying about being David Foster Wallace's college roommate would that make his plot twists any worse?

you should read the piece

it's a great piece bc it's v interesting and the guy is a character but i don't think it's like "and therefore his thriller novel about liars is bad" (except that it sounds bad on its own merits). the most lol part was the agatha christie legacy writer who wrote characters based on the guy.

I like the part where he sent emails to colleagues that he said were from his brother about what an amazing guy he (the novelist) was. Think I am going to start doing this. My family could stand to send more unsolicited emails of this kind, I feel

He was just correcting the record

then when someone asks you about your brother you can reply 'oh he's dead, he committed suicide' and move on to talking about that time you were on the cover of russian vogue

Seemingly you can keep this up for a long time with no consequences

being a charming, handsome white fabulist has its advantages it seems

lupus in fabula

i have read the piece and president keyes is largely otm

How otm could he be he thinks the story is that this novel is bad bc the author is a liar