Thursday, June 06, 2013

Nothing flattering about theft ...

... On Being Plagiarised - LRB blog. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

When Morgan mutilated my poem, he was mutilating the tedious and fervent labour, the discovery of what I hadn’t known I meant to mean, and the reward of a single moment of high praise. ‘A Little Song’ has faults, including some melodramatic and opportunistic line-breaks. How would I feel if the thief had improved my poem? I’d be abashed, but I’d also be bewildered that someone who could do that would bother, rather than write a better poem of his own.

No comments:

Post a Comment