To the ancient romans, a "Plagiarius" was what we call a kidnapper, and to steal children is certainly a heinous crime. It appears to those who work with their minds and imagination, however, that to steal one's brainchildren is almost as heinous a crime, and so "plagiarism, " in English, has come to mean the stealing of the ideas, forms, or words by someone who then puts them forth as his or her own.
A scientist's formulas, an artist's paintings, an inventor's models, a philosopher's thoughts, might all be the subject of plagiarism, but common usage has come to apply the term, specifically, to the theft of a writer's production.
Plagiarism is a horrid nightmare to writers in several different ways; and it is much more serious than nonwriters may realize.
If a writer, for any reason, commits plagiarism, copying some already published material, and if he gets away with it to the extent of getting the plagiarized material republished, he is bound to be caught sooner or later. Some reader, somewhere, will notice the theft. In that case, even if the plagiarist isn't sued or punished in any way, you can be sure that no editor who knows of the plagiarism will buy anything from that writer again. If the plagiarist has a career, it is permanently ruined.
You may think that such a literary thief deserves a ruined career, and certainly I think so, but copying an already published item word for word is such a surefire failure that only an idiot or a complete novice would do it. What about the case where someone simply makes use of the central idea of the story, the series of events it contains, the climax, the emotional milieu, and so on, but does not repeat it word for word? What if he uses his (or her) own words entirely, changes the incidents in nonessential details, puts it in a different setting and so on?
In that case, it becomes more difficult to decide whether plagiarism has taken place. After all, it is possible to have the same ideas someone else has had.
Thus, Ted Sturgeon once wrote a story which he sent to Horace Gold of Galaxy and which was accepted. I wrote a story which I sent to Horace Gold while Ted's story was still unpublished. There was no communication between us; we lived in different cities and had not exchanged phone calls or letters in months, nor had either of us discussed our stories with anyone. Nevertheless, not only did we both center our stories about a double meaning in the word "hostess," but two of my characters were Drake and Vera, and two of his were Derek and Verna.
It was the purest of coincidences, for except for the double meaning and the character names that we shared, the stories were miles apart. Nevertheless, even the appearance of plagiarism must be avoided. I had to make enough changes in my story (because it was the later one received) to destroy the appearance. To do so spoiled the story in my opinion, but it had to be done anyway.
In the same way, when I am writing a story, I must be conscious that there have been other stories dealing with similar ideas or similar characters or similar events, and I must make every effort to dilute that similarity. When I wrote a story once called "Each an Explorer," I never for a moment forgot John Campbell's "Who Goes There?" and spent more time trying to avoid his story than trying to write my own.
In the same way, when I wrote "Lest We Remember" (published in this magazine), I had to steer a mile wide of Keyes's "Flowers for Algernon." It's part of the game.
But I haven't read every story ever written and many that I have read, I have completely forgotten, at least consciously. What if I duplicate important elements of stories I have never read, or have forgotten? It's possible. I once wrote a short-short that ended with a certain dramatic climax in the last sentence. Eventually, I received a letter from another writer whose story had been published before I wrote my story and who had made use of the same dramatic climax in his last sentence. What's more, I had his story in an anthology in my library. I did not remember reading it, but I had had the opportunity to do so. The two stories, except for the climaxes, were completely different, but I promptly wrote the other author and told him that although he had my word that there was no conscious imitation, I would withdraw the story from circulation and it would never again appear in any anthology, any collection, any form whatever-and it never has.
Fortunately, the other writer accepted this, but what protection do I (or any other writer) have against the accusation of plagiarism over what is a bit of unconscious recall, or, for that matter, an outright coincidence?
Actually, very little. I rely, to a large extent, on my prolificity and my unblemished record. No one as prolific as I would seem to have to depend on someone else's ideas, and my own mental fertility is obvious to all. Secondly, I am cautious enough never to discuss my stories before they are published, nor will I listen to others who might want to discuss their stories. In fact, I won't even read unsolicited manuscripts sent me by strangers. They go back at once, unread.
Even so, every established writer lives under an eternal Damocles's sword of possible accusation of plagiarism. A casual reference, a small similarity, a nonessential duplication may be enough to produce such a suit. Such a suit, however unjustified, however certain of being thrown out of court, can be hurtful to an innocent writer. It is, after all, an expense. Lawyers must be paid, time must be lost and, invariably, one is urged to "payoff the kook."
But what if you, the established writer, have been plagiarized? That has never happened to me to the extent of publication-that I know of. To be sure, there have been pastiches of me, deliberate imitations of my robot stories, or my Black Widowers mystery stories, and so on. These come under the heading of fun. The writer who turns them out makes no secret of it, and the editor knows that it's a pastiche.
Sometimes, they send the manuscript to me to ask if I have any objection. I have always given permission. Then, too, there are stories that are bound to be similar to mine in some benign way. The Star Wars movies have some distant similarities to my Foundation stories, but, what the heck, you can't make a fuss about such things.
Unpublished plagiarism is more common. An English professor once sent me a story written by a student in first-year English. It didn't seem to her likely that the kid could have written that good a story and there were things in it that seemed reminiscent of me-like the Three Laws of Robotics. I went over the story and it was my "Galley Slave" word for word. I returned it to the professor and told her to (a) punish the student appropriately, and (b) not let me know anything about it. (I'm soft-hearted.)
And what if you're an editor and get stuck with some material that might conceivably be plagiarized. In the first place-is it? A completely original, nonreminiscent story is possible, but very rarely met up with. Similarities with some particular published story are almost unavoidable. However, the more similarities there are, with the same previously published story, the greater the possibility of plagiarism.
Nevertheless, it is difficult to establish certainty if the copying isn't word for word.
Should an editor refuse a story, however good, if there are too many similarities? Of course! Remember that I said even the appearance of plagiarism must be strictly avoided.
There is, however, a catch. An editor has not read every story that has been published. Sometimes an editor, being human, has not even read every famous story ever published. Or an editor has read many stories but some of them have completely gone from her mind. Such an editor may, in all innocence, therefore publish a doubtful story. He (or she) is then a victim and not an accomplice.
Just as honest, established writers must live, constantly, with the fear of being accused of plagiarism, or of themselves being plagiarized, so must honest, established editors live, constantly, with the fear of being victimized into publishing a doubtful story.
What does one do in such a case? One can't entirely ignore the matter. For one thing, the similarity between the new story and an older story is sure to be seen by some readers. Even if the older story is very obscure, someone will have read it and remembered it. If it is a well-known story, letters will come in heaps.
One can ask the writer of the doubtful story for an explanation. If the explanation seems unconvincing, one can avoid buying stories from the writer again. One might warn other editors in the field to be careful. And one can try hard not to let it happen again-knowing full well that there is no way of stopping every piece of literary prestidigitation.
It is comforting to know, however, that if an editor lets something suspicious get into print, the fact will not remain unreported for long. We can be sure, then, that if no indignant reader has written within two weeks of the appearance of an issue, we have probably committed no ghastly mistakes of this nature in that issue.