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There's a lot of seemingly random instances though, like the first ones which seem oddly specific, flowery descriptions. I'm having a hard time believing those

There's a lot of seemingly random instances though, like the first ones which seem oddly specific, flowery descriptions. I'm having a hard time believing those phrases coincidentally came out the same. If we're to believe op who claims they only checked the first couple pages of each book which were free to access, this seems quite damning. Writing isn't coding, this is not the same a just copying some snippet from stackoverflow. But then again I'm not a writer or expert on this, so I don't know how serious this is compared to a thesis or something where this would already cost you your title.

fauigerzigerk 3y ago
I'm not a writer either and I know nothing about plagiarism, but it would seem harsh to judge a novelist by the same standard as an academic. Academics are expected to use citations, not primarily because reusing a 5-word phrase would in itself be problematic, but because it's important for other scientists to be able to trace the idea back to its original context. Novelists on the other hand can't just include a footnote reference at the end of each sentence. And borrowing bits and pieces from other artists is completely normal, even desirable, in many arts. It's how the art form evolves.
- ghaff 3y ago
  The context here though is someone who churns out a lot of books and seems to have a real pattern of lifting a lot of phrases and descriptions near-verbatim from other places. This isn't an author lifting some particularly evocative phrase that they liked.
  - fauigerzigerk 3y ago
    The context of my response was the parent comment, which mentioned academic writing in comparison. I haven't read any of this author's books nor have I read the books he is supposed to have lifted these phrases from. So I don't really have an opinion on this particular case. I guess it would depend on whether he has reused more than some isolated sequences of words from a particular novel. What makes a novel unique for me is mostly the story and the characters.

fauigerzigerk 3y ago

I'm not a writer either and I know nothing about plagiarism, but it would seem harsh to judge a novelist by the same standard as an academic. Academics are expected to use citations, not primarily because reusing a 5-word phrase would in itself be problematic, but because it's important for other scientists to be able to trace the idea back to its original context. Novelists on the other hand can't just include a footnote reference at the end of each sentence. And borrowing bits and pieces from other artists is completely normal, even desirable, in many arts. It's how the art form evolves.

ghaff 3y ago
The context here though is someone who churns out a lot of books and seems to have a real pattern of lifting a lot of phrases and descriptions near-verbatim from other places. This isn't an author lifting some particularly evocative phrase that they liked.
- fauigerzigerk 3y ago
  The context of my response was the parent comment, which mentioned academic writing in comparison. I haven't read any of this author's books nor have I read the books he is supposed to have lifted these phrases from. So I don't really have an opinion on this particular case. I guess it would depend on whether he has reused more than some isolated sequences of words from a particular novel. What makes a novel unique for me is mostly the story and the characters.