[Christine Robins]

Was I within bounds in consciously appropriating Marilyn Taylor's idea for my own piece? Does plagerism extend to concepts, or just to the words actually used? Can anyone come up wtih examples of poets "stealing" conceits from other poets?


Reading the Obituaries

Now the Barbaras have begun to die,
trailing their older sisters to the grave,
the Helens, Margies, Nans - who said goodbye
just days ago, it seems, taking their leave
a step or two behind the hooded girls
who bloomed and withered with the century -
the Dorotheas, Eleanors and Pearls
now swaying on the edge of memory.
Soon, soon the scythe will sweep for Jeanne
and Angela, Patricia and Diane -
pause, and return for Karen and Christine
while Susan spends a sleepless night again.
Ah, Debra, how can you be growing old?
Jennifer, Michelle, your hands are cold.

Marilyn Taylor


Names
(Recently posted on TDE)

Today, kids’ names recall a distant past:
the Sarahs, Hannahs, Rachels, Abigails,
and Jacobs, Calebs, Joshuas, a cast
from Bible stories or Colonial tales.

The names I knew in school have lost their fans.
New parents shun past generations’ choices.
Kathleens are gone. No Larrys, Donalds, Stans.
My grandkids do not play with Freds or Joyces.

My mother’s friends were Florence, Rose, Irene.
She dated Clarence, Elmer, Clyde, Eugene.
These, once familiar as the sun, now share
the fate of melting February snow.
On graveyard walks I view each silent row
of slabs with names that soon no one will bear.

Christine Robins

[R. S. Gwynn]

Just dedicate it to Marilyn and send it to her. I'm sure she'll be pleased with the homage.

I just sent a bunch of people an obituary from the Houston Chronicle. The name of the deceased was Wardell Phlegm.

[albert geiser]

Hi Christine,

What you've done isn't plagiarism. Plagiarism doesn't extend to ideas.

And when a poem has been published, ideas in a poem are open to anyone to read and use; not the text of the poem, but the ideas. However if by chance you meet a poet who shows you an unfinished poem and you take an idea from that poem without asking the poet, then you've violated the poet's trust. Most likely the poet would be mad at you if you happened to publish a poem with the idea from a poet's unpublished poem. That sort of thing is becoming a much greater possiblity with internet forums like this one. Who knows what sorts of encounters this temptation from the internet is going to lead to that will become part of literary annals.

[Gregory Dowling]

Edited for pretentiousness.

[This message has been edited by Gregory Dowling (edited June 14, 2005).]

[Kevin Andrew Murphy]

Christine,

That's a pretty obvious lift from her poem, both in theme and execution, and I certainly wouldn't consider it kosher. Best bet is to do as Sam says, send it to her as a gift, then come up with an original concept of your own.

Kevin

[R. S. Gwynn]

My mother's name is Thelma, and my mother-in-law's name is Lucille. Lordy.

An homage to another poet's work, identified as such, is pretty common, though Kevin may be right that this one is too close to be comfortably published. I'd just ask Marilyn what she thinks.

[Chris Childers]

I'm with Kevin; I'm not sure you've done enough with the original idea to make it your own. I'm actually quite uncomfortable that most of the respondents to your poem on the DE said, "Great idea, wish I'd thought of it," which is what I would have written as well. I'd be interested to hear how Marilyn responds, if you send it to her first.

Chris

[Mark Allinson]

"Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different. The good poet welds his theft into a whole of feeling which is unique, utterly different from that from which it was torn; the bad poet throws it into something which has no cohesion. A good poet will usually borrow from authors remote in time, or alien in language, or diverse in interest."

- T.S.Eliot.

It all depends on what you can get away with. In your case, Christine, perhaps an addition to the title - such as "after ...." might be enough.

But don't forget, our greatest poet was also a fierce thief - one Billy S, who ripped off ideas, images and plots and speeches from all over the place.



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Mark Allinson

[Michael Cantor]

It probably does cross the line in terms of borrowing from the original, but I wonder if - rather than a dedication - an after Marilyn Taylor epigraph might serve the function of consciously acknowledging the inspiration and the debt? I have seen this used from time to time, and did it myself once in a piece (never accepted anywhere, which might tell you something) patterned after a Kenneth Koch poem.

Michael Cantor

PS - Just noticed that I echoed Mark on the "after". It was a cross post, not an "inspired by". I swear. Mark's not getting a credit. Mark - have your people contact my people. We'll leave it to the lawyers.

[This message has been edited by Michael Cantor (edited February 19, 2005).]

[Steven Schroeder]

Hmm, if I may tell an anecdote that is at least related and let you draw your own conclusions:

We got a submission for the last issue of the Muse. Both of the readers for this submission pointed to one poem they particularly thought was good enough to take. The poem was a first person narrative in which the narrator stood at the Vietnam Memorial Wall, looked at the names, tried to find the name of someone he knew, had a memory of an ambush or booby trap triggered by that name, and metaphorically suggested that he had been the one to die. I rejected it, telling the author it was well written, but far too derivative of Yusef Komunyakaa's widely praised and anthologized "Facing It," right down to there being a bird in both poems.

Now, if the poem had said "After Komunyakaa," would I have accepted it? I don't know, but my gut feeling is no. On the other hand, Christine's is definitely less derivative than that poem was, as well. It's clearly the same idea, but it's got enough differences that it might work as an answer or reinterpretation instead of a simple restatement. I'm not sure.

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Steve Schroeder