Similar plots vs. plagiarism

[Miss Shelf]

was reading the Dan Brown Under Oath thread and clicked on the links provided by lies. I was interested in The Gothamist one because it mentioned a book by Christopher Booker, Seven Basic Plots, the synopsis of which reminded me of a book I read earlier this year, How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster, which tells us that all of today's plots have been covered before, and points out examples that take plots from everyone from the Greek myths to Shakespeare to the Bible. I'm also reminded of a banner that one of my high school English teachers had in her classroom, "There is nothing new under the sun".

So, the case can be made for there being only a handful of plots-it's the author who takes these basic ideas and turns them into a story that may or may not be similar to a previous story. If we really think about it, we've all read the same story over and over-with different settings, characters and outcomes. I think we suppress our conscious "hey, this sounds familiar" so that we may enjoy a story. If you are really picky, you'll never read books if you think all books are rewrites of previous ideas.

 

[Peder]

... I was interested in The Gothamist one because it mentioned a book by Christopher Booker, Seven Basic Plots, the synopsis of which reminded me of a book I read earlier this year, How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster, which tells us that all of today's plots have been covered before, and points out examples

Miss Shelf
In one sentence, you have just added two books to the very top of my list to look at for the next time I go buying! I hope they both have the same seven basic plots.
Many thanks,
Peder

 

[Peder]

So, the case can be made for there being only a handful of plots-it's the author who takes these basic ideas and turns them into a story that may or may not be similar to a previous story. If we really think about it, we've all read the same story over and over-with different settings, characters and outcomes. I think we suppress our conscious "hey, this sounds familiar" so that we may enjoy a story. If you are really picky, you'll never read books if you think all books are rewrites of previous ideas.

Ms Shelf,
Back again, in a more serious vein.
I wonder how many of us actually react to books with the thought that "Gee, this sounds just like....?" Or, if we do take a moment to think "Well this is really a boy-girl-boy triangle," that we then we think less of the book. I rather doubt it, so I think it is all in the story telling as to whether we like a book or not, unless the writing is really so atrocious that we really can guess what the outcome will be.

Going a little further, I'm not so sure we have to work very hard at all to suppress the similarities that different stories may have. In fact, in some cases just the opposite. I think we depend on the similarities for enjoyment. Those of us who like detective stories pretty much, I think, expect that the bad guy will get caught in the end. And what would a romance be without the guy getting the girl? And we surely know there are enough romances on the shelves, and boy-girl attraction is not going out of fashion any time soon.

So I will go even a little further than your last sentence. I think we actually like, and even prefer, books that are in some sense rewrites of previous ideas.

And just as a wild thought, without having yet read either of the two books you mention, I wonder if the genres we tend to think of don't line up somehow with at least some of the basic story types.

Now I really want to read one of those books! And partly because they remind me of a similar book that I enjoyed many years ago which described the limited number of plot techniques that are available in writing a novel. Wish I could remember the title.

So, similarity forever!
Peder

 

[Billy]

Even Shakespeare wasn't original. Originality wasn't appreciated back then. There is a certain comfort in the familiar. Most romances follow the Cinderella formula, and as Peder said, in crime novels we expect that the bad guy will get caught in the end.

I do think that plots are constantly rehashed, but what makes stories unique is the characters involved. With each new character invented, we get yet another perspective on a similar situation. We also get to experience the different writing styles and contexts of the different authors, which also brings another perspective to the same old story.

 

[Jemima Aslana]

It's probably true that it'll be difficult to think of a plot that hasn't been done before, so it will also be difficult to base plagiarism claims solely on the plot.

The characters is the author's possibility of making something unique and even then there's a good chance many of them have been done before, then it's the combination of characters - the entire gallery that makes a book unique. And then all the specific details in the plot, the setting and whatnot.

If books are similar in plot alone, I see no problem, if the books are similar in setting alone, I see no problem either (how many medieval fantasy settings with dragons do we have by now?), but of both plot, setting, characters and possibly writing style are similar we run into a suspicious thing that should be checked much more closely.

I'm following the Dan Brown vs. Lewis Perdue case myself. And I must say I don't have much confidence in Brown's 'originality'. I haven't read either of the books though, so I'm weighing everything Perdue writes in his blog very carefully - he canot possibly be unbiased

The courtpapers speaks in Perdue's favour in my eyes though.

I hope that wasn't too much off topic

 

[novella]

A while ago we had a good thread on this subject. Rather than reiterate, here's a link.

previous thread on plagiarism and unintentional replication