As an author of retellings, I am a huge fan of borrowed inspiration. Rather than something to be ashamed of, I think the links of similarity from inspiration to inspiration are something to “geek out on.” I have personally spent countless delightful hours tracing back the different versions of the Arthurian legends, from modern retellings through Malory to his sources and their sources. It’s awesome!
I believe in copyrights
Now, that said, I am also personally a proponent of copyright law. My belief in copyrights has, in the past, set me at odds with some of my peers, who have a rather more anarchist outlook on the world. I believe that the author of a creative work deserves to earn royalties for that work. It often takes years to write a book, and years more to get it published; years to establish a career and get an agent (or to successfully self-publish it); and years to promote it. Whether an author has written one book or many, this effort represents a substantial portion of their life’s work, and if other people are consuming or otherwise enjoying that work, then the creator deserves to earn a return on the investment of their time and effort. The idea that readers should not have to pay for it because it’s so easy to make a digital copy is simply a rationalization for theft. Even worse, the idea that another author or unscrupulous publisher might profit off an author’s years of hard work by simply plagiarizing it, is beyond shameful.
Inspiration, Not Infringement
There’s an important distinction here. When inspired, an artist takes an idea and makes it her own.
Imagination can only take us so far. Most works of art (in this case, writing) use some idea as an inspiration or starting point. Sometimes the idea is based on the author’s personal experience. Sometimes the idea is based on information they have researched. Often the idea is based on some other author’s writings. For example, many of the greatest works in our culture were inspired by stories from mythology. I could list many more examples here, but that would make this post too long. Instead, this blog post will be the first in a series. I will write follow-up entries discussing the inspirations for the legends of King Arthur; the legends of Greek mythology (especially as told by Ovid in his great work, Metamorphoses); and the great writers of classical English: Shakespeare and Spenser.
Name Your Sources
Just as knowledge is based on sources, so too is credibility a product of naming those sources.
In scholarly works, from peer-reviewed publications and doctoral theses all the way down to an elementary school essay, the author is required to cite her sources. In news reports, the journalist cites sources (even when, as often happens, the source requests anonymity). How we know a thing is often just as important as what it is we know. This is the foundation of science and learning.
I propose that the same may be true of art.
Even a work of fiction usually has a number of sources: from other works of fiction to research materials. Accordingly, in many of my own writing projects, I have added a list of references at the back of the book. I first did this with my manifesto, “Principles for a Self-Directed Society,” which was a work of nonfiction and relied heavily on research to support its assertions. Beginning with “Rise of the Pagans,” I have done this for my works of fiction as well.
Rise of the Pagans
I self-published Rise of the Pagans in 2014. The story of “Rise of the Pagans” is fictional, although one pivotal scene was inspired by a real-life incident, as stated in the Introduction. The words are mine; but the narrative includes constant elements of Pagan mythology and history, interwoven throughout. How can I vouch for the accuracy of the assertions made by the characters in my story? By citing the references that I myself was drawing from as I wrote the novel. In the years since I wrote the book I have discovered several slips of scholarship, where assumption or misunderstanding got in the way of material fact; nonetheless, the book has held up pretty well over time: and because I named my sources, any student of Paganism who decided they really, really cared about the subject matter could check my references for themselves. (To learn more, you can visit the Rise of the Pagans website, or purchase Rise of the Pagans on Amazon).
Retellings and reimaginings
I took this concept and ran with it in my next several projects. First with my King Arthur retelling, then my Greek myths retelling, my Robin Hood retelling, and now my new Norse myths retelling project: I have borrowed scenes, ideas, and in places close paraphrases or even brief quotations from the original sources.
Public Domain
Please note that in my case, the original sources are usually Medieval manuscripts, which are internationally recognized as falling under the law of Public Domain. (Here are some links so you can read more about Public Domain.)
Anyone can do anything they want with those Medieval manuscripts. If I didn’t want to cite my close paraphrasings of them in brief passages, there was no legal requirement that I should do so. But I wanted to. For one thing, I think it’s fun to trace back an idea to its inspiration, and I want to share that geeky joy with the reader. For another thing, I don’t want anyone to ever say that I inappropriately claimed someone else’s work as my own. I’m a stickler for these kinds of details. Because I am consciously writing retellings based on original sources, the best course of action seemed to be to list in detail those sources and how I have used them, down to specific passages.
I would not demand that others do as I have done. I am not attempting to introduce yet another requirement for fiction writers. But I do strongly recommend it.
Do Not Plagiarize Your Peers
Inspiration is one thing; but I would strongly discourage writers from borrowing directly from other contemporary writers. “Plagiarism” is not a pretty word, and inadequately paraphrased passages that closely resemble another author’s work are rightly considered a form of theft. If you do borrow from another writer, get their permission, and give them prominent credit.
For example, the practice of naming sources could avoid situations like that recent incident when a young woman began her poem with a close paraphrase and partial quote of another contemporary poet’s work. That incident may have ruined her career before it even began. Because she failed to cite her source, her action was widely denounced as plagiarism, and the original author was rightly infuriated by the incident. This could have been avoided if she had obtained permission, and credited the original author as the source of her inspiration – and taken greater care to paraphrase rather than quote.
Celebrating Inspiration
We all take inspiration from other sources. But ideas themselves are too ethereal to be protected by copyright law. We must take care never to take other people’s work and claim it as our own: that would be both immoral and illegal. But when we create a work inspired by another work, we should celebrate that fact, rather than feel the need to hide it for fear of running afoul of copyright laws. I propose that when we borrow concepts and ideas, the right thing to do is to credit the source.
All writers and artists take inspiration from other sources. (Every modern fantasy writer is inspired by Tolkein, and to deny it would be pure folly.) There is no shame in acknowledging this fact. Let’s celebrate the bonds of inspiration, and inspire each other to keep creating more.
