Can Plagiarism Be the New Authenticity? Best-Selling Author, 17, Seems to Think So
Once upon a time, authors were expected to craft their own fiction, word-for-word. But a best-sellling German novel is casting doubt on that standard, winning selection as a finalist for a $20,000 Leipzig Book Fair prize even though the judges reportedly were aware of a charge of plagiarism against the author.
An entire page apparently was lifted almost verbatim from an earlier work by another author, but a jury member says this was “part of the concept of the book,” reports the New York Times.
Now author Helene Hegemann, 17, has entered the fray. She apologizes about not more openly describing her sources for her novel, Axolotl Roadkill, according to the newspaper. But she also indicates, in a written statement provided by her publisher, that standards have changed in the Internet age, as torrential information-sharing and compilations created from a variety of sources have become commonplace.
“There’s no such thing as originality anyway, just authenticity,” she says.
