My take on the whole Q.R. Markham plagiarism thing

For those of you not in the know, the scenario is thus: a new spy novel called Assassin of Secrets was published two weeks ago, and less than a week later the publisher pulled it from the market upon realizing that large swaths of the book were stolen, verbatim, from earlier works. The plagiarized texts ranged from Ian Fleming's classic James Bond novels and newer spy thrillers to nonfiction books about the intelligence industry, like James Bamford's tomes about the National Security Agency.



A few things to note: Markham and I have the same publisher and, in fact, the very same editor. I feel badly for my editor, not only because he's had to deal with this mess but also because some people will doubtless use this as yet another example of the inferiority of "traditional, legacy" publishers in a digital world, evidence that the gatekeepers of the publishing world are incompetent, etc etc.



Here's the deal: if you really want to pull one over on an editor, it isn't that hard. Editors have only so much time, and they spend that time doing things other than, say, Googling random phrases of a manuscript to see if they turn up any matches. We should not expect editors or publishers to play the role of high school English teachers looking for cheaters, mainly because we should not expect writers to act like 13 year-olds.



Another thing: Any writer with a "traditional, legacy" publisher signs these boring, analog things called legal contracts. The contract explains your royalty rate, what will happen if someone sues you for libel, what happens when your book is remaindered, and other fascinating tidbits of Inside Publishing. There also is a clause in which you, the writer, do solemnly swear that the work is entirely yours and does not contain passages taken from other writers.



If a writer wants to pull a fast one, fine, but you're breaking your contract. You're being a fraud. It's clear that there was some weird element of performance art with Markham, who published under an alias and even used stolen lines in his interviews. Perhaps he was intending to make some grand statement about influence and appropriation, or the art of fiction and lying, or sneaky spies, or whatever. I'm just not all that impressed. Congrats, you got your name in lights for a brief moment, and you fooled people who trusted you. Hats off, old man.



Another random thing: My editor had asked me, a few months ago, if I would read Markham's book and, if I liked it, if I might contribute a blurb. (Like "an amazing work from a writer to watch," a line which someone once wrote about a first novel and which countless blurbers have appropriated.) I've actually never given a blurb, and I wasn't sure the book would be my thing, but I said I'd take a look. I read the first chapter, didn't like it. I read a few more, as a favor to my editor, hoping it would get better. It didn't. After maybe 50 pages, I gave up, and sent my editor my regrets.



Of course, now it's coming to light that the book was not so much a cohesive novel as a series of stolen lines, woven together into something approximating a narrative. Maybe this is why I didn't like it, though I'd be lying if I said I felt there was something suspicious afoot.



A few of the stories about Markham have playfully noted that Publishers Weekly and Kirkus gave the book starred reviews, delighting in the fact that the publishing empire (whatever that is) could be so easily fooled. Others have wondered how the editor could have failed to notice the thefts, as if he should have possessed instant recall of spy thrillers he might have read as a teenager (which is when I myself last read a few Ian Fleming books).



No doubt some voices are already calling Markham a genius, a sly jester whose theft (and whose very brief period of Getting Away With It) exposed the flaws of big publishing and shined a spotlight on the notoriously muddy concept of artistic inspiration. We all borrow from each other, such voices say, and we all rip each other off. Right?



Yawn. I think it just proves that if someone in today's world wants to get a lot of attention for something other than hard work or artistic prowess, it isn't all that difficult. The rest of us will trudge along using our own words, thanks.



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