As I'm in the middle of getting ready to review four Flannery O'Connor Short Fiction Award winners, and try to do interviews with each of them, a visit earlier this week to the blog, Syntax of Things, led me to the discovery that one of the books has in fact been pulled from publication and from the bookstores early copies got out to.
It was determined that the story Tuscaloosa Knights, the one that opens up Brad Vice's collection, The Bear Bryant Funeral Train, borrowed pretty heavily from a 1934 work titled "Stars Fell on Alabama" by Carl Carmer. Once this was pointed out to him, Vice quickly admitted that it did, as he intended the story's title to be a play on the title of that specific section of Carmer's book, Tuscaloosa Nights. He also immediately stated it was done with no malicious intent. He has stated that he openly discussed the fact that the story used Carmer's book in interviews and didn't understand the principles of fair use (see linked column by Robbie Ward of the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal.
Jason Sanford, over at his online journal, storySouth, has posted about this issue. While I agree with many aspects of Jason's post, I disagree with his statement that the librarian who brought the similarities to the University of Georgia Press was overzealous - however, I still urge you to read his post - it's the most in-depth item I've read on the issue.
Sanford, due to his past experiences working as an editor for a commercical house, places more blame for this story going into the collection unattributed than he places on Vice. Again, I'm not sure I agree with this, but do have a similar question to Sanford's - why did the book have to be killed?
The story is one of nine fictional efforts. Thinking back to some of the more prominent cases of plagiarism in the recent past led to looking for information about Stephen Ambrose, and Doris Kearns Goodwin. Some of the specifics that could be found were that Simon & Schuster planned on working with Ambrose to make sure quotation marks were put in the necessary places in future editions. In Kearns Goodwin's case, she requested that her publisher pulp copies of the books so that a corrected version could be issued - but according to some columns regarding her issue, the books were still able to found with no corrections over a year later.
Why then was it so important for the University of Georgia Press to kill this, again fictional, book so quickly. Where Ambrose and Kearns Goodwin are historians, writing non-fiction where specifics truly matter, their books (big sellers) remained on shelves, with "plans" to fix the issues in the future.
In the case of this particular story, MacAdam/Cage's recent release, The Alumni Grill: Volume II - Anthology of Southern Writers, contains it (and in fact highlights that fact) and is still showing as a book that can be purchased according to their website (though, I do admit, questions regarding their own plans have gone unanswered to this date). The story is also available online at the webzine Thicket - to date, it remains.
Why couldn't the University of Georgia Press issue a press release stating that Vice had made an error, and that some sort of tip-in sheet stating such would be made available to the stores that had copies remaining - as well as promise to add the acknowledgement in any future issues?
A question that comes to my own mind is whether the press overreacted (my opinion) because of the recent flap they had to deal with over the resignation of Bim Ramke as Editor of the Poetry Series the Press had due to allegations made by those at a well known website that has made itself the watchdog of poetry competitions everywhere (not being a fan of their original methods, I'll leave it to you to determine their name and url). This resignation is well covered in the recent issue of Poets & Writers.
Due to the quality of their annual selections (including the other book chosen to receive the Flannery O'Connor Award last year, David Crouse's Copy Cats), I will continue to follow the Flannery O'Connor Short Fiction Series - I just don't agree with their actions in regards to this collection.
Again, visit the link above to Jason's site as he also offers a link to Vice's Department Chair at Mississippi State University (edited thanks to Robbie Ward). He is undergoing investigation, and can receive anything from a letter of reprimand to his personnel file on up to dismissal. I'm sure Vice wouldn't mind letters of support being sent on his behalf.
Editor's Note: Jake Adam York, Jason Sanford's co-editor over at storySouth, has posted his own essay about this event, looking in particular at the validity of calling this copyright infringement.
I wrote a fairly long piece about this issue in my blog today as well. I do believe it's highly likely that Vice is paying for the alleged sins of Ramke, and that the press acted too hastily to save its own skin following the Poetry Series scandal. Paying homage to another work by using the title of that work and "borrowing" from the original is a fairly common artistic trick. Poets and visual artists do it all the time, so why should fiction writers be held to a different standard?
Posted by: Michelle | November 06, 2005 at 06:25 PM
Just a little FYI - Vice is a professor at Mississippi State University, not the University of Mississippi. That's a rather large difference for Mississippians.
Posted by: Robbie Ward | November 08, 2005 at 03:46 PM
Good Lord I can't believe I did that - I'm sure it's just as big as if somebody called me a Spartan (Michigan State). Thanks for the heads up.
Dan
Posted by: Dan Wickett | November 08, 2005 at 05:21 PM