How Do I Steal Someone Else’s Idea And Get Away With It?
By Gail Tagarro / 2 December 2022 / 7 minutes of reading
Several days removed from Writer's Connect newsletter 71, I hope you've been ruminating on this issue's scandalous top tip. This week, you were not only permitted but encouraged to look over at the smart kid's exam paper and 'take some notes'. While this might sound like terribly irresponsible advice, consider this: that little shill has been copying from the real smart kid this whole time.
What? Two wrongs don't make a right? My sweet summer child, this is the art world. Stealing is the name of the game. The question is not whether to steal ... but how to steal effectively.
You're still not satisfied?
Fine, fine. Effectively and fairly. Happy?
May the horse be with shoe.
The Art of Conception
So, you like Star Wars. I mean, you really like Star Wars.
You sit down to start writing your new manuscript ... but every idea you come up with is literally just Star Wars. Recognising this, you try to think of something that is decidedly not Star Wars. Problem is, none of it interests you.
You're faced with a cold, singular truth: you want to write Star Wars, but Star Wars has already been written.
All is not lost! Though you may have missed the boat on ewoks, the Skywalker family, and the Death Star, there's still plenty about Star Wars that isn't unique to the franchise.
Let's break down what Star Wars is.
By genre, Star Wars is a work of science fiction (or SF). SF imagines a futuristic, passingly plausible universe with advanced technology, space exploration, and extraterrestrial life as its hallmarks. To classify Star Wars even further, it is part of an SF subgenre known as 'space opera', which adds interstellar warfare, melodrama, romance, and high-stakes adventure into the mix.
That all sounds like textbook Star Wars, right?
The point I'm trying to make here is that while it hits all of the same key points as Star Wars, space opera is a genre—far from a specific body of work, it's a whole category dedicated to a particular type of story. Not every space opera is Star Wars, but space opera is an enormous part of what makes up Star Wars' foundations.
So really, by writing a story in which there is love and war in a far away galaxy, you're not copying Star Wars; you're just participating in the genre!
The Sith Is In The Details
Participating in the genre is one thing, but if your main character's name is Fluke Drywalker, he wields a power called The Impact, and the heavy-breathing bad guy turns out to be his dad, it's going to raise some eyebrows. This is the part where you need to exercise some restraint (and creativity!).
This is what you don't want:
Although, Avatar made a TON of money, so ... maybe this is what you want.
Yes, believe it or not, the synopsis of your manuscript should not match a pre-existing work beat for beat when only the names are swapped out.
With all the trappings of a space odyssey already, your work will inevitably invite comparisons with the seminal works of the genre. People—not least of all the holders of the intellectual property—will notice if you fly too close to the sun, and they won't be impressed. More importantly(?), we already have Star Wars; a familiar setting is great, but we still want to see something new!
If you're really struggling to separate your work from its inspiration, one approach you could take would be to find a synopsis for the source material, highlight the key plot points, and then put them side by side with your own, making sure they don't match up too closely.
To illustrate the difference between what's okay and what's not ... it's okay for your protagonist to have a similar personality and character development arc to the one in the inspiring work, but it's not okay for the events that lead to their growth to be identical.
In other words, even if the starting point, half-way mark, and finish line are the same, the route they take between those checkpoints should be significantly different. Changing the names and appearances of the aliens that Fluke encounters isn't going to cut it if the experiences he has with them are fundamentally the same.
Stormtropers(sic)
If you need further proof that everything has been done before, look no further than tropes. At its most basic, a trope is a common character archetype or plot device, e.g., an anti-hero with a tragic past or rescuing a princess from a castle.
Tropes are somewhat synonymous with clichés; some of them are so tired and overdone that it's best to avoid them entirely. But in some ways, they are the building blocks of every story. There's no avoiding them. Look up any media series or character you can think of on tvtropes.org and you'll see a long list of tropes the author used when creating them (intentionally or otherwise).
Identify the tropes in the work you're using for 'inspiration', and you'll essentially have the recipe for exactly how it was made. Unfortunately, if you follow the recipe to the letter, you'll end up with largely the same product.
Now comes the hard part.
Your job is to modify the recipe. Remove some of the tropes, or try your hand at subverting them. Add in some of your own. Combine the tropes of one character with another and see how they interact.
Note that you don't have to (and indeed shouldn't) limit yourself to using tropes present in the work you're looking to emulate, or works in that genre. All creative works should be an aggregate of your experiences, drawing inspiration from many different sources. It's what makes your work uniquely yours!
Stealing With Integrity
In case it wasn't clear, I am in no way condoning or encouraging plagiarism. The goal was simply to highlight that it's exceedingly difficult (if not impossible) to come up with a brand-new, never-before-seen idea; sometimes, the most we can hope for is a creative new way of arranging them.
If all this seems a bit overwhelming, we can help.
Something described as deleterious is harmful, usually in an unexpected or not immediately apparent way. Depending on the use case, deleterious can stand in for either 'damaging' or 'adverse'.
Studies show that too much stress is deleterious to your health. The new dog in the neighbourhood had a deleterious effect on the whole suburb.
Quotidian Quote
“It’s none of their business that you have to learn how to write. Let them think you were born that way.” ~ Ernest Hemingway
Get Competitive!
A selection of current writing competitions YOU can enter!
The 12 Days of Christmas (Chaos) Writing Competition
Format: Short story Theme: Christmas chaos Word Count: max. 2,500 Entry Fee: £10 Prize: £100 plus publication Closes: 6/12/2022
Format: Full manuscript, short fiction Theme: Thriller Word Count: First 1,000 words & summary Entry Fee: $19 Prize: $650 plus critique Closes: 15/12/2022
Look over the fine print to make sure that your submission qualifies and you're happy with the terms of engagement.
The Australian Society of Authors has a highly informative post on their website called 'What to look for in a writing competition's T&Cs' . To locate the article, click on 'Home', then 'News'.
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