Posts by Ngaire BookieMonster
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Yep, and the reason there is "further discussion" is precisely because the original issue was never resolved, merely hushed up.
Yes - still a total lack of answers to all the basic questions. "It's a puzzle" is a kind of answer, but not the answer that a leading publisher should be giving.
I think the link is supposed to go to this post
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I was going to post a further blog about this last week after reading the NZ Listener, and then early this week after reading Peter Wells (excellent) blog, but it was hard to sum up exactly what I wanted to say - I agree with the "tawdry and depressing" sentiment.
It *does* now feel tawdry and depressing and even more so because I feel that further discussion is being painted as mean-spirited, rather than what it is - just further discussion. I was pretty damn disappointed actually to read the "let it go Listener" post on Beattie's Book Blog and similar sentiments in other corners - why should it be "let go" when the book is still for sale? The calibre of answers and explanations given started off at "crap" and has not improved, excellently illustrated in this post. The whole affair has been a complete let-down and the fact that genuine commentators (as opposed to the more extreme nutter theories that can and should be easily ignored) are basically being told to sit down and be quiet just, well, sucks.
And link much appreciated - I think the URL might be wrong though as the link seems to be not working?
It's been great to be able to be involved in and to comment on this discussion.
And I second your other options for the reading and buying public - particularly ANY Judith Binney. Love her work.
Lastly, I am ever so slightly hungover, hence only being able to sum up my feelings with "sucks". ;)
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Bravo on the Pterry reference, bravo. :D
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Young people + late at night + eating + smiling = Must be stoned!
Young people + late at night + vomiting + acting like dickheads + beating people up = that's alright, they're "on the piss".
I'm over LTSA's ad strategy. Way past time for a change.
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That is so many parts of awesome.
"It makes me wonder how I ever kept track of my friends and their symbolic prose examinations of universal human experiences before this," user Joyce Carol Oates said. "I'm like, did we really ever actually go to libraries? Weird, right?"
Looking forward to your round up Jolisa. :)
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Interest officially piqued, though also slightly irritated at being kept in suspense. :D
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Sad for him. And sad that people have been so horrible and unforgiving. Whoops – stuff up. Could happen to any of us.
I think on the whole most people have been sad about this also, and were looking for reasons to be forgiving in the hope that this can be explained, even as a mistake (which is an entirely human and understandable thing).
But the responses from parties involved to their general audience have ranged from defensive and dismissive at best to meaningless hyperbole at worst. By comparison, "Whoops - stuff up" would have been an excellent start to then expand upon.
My own problem with the story has not been that it happened in the first place, because it does happen and everyone makes a mistake they wish they could take back, and it doesn't mean the easy dismissal of an entire body of admirable work. It's always been more about the lack of given insight into how it got this far. I think it would be enlightening for all in the industry, other writers, as well as the general reading public, to know how that occurred. Instead it's been presented as some personal misstep, so that inquiry into the details can be framed as either a personal criticism or a privacy issue.
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The last phrasing I'd heard was that he was "planning to buy back unsold copies". It was still available at The Warehouse yesterday - Fishpond has it though Whitcoulls and PaperPlus now list as unavailable on their websites. Biblioz has it but very expensive.
I think technically he's buying back the warehouse stock - that means stock that Penguin has, or possibly is being returned to them, but Penguin was not insisting on a return - so that part is up to the individual retailers.
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Regarding the "drug cheat" analogy, I got the impression from the way the article was worded that the journalist actually put that analogy to O'Sullivan and he agreed - rather than O'Sullivan volunteering it as an analogy. Of course then the article became "O'Sullivan says plagiarism like drug cheating".
From the NZ Herald article:
Award-winning author and poet Vincent O'Sullivan, an emeritus professor of English at Victoria University, was reluctant to comment directly on the "Witi Ihimaera situation" but said the drugs analogy was fair.
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All of this could have been avoided if he'd just put a "RT" in front of each passage.
Aaaaand... brilliant.