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Is it ethical to steal a plot?
I recently read - can't remember where - that, if you can't think of a plot for a short story, just take a plot from an old magazine story, people it with your own characters, choose a different setting and re-write it. I just wondered what others thought about this.
Comments
Personally, I don't think it's ethical.
e.g. A single mother looking for love meets a perfect man then she sees him with another woman and they are kissing. However, it turns out the woman is his sister.
There are many such plots in magazine fiction that come up over and over again.
If it goes as far as the woman works in a florist, the man is a customer who comes in every day, buying specific flowers based on their meaning etc etc etc then it's possibly unethical to steal it.
Having said that though, this is a story that I started writing a few years ago and couldn't be bothered finishing. I saw a story almost the same a few months ago in print. So no-one had stolen anything - just had the same idea!
(Many famous stories are effectively stolen plots e.g. West Side Story/Romeo and Juliet.)
Stealing a whole plot and just tweaking a few details such as character names is definitely wrong. Legally as well as ethically.
Using a story as a starting point or to get ideas is fine though. If you really do use your own characters, rather than changing the names of other people's, then it'll become a different story as those characters will act differently and change the plot.
I'd suggest the story being the inspiration for a new story on that same theme, with plot elements- many will have been used already in many other stories.
- Somebody wants something
- They try to get it
- They either succeed or fail
The "something" can be an object, a person/relationship, an achievement or experience.
As Carol says, it's your characters that'll make it unique.
Take any old story remove the waffle and write down the bare bones... I mean the very bare bones... i.e. whittle it down to a few sentences. There's your plot ready for YOUR characters to behave in whatever way they will - different era, different class, different everything, and no one will know from where you took your inspiration.
My initial reaction to the title of this thread was, "Why are you even asking? - The answer is a resounding NO." So I was glad to see your question modified later.
The book I've thought about is set in the modern day rather than the period of WWII where the main characters are experiencing their adventures that is the focus of the story but there is a fantasy world where they find a secret passage to. It can also be pointed out that if anyone is wondering what sort of secret passage into a fantasy world I mean I'm talking about something different and slightly more exciting than the example that was depicted in Chronicles of Narnia. My fantasy world is slightly inspired by Phillip Pullman's books such as the one that was made into a film as there is a continent that has divided into different countries that is populated and governed by a particular tribe. The tribe I have chosen for each is distinct from Pullman but I was particularly interested in the Egyptians that was one of them mentioned in the Golden Compass text so I decided to call the people by the same name as the writer I was inspired by so that the ideas could be seen from my text easily in case readers didn't have much historical knowledge as other readers might. To use this particular plot devise I chose to contact the publisher that printed the writer's books to ask expressly for written permission to follow the same path. I received communication in response to the inquiries I was making during the process of researching for the writing project and the message informed me gratefully that the author was agreeing to the use of the idea in my text. Following on from the subject of an invented language I have drawn on the ideas that were used by Tolkien to tell the story he has written but the language I have created is different from the one he has used but I have given it a similar design and feel to his.
It is fine to take a basic idea, and tweak it to fit your desires. Every writer does that, consciously or otherwise. Isn't it said their are only 12 plots in the world? But every story is very different.
Would anyone who didn't see this thread think it was based on the Tower Block story? Maybe, but it won't be so obvious, as it will be very different at the same time as being very much the same. Again, I am taking a premise, and making it my own.
I just have All discussions up and look at what's been said when there is a yellow notification to indicate a new comment. I read almost every thread.