Saturday, March 19, 2016

What criteria would have been used to exonerate Nella Larsen from the plagiarism scandal regarding her story "Sanctuary"? Why didn't she ever...

Nella Larsen’s short story “Sanctuary,” unfortunately, was almost certainly adapted from British author Sheila Kaye-Smith’s story “Mrs. Adis.” While Larsen’s version reflected her own unique history and the culture in which she was raised and lived as an adult, the similarities between the two stories were such that charges of plagiarism were valid. Even Larsen biographer George Hutchinson states in an endnote accompanying his book In Search of Nella Larsen: A Biography of the Color Line that the charge of plagiarism leveled against Larsen was “probably valid.” What made Larsen’s case particularly tragic, and one of the reasons she was unable to continue her career as a writer, was that, being of mixed-race with noticeably dark skin, she was unlikely to receive either the benefit of the doubt in early-20th century America or credit for being a legitimately-talented writer whose “crime” was minor, if that, and little different than what has occurred in the arts for centuries. The only writer, painter, or musician who was not influenced by at least one predecessor had to have existed in biblical times—specifically, within the timeframe of the Old Testament. Adapting a theme to one’s own circumstances, in fact, is very common, whether it was George Harrison’s “plagiarism” of Ronnie Mack’s “She’s so Fine” when he wrote his hit single “My Sweet Lord,” or the openly-acknowledged adaptation of Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness by film director Francis Ford Coppola and screenwriter John Milius for their surrealistic Vietnam War movie Apocalypse Now. Each generation of artist influences those that follow, and it may have been accurate to accuse Larsen of plagiarism, but it probably was not fair. The fact that Larsen had been seriously and unambiguously influenced by Edith Wharton, however, lent additional credence to the accusation.

In any event, the plagiarism case wounded Larsen’s literary career, but might not have ended it had not her marriage dissolved among accusations of infidelity on the part of her husband, Elmer Imes, a prominent African American physicist. The humiliation of the revelations of Imes’ infidelity and their subsequent divorce is believed to have so adversely affected Larsen that she was never able to recover emotionally or professionally from these two developments.


As to what criteria would have been used to exonerate Larsen or any other individual accused of plagiarism, that would depend upon certain facts in the individual case. Plagiarism is easy to detect in its most obvious form: the verbatim copying of another author’s words. Exonerating somebody from a charge of plagiarism when one or more passages of this person’s work was clearly taken from another source is more than a little difficult. Exonerating somebody whose work was thematically influenced by another writer, however, is another matter. As noted above, it is the very rare writer or artist who hasn’t been influenced during the course of his or her intellectual development by earlier generations of writers or artists. That is why jazz aficionados so enjoy linking disparate jazz musicians to each other; they have all been influenced to greater or lesser degrees by those who came before them, or to contemporaries they admire. Judgements regarding accusations of plagiarism, therefore, can be very subjective. It is this subjectivity that allowed for Larsen’s exoneration. As with political mud-throwing, however, once the charge is made and publicized, protecting one’s reputation is extraordinarily difficult, even if found innocent.

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