Plagiarism Scandal Hits Poetry Community
British poet David R. Morgan has been exposed as a plagiarist.
The poetry community is searching its soul after another case of multiple plagiarism emerged over the weekend.
Publishers and magazines have been working to take down poems and suspend sales of collections by David R Morgan after the American poet Charles O Hartman realised Morgan’s poem “Dead Wife Singing” was almost identical to his own, three-decades-old “A Little Song”.
Assiduous digging by the online poetry community, led by the poet and academic Ira Lightman, then discovered that Morgan, a British poet and teacher, had lifted lines and phrases from a host of different writers. One of Morgan’s poems, “Monkey Stops Whistling”, won him an award. Opening: “Stand to attention all the empty bottles, yes … // the long-necked beer bottles from the antique stores, / the wine bottles and pop bottles left on beaches; / steam off the labels and line the bottles up, the green ones / with the brown, black, yellow and clear ones,” it was found to be virtually identical to a 1981 poem by Colin Morton, “Empty Bottles”.
“When an American poet spotted his own poem under David R Morgan’s name on a website that blogs new work, he contacted its editor, and its editor contacted me. Within around one hour, I’d found a dozen more. Everything online by David R Morgan that I could find since Jan 2011 I could trace 90% of to another person’s poem,” said Lightman, who also discovered an alleged plagiarism of Roger McGough by Morgan dating back to 1982.
Read the entire article here.
And the “worst get-rich-quick scheme ever” award goes to….
Ha! That’s great.
Plagariste’
David Morgan downed some Captain Morgan
And found some buried treasure.
He dug up old words, lines, and poems
For his own wily pleasure.
Inspiration recycles every season
And isn’t really all that fussy.
A publication, a book signing, tenure–
Now you’re swimming in the pussy!
But you molested the muses you bastard!
And you proved some valid shit–
That the only person that really reads
A poem is the self-same poet who wrote it.
Second stanza killed me. Brilliance.
You need to write a ‘Lives of the Poets’ biographical sketch a la Suetonius’s ‘The Twelve Caesars’ and capture the essence of various poets and their motivations. This guy can be #5–Plagiarist Poet. Also to be included: ‘Self Doubter Poet’, ‘Exhibitionist Poet’, ‘Traveling Poet’, ‘Running Tally Publication Poet’, ‘Editor Poet’, ‘Jock Poet’, ‘Sex Poet’, ‘Geezer Poet’… Sorta akin to the Smurfs. ooo–‘Jokey Poet’–lmao!
i could shit my sporty spice shorts over how discriminating my brain is- some yuppie with skillfully trimmed facial hair plagarized dead poets? it’s like that bob dylan fiasco all over again.
i’m not too suprised the cover of the book i’ll bet he’s signing ripped off my lunar/trees theme i’ve been going at for years now.
Good to hear from you again, cerebella!
aww oh that’s so welcoming ohhhhh my god homecoming queen finally achieved etc.,
no but that’s nice rly thnx hi ‘sup
i really only lef that comment to be a troll. consciously. in case that isn’t like screaming in overtones all a’steaming caboose whistles. i think it all started one summer night in the back of my mind: distancing from people bc i can’t tell if i’m discerning or if everyone really does suck too much. it’s all such a landslide of projectile vomit that wont dry up no matter how many shopping carts i put back in their depots.
really i’m not cool with plagarism, though. personally i’m not into it bc of pride. but a friend put it like yesterday or whatever to this effect- it seems innocent at first than gets out of hand. (think salem witch trials except grown people who should’a gotten the hint about retribution by the time their ‘maladaptive behaviors’ chomp them back in the ass)
unless you’re pressurized by crunch time during high school writing an essay about some dry social studies textbook special feature…tot’ diff’ story.
one love