Books featured in Issue 64, Winter 2019

Occupational Hazard

Derek Robinson on plagiarism

As the recent Da Vinci Code spat demonstrated, complaints of plagiarism reach far beyond Aussie mapmakers. When Arthur Halliwell created his hefty film guide, he added a non-existent movie which in due course trapped a rival directory of films. Justice was swift. When Nigel Rees – he of ‘Quote Unquote . . .’ – published his Dictionary of Twentieth Century Quotations, he slipped in a dummy quote credited to one Guy Simon (Rees’s pen name). Eventually HarperCollins bought the dummy and Guy Simon appeared in their Collins Dictionary of Quotations, a little bit of larceny for which they paid, in sterling. And when Antonia Fraser wrote her classic life of Mary, Queen of Scots, she thoughtfully inserted a burglar alarm. At Mary’s execution (Lady Antonia said) Lord Shrewsbury’s face was ‘wet with tears’. It was an invention. Later, James Mackay’s book on Mary copied it, and the alarm rang.

1 Dec 2006

Books featured in SF Issue 64

Going Solo (No. 49)

Merivel

The Gustave Sonata

Restoration

The Slaves of Solitude

Being an Actor

The Death of the Heart

The Wolves of Willoughby Chase

Rosie

The Levant Trilogy

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