3 thoughts on “The Man in Me.”

  1. Your attitude surprises me, Kevin. Is plagarism only for historians like Doris Kearns Goodwin or Stephen Ambrose (couldn’t find permalink in your archives, but see 1/11/02)?

    While Junichi Saga may have the correct attitude (sincerest form of flattery and all that), it still seems to me that sicne Dylan did not give any credit at all to the Saga’s work (or the work of the translator?) it is plagarism.

    I am curious to hear what Bob has to say about all this.

  2. Well, yeah, sort of. I do believe plagiarism in the academy is a much more serious offense than what happened here. Stealing other people’s words in a purely writerly craft (and one where the author claims to speak for veracity) is something altogether different than setting other people’s words to music, which is a pretty standard practice. Simon and Garfunkel’s “Richard Cory” ripped off Edwin Arlington Robinson…no harm no foul. And Dylan himself has taken lines from dozens of other works and incorporated them into his music. As noted in Song and Dance Man III, most of the lyrics (and melodies) that we consider Classic Dylan are just variations on old blues riffs.

    Moreover, one would be hard-pressed to argue that Floater (which, to be honest, is a song I don’t like very much) has much to do with feudal lords or the Yakuza, even if three lines from the song were from Saga’s book. Again, I think this is quite different from Stephen Ambrose passing off someone else’s writing on WWII as HIS writing on WWII.

    Plus, the album is called Love & Theft. 😉 (And I don’t think he credits this book either, which clearly was an influence.)

  3. I think I will respectfully disagree. IMHO, if one takes the works of others and doesn’t include either quotations or at least a mention in the liner notes (appendix, etc), it is intellectual theft. I don’t think it matters if it is in a comic book, a song, a web log or history book.

    If I had read about this on GitM, and then wrote the following on my site:

    “The Man in Me. Some Japanese dude finds himself quoted in Dylan. I think he’s got the right attitude about it…I’m not sure this really constitutes plagiarism.”

    Would you call me on it? Would you write me an email and say “Scully, you could have at least wrote something original.” Or would you simply blush it off?

    A friend of mine tried to argue this by saying “Dude, I would be so honored if Dylan ripped my words off to put in a song.” I countered by asking if he would feel the same way if it was Michael Jackson. He didn’t.

    Plagarism is bad no matter what the medium is. It is stealing a part of someone else, and it is wrong.

    I sure wonder what Dylan will say (if anything).

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