It took no more than a few minutes of reading Jonathan Lethem's "The Ecstasy of Influence" for me to understand exactly what Lethem was describing. It instantly brought to mind a quote that I read a while back that I thought better summarized my feelings on the subject. The quote is from one of my favorite directors of all time Quentin Tarantino, who when being question by a reporter about his style replied, "I steal from every single movie ever made. If people don't like that, then tough tills, don't go and see it, all right? I steal from everything. Great artists steal, they don't do homages." Sure, this quote makes him sound like a jackass, which may not even be too far from the truth, but it serves my purposes quite well. And that is the reason why any person steals an idea, because it serves their purposes well. Students plagiarize to get a better grade. Quentin Tarantino copies story elements to make entertaining films. I steal his quote to better explain my thoughts. You'll notice that the common thread between all of these circumstances is that each thief steals to make better. Better grade. Better film. Better blog post. One personal experience I've had with this is the music that I listen to. I'm big on the house/trance scene in which many artists will take another artist's previously recorded track and do their own take on it (Lethem briefly touched on it in his essay when he told of King Tubby and Lee "Scratch" Perry). This act is called "remixing" and oftentimes one of these remixing artists will take a song that enjoyed a lot of mainstream success, like something of off the Billboard Top 40, and then take away all instrumentation and lay down a new track underneath the original vocals that better suit their personal tastes. Anyone could argue that this is stealing, these remixers are taking the words and vocal melodies that another artist wrote and putting their name on it, but you can't argue that they have bad intentions. In fact, these remixers are trying to make the song better, they feel that they can take this part of a song to form a better one. This is why all artists steal. Quentin Tarantino takes plot elements from other directors because he thinks he can do it better. People steal lines from texts because they feel it better suits their purposes. Ancient stories like the Odyssey are retold because writers feel like they can tell it in better, more relevant ways. It isn't a spiteful act, it is for progress.
and to further my point, here is a good remix
http://www.fileden.com/files/2009/5/27/2457799/Frankmusik%20-%20Confusion%20Girl%20%28The%20Aspirins%20For%20My%20Children%20remix%29.mp3
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I agree with you, Tom. Going back to the comment you made about remix artists taking a song from the "Billboard Top 40" and remixing it to their own liking. Many of the songs placed on the top 40, especially in the hip hop genre, are original lyrics recorded with the chorus, melody, or beat from other artist's songs. Take Gold Digger by Kanye West for example, the majority of that song is another artist's lyrics. But, people still listened to the song, and the song still made it to the top 40. Borrowing another artist's ideas to write a song is just like borrowing another authors ideas to write a book, or in our case, an essay. So would it be wrong for us, or even an author, to write an essay comprised mostly of someone else's work? If remix artists can take another artist's lyrics, mix them around and add his/her own little twist on it then why can't we do that with our writing without being criticized or penalized for it? Songs are stories, and listening to a song is just another form of reading. It is just like reading a book on tape.
ReplyDelete