Based on the best selling novel

[Lee Chambers]

If you wanted to write a story based on a piece of non-fiction, exactly how would you go about it as far as legality and trying to avoid being seen as a plagiarist?

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Depends on what kind of non-fiction it is. Is it a newspaper or magazine story? A history book? A confidential report? An article in a journal? Are you just trying to fictionalize something that happened, or do you want it to still seem real?

I take it you want to use the plot from reality. Reality isn't copyrighted. I think you can fictionalize newspaper stories to your heart's content.

Details. We need details.

 

[Lee Chambers]

Depends on what kind of non-fiction it is. Is it a newspaper or magazine story? A history book? A confidential report? An article in a journal? Are you just trying to fictionalize something that happened, or do you want it to still seem real?

I take it you want to use the plot from reality. Reality isn't copyrighted. I think you can fictionalize newspaper stories to your heart's content.

Details. We need details.

The book is called "101 Things to Do Before You Die" and basically serves as a detailed checklist of things that a person should try. They range from having a threesome to meeting someone with your own name, conquering your fear, winning an award, living to 100 and even continuing your gene pool.

I got the idea to write a series of stories with maybe 50 of the things from this book where the character receives a similar book and decides to do everything in it. Of course, every activity he works in ends up involving sex in some way even if it wasn't the original goal of the activity.

I think the book is really great but I don't want people to hammer me about "You stole this guy's idea". I just want to write a fictional adventure of someone who might buy such a book.

 

[3113]

First thing you should do, and I say this quite seriously, is to check and see if someone hasn't already bought the rights to it and is making some kind of film (fictional or otherwise) based on it. Because if a film company has bought said rights, then they will guard it fiercely and bring a lawsuit against anyone else trying to use it however innocently.

If it's free and clear, then what you're talking about, essentially, is "The Bucket List." The idea is not copyrighted--there have been plenty of stories and movies before about people deciding they must do something before they die--whether it's just a suggestion from a friend or something said to them by a guru or, as in "The Bucket List" a list they come up with for themselves.

If you steal this guys suggestions one after the other, then you might get into trouble, but the idea of doing certain things before you die is hardly a new one or a copyrighted one.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I use material thats at least 100 years old, mostly 1890s obscure periodicals....like local newspapers. H.L.Mencken confessed that many of the strange stories in these papers were entirely fiction and got passed around & embellished. He did it himself.

 

[incubus666]

I would think if your fictional protagonist found he/she had a year to live and he/she decided to do several things they wanted to do in their life and had never done it would be fine.

Use your own thoughts as a guide. What would you do if you only had a year to live?

 

[Lee Chambers]

I would think if your fictional protagonist found he/she had a year to live and he/she decided to do several things they wanted to do in their life and had never done it would be fine.

Use your own thoughts as a guide. What would you do if you only had a year to live?

The original premise wasn't going to be a bucket list. It was basically the main character picking up the book that I mentioned or some variant of it (101 different stories is a bit much) and then write about his naughty adventures as he tries to complete everything on the list.

After reading some things here, I think I'm going to go with the basic idea but with some alterations to avoid troublesome copyright issues.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Personally, I would make a parody of the book. Call it 101 Things To Do While You're Still Alive and just use the ideas from the original book. Use of copyrighted content is allowed for the sake of parody and satire, and people who cared would know what book you're referring to and understand that you're just doing a take-off on it. No one's going to accuse you of plagiarism if you're satirizing a book.

Everyone from Mad Magazine and porno films has used this technique to access otherwise copyright-protected material.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

DOC

I found an old copy of THE AMERICA JOURNAL OF INSANITY circa 1914, and want to do something with an article titled COLORED PSYCHOSES. An MD named Mary O'Malley wrote a long article about the special problems blacks have because of their inferior racial status and their child-like minds.

According to Dr. O'Malley, American blacks were inferior even in Africa, where robust tribes displaced them and forced them to settle along the coasts. There they were easy prey for slavers. In America they bred with white men, and this made a bad situation worse. The intereracial breeding allowed their imaginations to dominate their reasoning, resulting in a 'lower race' that is child-like, even after maturation.

Maybe I'll just add it to the Library of the Institute for Advanced Racial Studies.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

I can see why this article appeared in the Journal of Insanity.

That makes sense. Displacing inferior tribes from the interior of the continent to the much more desirable coasts?

That reminds me of the position of the American Psychological Association (or somesuch high-powered group) who declared in the post-war era that children didn't need family love, and suggested parents only kiss or hug their children on two occasions each year--the child's birthday and the parent's--as more contact than this would render the children soft and effete.

The social sciences are always at the forefront of bullshit.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

DOC

I can tell you some stories about how bizarre and absurd the psychiatric business is. Local mental health centers are strange enough, but the state hospitals are other-worldly.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

That reminds me of the position of the American Psychological Association (or somesuch high-powered group) who declared in the post-war era that children didn't need family love, and suggested parents only kiss or hug their children on two occasions each year--the child's birthday and the parent's--as more contact than this would render the children soft and effete.

Right. Thanks Dr. Skinner. The man who put his daughter in a box.

 

[cantdog]

If you wanted to write a story based on a piece of non-fiction, exactly how would you go about it as far as legality and trying to avoid being seen as a plagiarist?

Christ, historical novels are commonplaces. You can't plagiarize reality.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I read a quote about F.Scott Fitzgerald recently. One critic praised THIS SIDE OF PARADISE as 'The Collected Works of F. Scott Fitzgerald!' Another critic added, ' and the collected works of H.G.Wells, etc.'