Associated Press Article has Response from Cassie Edwards

Part of a series: Cassie Edwards 1: The First Post | Cassie Edwards 2: Savage Longings | Cassie Edwards Part 3: Running Fox | Cassie Edwards Part 4: Savage Moon | Cassie Edwards Part 5: Savage Beloved | Follow-up: Penguin (Part 1?) | Official Statement from Signet | AP Article Contains Response from Edwards  | RWA Responds to Allegations  | A centralized document for the Cassie Edwards situation


An Associated Press article has a response from author Cassie Edwards to the allegations that “she lifted work from texts:”

[Edwards] acknowledged that she sometimes “takes” her material “from reference books,” but added that she didn’t know she was supposed to credit her sources.

“When you write historical romances, you’re not asked to do that,” Cassie Edwards told The Associated Press, speaking earlier this week from her home in Mattoon, Ill.

Edwards then asked her husband to get on the phone. He told the AP that his wife simply gets “ideas” from reference books.

“She doesn’t lift passages,” Charles Edwards said, adding that “you would have to draw your own conclusions” on how closely his wife’s work resembles other sources.

 

The article also quotes plagiarism software detection developer John M. Barrie as saying that she “had indeed lifted material,” and Sherry Lewis, president of the RWA, is also quoted: “It’s not clear-cut to me,” she said. “You can see similarities in the passages, but I’m not qualified to make that assertion.”

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  1. Ros says:

    Jane, I think you’re quite right.  I wonder if the media isn’t a better tool than the law in this instance.  Shame may be more powerful than guilt in getting action.  If Penguin’s name is properly dragged through the mud, it seems to me they might be persuaded to take action to stop this kind of thing happening again.  I think maybe it would be more effective to focus on the actions of the publisher in allowing this to go out, than on Edwards herself.  What do you think?

  2. bev Stephans says:

    “I didn’t know the gun was loaded”, as she stepped over the body.  Ms Edwards is full of it!

    RWA is also full of it.  E-Publishers are out, plagiarism is in.  For god’s sake, when is that organization going to get their act together?

    Good to see that AP picked up on the story.  It will be interesting to see what happens, if anything.

  3. ardith says:

    It makes me feel sad, too. Plagiarism sucks monkey balls. Her explanation is so freakin’ lame. *Grrr*

    You know, even though I haven’t published a real book, I have had someone take a fanfiction I wrote and made it into her own. She took the plot and whole passages. Just replaced the characters I was writing about with her favorite characters.

    But since mine was on the internets since like 1998, she was hunted down by one of my old readers who harassed her and then alerted me.

    I mean, it isn’t the best story in the world, but I came up with it. I asked her to take her story down and she did right away, denying that she did anything wrong.

    But again, she was a 15 year old girl. NOT a published writer. The internet can expose everything.

    I wonder if CE thought, Hm, my readers aren’t the sort of ladies who’d surf the internet and find these handy informational passages that I plan to just drop right into my story.

  4. Teddy Pig says:

    Which brings up a question I’ve been meaning to ask.  Any of you academic folks out there have access to TurnItIn?  ‘Cause it’d be pretty interesting to see the resulting analysis on one of CE’s books.

    Nikki, You bring up the one most damning thing I have been considering all day. It took me oh about all of 5 minutes tops to find a 2003 review of the best Anti-Plagiarism available on the market. Turnitin came out with flying colors because it does batch work.

    Now talking standards in publishing…

    Why the hell is no one in publishing using this convenient software for CYA?

    Am I the only one that keeps getting the feeling no one wants to do anything but continue to shrug their shoulders and run huge publishing firms based on finger crossing and the honor system?

  5. Barbara says:

    I have read this post about the allegation of plagiarism against Cassie Edwards by “the plagiarism software detection developer, John M. Barrie, as saying that she “had indeed lifted material,” while Sherry Lewis, president of the RWA, is also quoted: “It’s not clear-cut to me,” she said. “You can see similarities in the passages, but I’m not qualified to make that assertion.” “

    Anyone who has read these comments either in this blog or in the press is NOT in a position to say that Cassie Edwards plagiarized material. Ms Lewis is correct in making the statement she did, and Mr. Barrie, despite his expertise, has committed slander which is a crime, and the press ought to know better for printing libelous comments. It matters not whether the statements made against Cassie Edwards are true or not; if the comments are harmful to her reputation then Ms Edwards has the right to litigate against those parties.

    It is up to a court of competent jurisdiction to decide whether or not the allegations are true.

    My comment to the owners of this blog on this topic is that I never thought to come across a wild pack of dogs ready to tear one of their own apart in public. Shame on you.

  6. Goblin says:

    Oh, for goodness’ sake, Barbara. One of our “own”?

    I’m not a thief or a plagiarist, thank you very much.

  7. Teddy Pig says:

    I’m not a plagiarist. *looks around* Anyone here a plagiarist?
    Barbara wants a word with you for attacking your own.

  8. Teddy Pig says:

    Oh what I would give for an ARC of Stolen Thunder.

  9. Sphinx says:

    Wild dogs?  Have some perspectives.  If anything, she’s being torn apart by black-footed ferrets.

  10. Nikki says:

    Nikki, You bring up the one most damning thing I have been considering all day. It took me oh about all of 5 minutes tops to find a 2003 review of the best Anti-Plagiarism available on the market. Turnitin came out with flying colors because it does batch work.

    Teddy, one of the reasons I’d love to see a report from TurnItIn is because of the inherent impartiality of the program. 

    Naysayers point the finger and cry, “Witch hunt!” when the evidence is coming from the SBs. 

    But a computer program that has no perceived pre-existing bias against poor, widdle Cassie Edwards?  Priceless.

    Plus, out of simple curiosity, I’d like to know if it supports or refutes my first report to the SBs on SAVAGE BELOVED.  Not that I doubt myself—because I fully stand by everything I said—but it’s always nice to have supporting statements from a third party.

  11. Teddy Pig says:

    Great idea Nikki! Print that report.

    While we’re waiting…

    You know what you call making a Cassie Edwards fangirl in denial angry?

    CEnile Agitation

  12. Nikki says:

    Since there seems to be quite a bit of disbelief regarding Ms. Edwards’ “borrowing and paraphrasing” as the PTB at Signet put it, I thought I’d toss a glass of water on the towering inferno.

    If nothing else, it’ll give us something to do while we wait for more Outraged Citizens to wade into the fray.

    Let’s play a game, boys and girls.  Okay, open a new window or tab in your browser and surf on over to books.google.com (that’s Google Books, for the slower kiddies in the back of the class).

    Good job.  Now enter in the words: doeskin moccasins wrought patterns.  No quotes needed, just four individual words.

    Go ahead.  I’ll wait for you.
    .
    .
    .
    Alright.  Hit enter and tell me what books pop up.  What?  Only two books out of the THOUSANDS of books on Google.  I can hardly believe it. 

    For the lazy kids who don’t do class assignments, the two books are SAVAGE OBSESSION by Cassie Edwards and LADY UNAFRAID by Joseph Raleigh Nelson.  S.O. was originally published in 1983 as the first book in the Savage series.  LADY UNAFRAID was originally published in 1951 and is, indeed, still under copyright. 

    Here are their respective quotes:

    SAVAGE OBSESSION page 49
    His beaded doeskin moccasins were wrought intricately in patterns of porcupine quills dyed rose, green, and blue…

    LADY UNAFRAID page 68
    … his doeskin moccasins were wrought in intricate patterns of porcupine quills dyed rose and green and blue.

    Anyone up for round two of Google Me This?

    (spamblocker: group31 Hmmm, I thought the classrooms capped at 30 students.)

  13. Nikki says:

    Teddy Pig, you are wrong yet oh so right sometimes.

  14. Alexandra says:

    The only problem with turnitin.com is that is does not recognize when a paper is actually citing their sources, and so any quoted material will come up as plagiarized.

    Ohhh…but this is *Cassie Edwards*, who has no reason to cite, footnote, or even give credit where it is most definitely due.  My bad.

  15. snarkhunter says:

    I just ran the passages Candy sent me through Turnitin. Here’s what I found:

    From Savage Hope:

    “p. 24: He was in his mother’s home, a traditional longhouse made of split cedar planks placed horizontally and lashed to upright poles with lengths of twisted cedar withes.”

    From a Washington State library online:

    “Traditional Makah houses were constructed of split cedar planks placed horizontally and lashed to upright poles with lengths of twisted cedar rope”

    This isn’t that damning. But there are others—it seems much of her information on the Makah people is definitely lifted.

    I’ll send a proper report to Candy in a couple of days, but since I just did this Turnitin thing, I’d thought I’d get it to you all tonight.

  16. R. says:

    Okay, being a research-aholic myself, I couldn’t resist Nikki’s challenge—

    I went to the given url and typed in the given four words,… and got only two, count ‘em, two returns.

    Cool!  So what’s for round 2?

  17. Savage Ferret says:

    quote:

    [Edwards] acknowledged that she sometimes “takes” her material “from reference books,” but added that she didn’t know she was supposed to credit her sources.

    translation:

    I’m just a poor little green 70-year-old author with no more that 100 books to my credit. How was I to know?

    quote:

    “When you write historical romances, you’re not asked to do that,” Cassie Edwards told The Associated Press, speaking earlier this week from her home in Mattoon, Ill.

    You’re not asked to not plagarize? I know I’m giving fuel to those who see this kerfluffle as a personal attack on CE, but I really can’t help but say that I’m beginning to think she’s not the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree.

    quote:

    The article also quotes plagiarism software detection developer John M. Barrie as saying that she “had indeed lifted material,” and Sherry Lewis, president of the RWA, is also quoted: “It’s not clear-cut to me,” she said. “You can see similarities in the passages, but I’m not qualified to make that assertion.”

    translation:

    There’s this thing in the middle of my face – it may be a nose, but who’s to say? Maybe it’s an ear. I’m no anatomist, so I’m really not qualified to make that assertion.

    quote:

    Mr. Barrie, despite his expertise, has committed slander which is a crime, and the press ought to know better for printing libelous comments.

    Oh, Christ on a cracker. Slander is NOT a crime, it’s a civil tort (did I get that phrasing right, lawyer-type people?).

    quote:

    Actually, I think that the ferret paragraph is pretty damning – the “researchers theorize” sentence is an exact lift.

    It’s always the ferret. I’ve seen it a million times. We’re a savage bunch, and we’ll get you in the end.

    Sorry for my inability to figure out a quote function. As I may have mentioned, I am but a poor, lowly (savage) ferret.

  18. Anna says:

    OK, I’m definitely with you all here. I have posted on Jenny Crusie’s blog (which i never, EVER do) to explain my stance that this plagiarism thing is, for once, not concurrent with hers, and that this is in the spirit of critical inquiry which is essential to smart women who read.

    Plagiarism is dishonest, and the reception these claims have gotten on this thread and many others tells us what the non-legal consequences of plagiarism are; namely, reader betrayal. Even those of us that don’t like Edwards’ books feel betrayed.

    I understand the gut wrenching wrongness of the whole thing. You have a right to express your anger, frustration and anything else you want.

    I am not a fan of Cassie’s books or her ethical choices.

    But you guys are starting to sound like bitches. Not Bitches, either. just… plain old bitches.

    Pursue the facts and chill the hell out.

  19. I’d love to see these passages. Anyone know where they are? BTW – love your blog.

  20. Anonymous says:

    Boo me if you will but isn’t Cassie Edwards kind of old? Not that I’m using her age as an excuse but…If she felt the need to put her husband on the line that must have meant something. Maybe she’s frail and confused? Maybe she really didnt know. Didn’t she start writing in the early 1900’s. Things were surely different back then.

  21. LadyRhian says:

    I don’t think her age can really excuse her. I mean, Students back then had to footnote and cite sources, they just didn’t have the internet to make things easier for them.

    I mean, goodness knows, the woman can’t write unwooden prose worth a damn. All her books come off like they were hewn out of tree limbs, to me.

    I’ve only once plagiarized and it was into a journal I kept. I didn’t think it fit right, so I never did it again. Some live and learn. Some, apparently, never do. Maybe Cassie Edwards is so, well, I was going to use “dim”, but that’s really an insult… so naive that she assumed that the first time she did it, she wasn’t caught out or even “talked to” by her publisher, so she assumed it was all right. But that still doesn’t make it any less stinky a thing to do. It really is too bad that Candy and Sarah can’t forward the information to the nearest and dearest of the departed authors so that they can take action against Cassie Edwards and Penguin/Signet. Because really, if Penguin/Signet assumed it’s okay, they should be the ones penalized. It was their duty/job to catch this and nip it in the bud, and their mishandling of the whole situation is what is going to get them sued.

    Maybe having to pay actual money will get them to straighten up and fly right, so to speak. We can only hope.

  22. barano says:

    First the Harry Potter Encyclopaedia controversy, then this – I’m astonished at seeing supposedly well-educated and intelligent people simply not getting it.

    “Only gets ideas”? The sources are copied verbatim, anyone with a working eye can see it. Sure, they’re just sentences or sentence fragments, about relatively trivial things, but you can’t just copy-paste stuff from your sources and leave it at that, even if it’s technically legal for whatever reason. Especially when you prize yourself on your “meticulous research.”

    I have a feeling these people honestly don’t understand that the problem is not using sources and not crediting them – obviously no-one expects a romance (or anything else, for that matter) writer to be an expert on, say, ferrets. (Oh, the ferrets!) Of course she has to use sources, and I’ll go as far as saying she really doesn’t have to credit them, in my opinion, as long as they’re only for trivia.

    But using sources and copy-pasting sentences without referencing the source, then letting yourself be praised as a meticulous researcher? Is not the same thing as simply “getting ideas.” Jesus Christ.

  23. Very impressed by the AP article.  WTG on breaking this, Bitches.  I’m interested to see what happens next as the story continues to grow.

  24. I can well understand the RWA’s caution.

    Can anyone explain how the Cassie Edwards alleged plagarism materially differs from the Dan Brown plagarism judgement?

    I am thinking about this part of Mr Justice Peter Smith’s judgement from March 2007:

    It would be quite wrong if fictional writers were to have their writings pored over in the way The Da Vinci Code has been pored over in this case by authors of pretend historical books to make an allegation of infringement of copyright.

    I accept that if that was allowed to happen it would have a serious impact on writing.

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/4888506.stm

    I am not defending what Cassie Edwards did, just wondering why the judge’s ruling was ignored as it would seem her copying is not archetectural and limited to general facts. And why the doctrine of *fair use* as laid done in the judgement is not being applied here, regardless of what one expert is saying.
    Is everyone clear what *fair use* is? Signet appear to be. The judges in the Dan Brown case were.

    It is not clear cut as the Brown case proved. Dan Brown, despite having copied some of the Holy Blood/Holy Grail book is not considered by the courts in both the US and the UK to be a plagarist and he did not infringe copyright as his copying was low level and general.

    Thus in my very humble view, the RWA is right to be cautious until it has been proven one way or another in a court of law.

    Cassie Edwards is like anyone else entitled all due protection of the law. She is an ALLEGED plagarist who may or may not be found guilty of the offence. But it would have to be a proper trial and not a media witch hunt.

  25. barano says:

    Michelle,
    The fact that she’s a plagiarist is right here in this blog. There are many evidences that simply can’t be refuted. She has copied verbatim from her sources, and this counts as plagiarism. Not “high level” plagiarism, sure – the excerpts in this blog are limited to trivia about nature and Native American culture, and do not form an important part of her stories (I suppose, I haven’t read any of her books). Frankly, I don’t expect any serious consequences, simply because what she plagiarized belongs to the “who cares” category for most people. But it’s plagiarism nonetheless, made worse by the fact that we’re talking about an award-winning author. The facts speak for themselves.

    At the moment, CE is an alleged copyright breaker. So far all the sources the SBs have checked are in public domain, so there’s no proof if she’s broken any laws. Which is what most of her defenders emphasize, conveniently forgetting that you don’t necessarily have to break the law to do something wrong.

  26. barano says:

    Michelle,
    There’s no witch hunt, and CE is no “alleged” plagiarist. The proof that she’s a plagiarist is right here in this blog: the evidences that simply can’t be refuted. She has copied verbatim from her sources, and this counts as plagiarism. Not “high level” plagiarism, sure – the excerpts in this blog are limited to trivia about nature and Native American culture, and do not form an important part of her stories (I suppose, I haven’t read any of her books). Frankly, I don’t expect any serious consequences, simply because what she plagiarized belongs to the “who cares” category for most people. But it’s plagiarism nonetheless, made worse by the fact that we’re talking about an award-winning author. The facts speak for themselves.

    What a trial could decide is whether she has broken any laws. So far all the sources the SBs have checked are in public domain, so there’s no proof that what she’s done anything illegal. Which is what most of her defenders emphasize, conveniently forgetting that you don’t necessarily have to break the law to do something wrong.

  27. barano says:

    Eeh, sorry for the mistakes, my English is not very good at this time of the day.

  28. To be fair, if I got a phone call from the press telling me I was being accused of plagiarism I’d be in shock.  I don’t know if I’d ask my partner to take the call for me, but if I did it wouldn’t mean I was weak in all areas of my life.  Honest!

  29. DS says:

    I didn’t follow the Brown thing closely but from what I read he wasn’t accused of lifting passages, he was accused of stealing his plot from the nonfiction book’s theory.  I wasn’t surprised at the outcome. 

    With regard to CE, she lifted actual text with few, if any changes.

  30. Anna Katz says:

    You people are pathetic. I’ve read the quotes and she didn’t do anything wrong. The quotes are different. Plagiarising something is when you steal a quote word for word without crediting it. She never did that. Just because she used a lousy phrase, big deal. You people really need to get a life. Instead of sitting on your lazy asses devoting your life to seeing if someone who’s written 100 books borrowed 2 or 3 words, maybe you could develop a life of your own and actually accomplish something of your own with your pathetic mundane existance. When you write 100 books, or even ONE, then we’ll talk. Then we’ll pick apart your book, word for word, and have a bunch of bored pathetic self-proclaimed “bitches” sit there for months cross-referencing each word and phrase and God forbid you use a phrase that someone else once used, then there will be hell to pay. At least that woman has accomplished something with her life unlike you people who obviously have no life and nothing better to do than to sit on your fat asses proclaiming what “bitches” you are (your words, not mine). At least you seem to have gotten the later part right. Hey, maybe next you can analyze music and singers and bands and songs, and dissect those, just to make sure none of them have ever used a single note that anyone else in all of history has ever used before. And if they have, by all means, go nuts and post thousands of comments freaking out about that. You people are truly lifeless and pathetic.

  31. Julie Leto says:

    Bev, I don’t think it’s fair to say that RWA believes “plagiarism is in” based on one sound bite from a brand new RWA president.

    I say this because as I wrote on Dear Author, RWA acted swiftly and responsibly in taking care of a plagiarism issue for a friend of mine.  The offending author was booted out of the organization and chastised for her actions.  The whole incident was very hush-hush, mainly because the author who was stolen from wanted it that way.  She didn’t want a big deal made out of it because the publisher of the other book acted swiftly in pulling the book (an ebook) from distribution on both their site and other sites like Fictionwise.

    That said, I do not agree with the way the president handled this interview.  I think it is very important that the spokesperson for the national organization take greater care in issuing any statement at all.

  32. From my experience, women “of a certain age” often ask their husbands to handle anything upsetting or difficult.  They may be fully capable of handling it themselves, but it’s just a default reaction to put the husband on the phone.  That was my first thought when I read she’d done that—dunno if my opinion is worth anything on that or not.

    Yay trolls!  2 or 3 words???  *rolls on floor laughing*  Love it.

  33. Nora Roberts says:

    “When you write 100 books, or even ONE, then we’ll talk.”

    *raises hand*

    Okay, let’s talk. Plagiarism is copying another’s work and calling it your own. Minor paraphrasing doesn’t change the offense.

    I do not have a lazy ass, though I sit on it for considerable stretches of time. To write. Using my own words.

    Repeating a single phrase or two within the body of a book—not plagiarism. Wholesale copying of passages with a bit of tweaking here and there? Plagiarism.

    And that is the issue. Plagiarism.

  34. Oh, and btw, I don’t have 100 books out, only 13, but feel free to run ‘em through TurnItIn if you like.  I have no fear.

  35. Marianne McA says:

    And, in the report you linked to Michelle, the judge does say:

    ‘I believe that their work was genuinely and clearly acknowledged.’

    Not a lawyer, and don’t live in the US, but would there ever be a trial? You can see why they tried to sue Dan Brown – because of the sheer amount of money involved, but it’s hard to imagine it would be worth anyone’s while to sue for this.

    And I don’t blame her at all for letting her husband take the call – I think when you grow older sometimes it does take longer to react to something. But on the other hand, I think age has nothing to do with understanding it’s wrong to copy: I’m sure my 75 year old mother learnt that at school.

  36. Part of the Brown case did revolve on his copying part of the Holy Blood and the Holy Grail into the da Vinci Code.In fact the judge said that he did. Mr Dan Brown in the court’s judgement did not infringe on the language copyright. It is not what he was accused of plagarising even though he did copy parts.

    To quote from the judgement of Mr Justice Peter Smith:

    There are grounds that Mr Brown copied language from The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail.

    I do not accept they are evidence of copyright infringement by substantial copying whether textual or non-textual, as they are as I have said too general and too low level of abstraction.

    I stress it is no part of the claimants’ case that any language copying is a copyright infringement in respect of their book

    At the moment, because it has not been tested in a court of law, I have no idea if Cassie Edwards’s alleged copying was substantial and therefore broke the doctrine of fair use. The RWA can have no idea either.

    What I am saying is that until such a time, it is wise to be cautious as it is not always as clear cut and there is this doctrine of *fair use*.

    It is a pretty far ranging judgement and does need to be taken into consideration.

    Therefore, it is right that the RWA is cautious and say—it is not clear cut.

    If allegations of plagarism are going to be made against fiction writers then the latest judgements do have to be taken into consideration.

  37. Gab says:

    I’m about to start my last year of high school and I know that it might not count for much when I seem to be surrounded by lawyers and writers and people with more life experience than me. But ever since I started high school plagiarism and copyrighting have been major issues. We’ve done countless workshops with names like “All My Own Work” and we have to cite every single piece of information that we get, whether we are paraphrasing it or just using it as a little bit of background research. Our teachers have also been kind enough to use threats to keep us in line. They have a program (which I think is like turnitin.com) that catches plagiarism and all of our assessments and essays are put through that system. If we are caught with anything that is taken from another source we fail and get a zero.

    I don’t want to snark or anything like that but I just wanted to say that if my school goes to all that trouble to ensure that we don’t plagiarise in high school, then why dont publishers do it? Or do they? I’m confused about that. Is it that they trust the author to be original and innovative that they don’t check?

    Sorry if that’s a stupid question but I was just really wondering about that. If she’s written 100 books why has it only come out now?

    Good work to the SB’s for finding it =)

  38. Alecia says:

    I wonder how much money the “poor old dear” has made from these books. I’m not a fan so I don’t feel personally betrayed but I would be very upset if this type of thing became a trend. Regardless of whether or not a personally like a book, I’d like to able able to trust that the author is getting paid for work he/she did themselves.

  39. Unhappy Bitch says:

    Bull.

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