Victoria Ilyinsky, We’re Letting You Off With a Warning
The next Kaavya! The next Kaavya! That's the shrill-ish noise we're hearing from Cambridge, after the Crimson ran an editor's note yesterday apologizing for an Oct. 16 column by Victoria Ilyinsky '07. The column bore some similarities to a Slate piece on misuse of the word "literally." The relevant passages (via Steve Melendez '07 and his blog, Rabbits and Robots):
From Slate:
As is often the case, though, such "abuses" have a long and esteemed history in English. The ground was not especially sticky in Little Women when Louisa May Alcott wrote that "the land literally flowed with milk and honey," nor was Tom Sawyer turning somersaults on piles of money when Twain described him as "literally rolling in wealth," nor was Jay Gatsby shining when Fitzgerald wrote that "he literally glowed," nor were Bach and Beethoven squeezed into a fedora when Joyce wrote in Ulysses that a Mozart piece was "the acme of first class music as such, literally knocking everything else into a cocked hat."
From The Crimson:
Not only is "literally" one of many misleading terms, but it's also had multiple meanings for quite a while. The third aforementioned quote-"the land literally flowed with milk and honey"-comes straight from Louisa May Alcott's 1868 novel "Little Women." And who doesn't remember Fitzgerald's description of Jay Gatsby: "He literally glowed?" But neither was the town of Plumfield overrun with food-stuffs nor our favorite social climber actually luminescent.
Melendez notices how Ilyinsky makes the same points about "Janus words" and "contranyms" as the Slate writer and emerges unsympathetic:
My conclusion is that Ilyinsky plagiarized [Slate's] Sheidlower; of course, she may not have started writing with that intent, but it looks like that's what happened.
Honestly, we're not so sure. Ilyinsky definitely ganked the Slate author's ideas with no attribution whatsoever. But there's a line between honest mistake and you'll-never-work-in-this-town-again plagiarism/fabulism. We say Ilyinsky falls, with a couple inches to spare, on the honest-mistake side. The bigger sin is lazily revisiting tired subject matter that's been treated in a classic David Cross routine, this blog, and every pop grammar book ever. (IvyGate reserves the right to flip out if more infractions come to light.)
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October 24th, 2006 at 11:57 am
I literally shit my pants when I read this.
October 25th, 2006 at 10:18 am
Wow, this reporting is so misleading. You cut and pasted her article together to create similarities where they didn’t exist. If you ever want to be considered an actual source, you better start presenting the facts truthfully, and stop relying on google and the facebook to do your investigative work. Good thing Victoria neither plagerized nor copyied from the Slate article- the same two literary references to the word “literally” are EVERYWHERE on the internet, it is almost impossible NOT to find those two quotes when doing any research on the word. Please, find something better to do with your time than ripping apart a talented writer who’s column is arguably the most interesting the Crimson has to offer.
October 25th, 2006 at 11:56 am
Maybe Victoria should stop relying on “Google and The Facebook” for clever references that she can try to pawn off as her own.
October 25th, 2006 at 11:58 am
This is ridiculous. I am Tory’s sister and I completely agree with the above blog. The one point I will concede is that Tory’s article may not be novel or inspired, but that certainly doesn’t make it palagrism. So what you’re basically saying is that an author can’t write about an idea or topic already broached at some point in the history of literature lest she be accused of “ganking”. Yikes, that doesn’t leave too many topics left in the world, amazing we even have newspapers and magazines. Plus, I thought Tory did a great job applying the idea to her world – her campus, her friends and herself – and that IS a novel perspective. I googled the two quotes Tory used in an effort to see how many times they came up (as did the above blogger) and I too had to stop counting. The saddest part for me about this accusation and its aftermath is that I know Tory to be honest and hardworking and I fear that this incident may stifle her creative spirit and love for the written word.
October 25th, 2006 at 7:38 pm
Please see my reply at http://ftp.campustap.com.
October 25th, 2006 at 7:41 pm
D’oh! That link is broken. Try http://ftp.campustap.com
October 25th, 2006 at 9:28 pm
“The saddest part for me about this accusation and its aftermath is that I know Tory to be honest and hardworking and I fear that this incident may stifle her creative spirit and love for the written word.”
Drama queen, anyone? Yes, after all, the intense media spotlight currently focused upon Ms. Ilyinsky is too much for anyone to effectively bear. I guess she better literally start looking for work at some supermarket or construction site now that Ivygate and Steve Melendez are on the case.
October 27th, 2006 at 4:32 pm
I’d still do her.
October 28th, 2006 at 9:33 am
I think she sucks. she’s a huge bitch and shes getting what she deserves
November 30th, 2006 at 3:12 pm
I know this girl’s sister (I assume it is the older one from Tufts), I know her routine, and I know the constant drama. Get off of your high horses and take some responsibility for being dishonest. See, this is where growing up spoiled and self-righteous literally (whoops) leads to an inability to handle rough times and real life ahead. Good luck with all that.