On the afternoon of March 20, in response to the alleged plagiarism of the writer Mo Yin's novel "Beside the Word" published in 2009, the writer Lin Peiyuan finally apologized publicly online, "I have not had the courage to face this problem for so many years." This matter has become a knot and a shadow in my heart," he said in a strong tone, "I'm sorry!" Please forgive me! ”
13 years ago, Lin Peiyuan was a rising literary star, the first prize winner of the two consecutive new concept essay competitions, and a contracted writer of Guo Jingming's popular youth literature magazine "Minimal", and his first novel "Bo Twilight" had more than 40,000 royalties. 7 years older than him, Mo Yin has just emerged in the literary circle, and the first science fiction novel "Moonlight Flower" will not be published until 3 years after the incident. At that time, after the accusation of plagiarism of Silent Yin was issued, Lin Peiyuan chose to be silent, and fans tried their best to maintain it, and the matter was not resolved.
"Maybe I'm also a standing writer now, saying that Lin Peiyuan no one will say that he is throwing dirty water at him, and things have been seen by more netizens." Mu Yin said. This time, after the accusations continued to ferment on the Internet for 3 days, Lin Peiyuan made a public apology.
"But his apology letter was not forwarded to me at the same time on Weibo, I only learned about it from a friend." Mo Yin felt that this belated apology was not so sincere, and also said that he did not want to have a private connection with Lin Peiyuan.
Plagiarism is frequent, and the old things are mentioned again
Mo Yin told First Finance and Economics that the reason why she mentioned the old matter of plagiarism was because recently Douban netizens Xiangyun and Gaslemov publicly spoke out about the fact that the log was plagiarized by other papers and publications. In the comments, many netizens told their own experiences, such as some people saying that their works were copied and sold at a low price, and found the plagiarists theory, but the other party was justified, and in turn accused her of "inflated pricing", "That disgusting feeling has not been digested until now." ”
For the grievances and resentment of the "literary weak" in the process of defending their rights after being plagiarized, Mo Yin can feel it too much. On the afternoon of March 17, she re-retweeted on Weibo the statement she had posted after the novel "By the Flip-Flops" had been plagiarized by Lin Peiyuan in 2010. Science fiction writer Han Song and the WeChat public account of Shanghai Literature magazine expressed their support at the first time, and the Weibo reading volume of the statement exceeded 100,000 times in just two days. "I don't know why so many people pay attention to this time, maybe the network is too developed now, and I didn't expect it when I forwarded it." Mo Yin said that the apology can be promoted by pure chance, he just wants to explain the ins and outs of the matter, and has no intention of continuing to pursue responsibility, "For me, speaking out and getting many people's responses, I feel that I can already let go of this matter." ”
Writer Han Song revealed on Weibo that many netizens are very angry about this matter, especially on Lin Peiyuan's often active Douban network, where people continue to give him a star in the literary criticism collection "Common Sense of Novels" that he has just published this month. At present, Douban shows that the book has 69 short reviews and 1 book review, but all the comments cannot be displayed.
After seeing Mo Yin's statement, the first financial reporter sent a private message to Lin Peiyuan on Weibo, asking him to verify whether the accusation was true, but he had not received a reply.
Some netizens on Weibo also broke the news that at first, Lin Peiyuan still tried to remain silent. An editor of a publishing house once asked him to respond to this in a WeChat group with Lin Peiyuan and apologized to Muyin. But the group owner and the administrator are concerned about him and defend Lin Peiyuan, and suspect that the editor sent a screenshot of the chat information in the group, which caused the continuous attention of netizens. In the end, the editor was kicked out of the WeChat group.
Uneven and juvenile fame
In a Weibo article in solidarity with Mo Yin, Han Song said that she was a "famous young writer", but the road to fame was not smooth.
Mo Yin was born in Yunnan in 1980 to Shanghai Zhiqing parents. At the age of 14, she returned to Shanghai to prepare for the middle school entrance examination. Due to the completely different teaching materials in Yunnan and Shanghai, she entered a vocational school in the middle school entrance examination and went to the mall as a salesman after graduation.
She continued to pursue literary ideals in her spare time, starting from science fiction, did not expect to attract attention in a small test, published works in "Science Fiction World", and won the "Young Jules Verne" Award in 1996, with a "huge prize" of 300 marks, which gave her great encouragement. Later, Mo Yin became interested in Japanese, and with unremitting efforts to pass the adult self-examination, he was admitted to Shanghai Overseas Chinese University in 2007 to pursue a master's degree in Japanese literature.
After graduating, Mo Yin entered the publishing house as an editor, and engaged in literary writing and translation in his spare time. At that time, she got up at 6:30 in the morning, used the only full time of the day to write 1,000 words, and went out at eight o'clock to take the bus to work. It wasn't until she quit her job from the publishing house last year that she had more time to write.
In comparison, Lin Peiyuan's writing path is much smoother. Through the college entrance examination, he came to the department of Chinese of Shenzhen University from Chaoshan Town, won the first prize of the 9th and 10th National New Concept Essay Competition consecutively, was rated as a literary newcomer, was a contracted writer of the popular youth literature magazine "Minimal", and had a group of literary fans. In July 2009, Lin Peiyuan, who had not yet graduated from college, published his first novel "Bo Twilight", and the royalties alone took more than 40,000 yuan, and the Shenzhen media also made a special report on it.
"This glory also makes me lose my mind in a way." Thirteen years later, Mr. Lin said in his apology letter that he was soon backed by accusations of plagiarism.
13 years later he admitted to "borrowing the plot"
In August 2009, Mo Yin published the short story "Next to The Human Character" in the inaugural issue of another famous youth literature magazine at that time, "Carp". In December of that year, the magazine launched a special issue for its third anniversary, and it was soon discovered that Lin Peiyuan's novel "Dark Light" published on it was suspected of plagiarizing "Next to the Word".
Mo Yin recalled that after getting a copy of "Dark Light", the biggest impact in his heart was, "This is not only plagiarism, but also a clumsy rewrite." After comparing the two texts, the first financial reporter also found that "Dark Light" has obvious traces of plagiarism, and it is exactly the same or highly similar in plots such as "the boy the heroine knew when she was a child is three years older than her" and "hermaphroditism". It's just that Lin Peiyuan has changed some elements in the original work, such as changing the name of the character, changing the sea life to Runsheng, and changing the small fish to Ling Sheng.
Mo Yin immediately issued a statement on Douban, saying that his novel was "copied", although some netizens expressed support, but overall there was little response. Instead, Lin Peiyuan's fans have attacked her online. After that, the editorial board of "Carp" tried to contact Lin Peiyuan without success, and the matter was closed. "Maybe my voice is too weak." Silent said helplessly.
In the apology letter that was 13 years late, Lin Peiyuan restored the plagiarism process from his own point of view. He said he was a junior in his junior year when he wrote Dark Light, and the editor of Minimal Production told him that the third anniversary special issue was a particularly rare opportunity to "seize it." "It just so happened that he wanted to write a story about a wolf child, and he had a preliminary idea, but he wrote the beginning several times and it was difficult to continue. One day, while flipping through Carp magazine, he saw the novel "Herringbone", "under the influence of the story of 'hermaphrodites', borrowing the plot of "Hermosaurus", he wrote a story of a wolf child who was adopted, shaved his hair and became a human, and finally disappeared because he was not accepted by secular society." ”
At the same time, Lin Peiyuan argued that "'Next to Herringbone' expresses the theme of a hermaphrodite intersex person seeking and placing inner emotions and ultimately falling in love", while 'Dark Light' "wrote a story with 'wolf child' as the main character, expressing the theme of the tragedy of human and animal love, the inner tearing of 'half man and half wolf'". He believes that he is only "borrowing" from "Next to The Word", rather than simply copying the text, and also admits that he was "too young, too vain and impetuous, very immature in his literary view, and unclear in his understanding of the originality of the story."
Shame on the plagiarized
Mo Yin said that the plagiarism hit her hard and made her feel powerless, "The plagiarists are not just hanging a mask similar to the original, as people think, but directly taking away the faces of others - the originals who have been copied, in addition to anger, must feel some kind of loss." She once described her mood on Weibo.
"After it happened, I myself would have a sense of shame." Mo Yin told First Financial Economics, "For a simple example, although we can't be considered a famous writer now, he and I have produced several books each, which can also be said to be eating by writing, and there will be some invitations such as pen meetings and forums, but I am very afraid of meeting him." Before each time she accepted the invitation to the event, she would look at the guest list in advance to prevent meeting Lin Peiyuan, "because if I met, the other party was still indifferent, which was very embarrassing for me." Coincidentally, they have not had a chance to meet so far.
However, Mo Yin quickly raised his voice, "If I meet him in the future, I will definitely not feel embarrassed, because this matter has been openly and solemnly said by me this time, and many people have already seen it." ”
Lin Peiyuan said in his apology letter that he was shocked and confused in the face of Mo Yin's accusations, "How to define between plot borrowing and imitation and plagiarism?" If it is just a new story, using some plots, but injecting your own thinking, is this considered plagiarism? He also admitted that Dark Light was a "clumsy imitation and copycat" that did not include any collection of works, nor did it bring any literary awards or royalties, "this novel has always been a shame for me."
As for why he avoided apologizing at that time, Lin Peiyuan gave two explanations. One is that "friends who learned about this advised me not to respond", "I have always been timid and afraid of things, very afraid of causing quarrels and disputes, especially on the Internet, so I listened to advice and was silent." Second, after the publication of the novel "Bo Twilight" in 2009, it triggered fierce conflicts within the family, and he became "neurotic" and "the spirit brought great pain", and he did not want to face The accusations of Mu Yin.
Mr. Lin's apology letter was about 5,400 words, the part explaining the plagiarism process of Dark Light was about 1,500 words, and the experience of "mental pain" was written in nearly 1,800 words.
"Extremely unjust and unfair"
In the apology letter, Lin Peiyuan also used nearly 800 words to describe his changes after suspected plagiarism, saying that he "began to transform into the path of serious literature" and that his creation "has been fundamentally different from the youth literature of the university era."
Judging from the resumes published online, the plagiarism incident did not affect Lin Peiyuan's literary and academic development. After graduating from undergraduate, he studied for a master's degree in the College of Literature of Jinan University, and then went to Tsinghua University to study for a doctorate in the College of Literature, and married and had children. He is also very active on Weibo, with about 220,000 followers.
From 2010 to 2020, Lin Peiyuan published eight novels and short story collections, and the "Guide to Small Town Life" mentioned in the apology letter was also named the top ten novels of 2020 by Asia Weekly. Writer Ah Yi commented that he was "the representative of a new generation of academic novelists" and that the words given by the "Star of Zhong Shan" Literary Award were, "With elegant and restrained language and exquisite narrative skills", "speaking for the silent".
At the end of the apology letter, Lin Peiyuan insisted, "This work from my university days did not constitute the cornerstone of my novels for more than ten years, nor was it a masterpiece of my novels." The academic research and literary criticism work he engaged in after his doctoral studies have nothing to do with this novel. He also emphatically emphasized, "If you make this mistake when a person is young, you completely deny the results of this person's creation and labor for more than ten years." For me, it is extremely unjust and unfair, and it is also something that I cannot bear myself", "The achievements, stupidities and mistakes of youth writing should be said goodbye.".
In the years when Lin Peiyuan has gone forward smoothly, Mo Yin has also survived many hardships of the lonely writing period, and the road of literature and translation has become wider and wider. In addition to "Beside the Word", she has successively published novels such as "Moonlight Flower", "Jiama", "Star in the Abyss", "One Word Sixty Spring" and so on, switching freely in science fiction primary schools and pure literature. He has also won many literary awards, such as the 2015 Excellent Long Story Award of the Shanghai Writers Association and the 2017 Chinese Literature (Novel Category). Next year, the short story collection The Trailer will also be published.
She is also a prolific translator, translating many Japanese novels and non-fiction works, including "Masahiro-Ekimae Tada Convenience House", "Modern Times", "Iemori Akitan", "Snow Trainee", "Normal Body Temperature in Kyoto", and so on.
The first financial reporter noted that although Moyin's Weibo fans have less than 10,000 so far, on douban, the overall rating of her novels given by readers has always been higher than Lin Peiyuan.
Can the literary world purify itself?
After Lin Peiyuan's apology letter was issued, it caused a polarizing reaction. Nearly 2,000 people liked his Weibo to express their support, but many netizens also resented the arrogance and insolence hidden in the wording, "How difficult it is to write your own past history, being criticized by your family that you do not understand, and what does it have to do with this matter (apology)?" ”
Mo Yin said that when he saw the apology letter forwarded by others, his first reaction was "I think it is quite ridiculous, and then he forwarded a word-for-word analysis and comment on the apology letter by netizens in the circle of friends, and added the three words "language class" to indirectly express dissatisfaction. At the time, her emotions were more focused on a friend. The friend cried bitterly after seeing Mo Yin's Weibo about plagiarism experience on the subway, "She also had the experience of plagiarism, and she was copied by a writer with many fans, but there was no way to stop it." Not every plagiarized person's voice can be heard. ”
On the morning of March 21, when CBN contacted Moyin again, she said that after calming down and reading Lin Peiyuan's apology letter, she was a little angry, "I think he is not only sincere to me, but also insincere to all those who are watching this matter." A simple question is, if you write an apology letter and put it on a public platform, are you going to forward it to the person who apologized to you? He didn't. I now feel more sympathy for people who have the same experience. ”
Earlier, Han Song said on Weibo that he hoped that this incident would be like a mirror, "directly reflecting whether the literary world has a self-purification mechanism." Han Song said that Lin Peiyuan's "Common Sense of Novels" and "Guide to Small Town Life" have the praise and recommendation of well-known writers such as Ge Fei and Ah Yi, but if the literary world only "supports each other" and does not condemn and correct acts such as plagiarism, it is not only not conducive to the growth of young writers, but also corrupts the credibility of this recommendation mechanism in the minds of readers. ”
Han Song also specifically mentioned that although the "Minimal Story" that published "Dark Light" has been suspended, since Guo Jingming remitted 3 million yuan to the "anti-plagiarism fund" set up by Zhuang Yu, and did not have any public statement on the suspected "washing" behavior of his writers, it is inevitable that people will feel that the previous high-profile is only for "whitewashing".
In the past two days, Muyin has been hesitant to respond positively to the long apology letter. On the evening of March 21, she made up her mind and once again forwarded another reader's plagiarism analysis article on the Douban homepage, and briefly commented that she did not want to continue to talk about this matter, "Finally, to say more, creation and reading, are very beautiful things, you can use this to discover a new world." ”