pumpkin eaters

despite being glued to the fantastic coverage (well done with the constant scooping the big kids, guys) that the crimson has been turning out about poor downtrodden kaavya viswanathan and her "accidental internalisations" of 2, 3, 5, 7, any number of books that have been released over the past few years. But I can stay silent no longer...

After being scolded by Katie Couric, mocked by her peers, and (eek!) bitch slapped by Salman Rushdie, Kaavya received her death blow earlier this week when Harvard Alum and Little Brown publisher Michael Pietsch announced that Little Brown was leaving its prodigal teeny bopper out in the cold.

I'll confess...I received a smidgen of joy and evil glee when I heard this...I, like any other self-reflective would be young author, felt the sting of jealousy that this 17 year old got a $500,000 two book deal like manna from heaven while I'm squarely in my mid-twenties, working nine-to-seven every day to make ends meet. Alas...my loathing couldn't last as long as the controversy...and now I feel pretty bad for this kid.

The facts:

young indian prodigy is nagged and pushed by her over-achieving neurosurgeon of a father into getting into harvard whatever it took. he even hires a 25,000 college advisor to give his little girl an extra leg up. the kid's a pretty good writer (unless she plagiarized her essays as well) and her advisor says, well...a book deal sure won't hurt your chances of getting inside the hallowed halls of harvard yard. one hell of a marketing meeting later, a 17 year old (and some professionals who are hired to 'sex up' mediocre books) get a cool half million dollars to write two books.

what i assume happened next:

young indian prodigy *freaked out*...and when she came down from her anxious, intimidated state, decided that the risk of getting caught plagiarizing in the literary world is about as slim as getting caught plagiarizing on an ivy-league campus. slim.

ah...but kaavya...you didn't consider what happens if you end up in that narrow alley of the cheaters who get caught. smug laughter. loud accusations. microscopic inspection. ostracism. alienation. and did i mention a bitch slap from one of the greatest authors of the modern age?

take her money away, expel her from harvard...fine...but don't doubt that her punishment is cruel and unusual and devastating already. not only does she have to suffer her crazy father's likely insane criticism and the fact that, at 19, her reputation and all work she's ever done will be called into question...she has to go back to academia and face some of the greatest minds in the world, turn in papers, and walk the already hyper-critical hallways and landscapes of cambridge. her social and academic life is ruined.

and with a name like kaavya...she's not bound to be forgotten quickly. may i suggest she consider changing it? kate. that seems like a suitably commonplace pen name...and you can keep the k.

fix your jones for kaavyagate @ the crimson and the harvard independent and for some stunning data on the prevalence of plagiarism @ plagiarism.org

Posted by sarah t. at 12:30 PM