The Writing Thief

It's been a month since I last posted.

Ick.

I need to get on here more often even if it no one else gets on here (Though I guess you're reading it, so that's a start.)

My last post, about the Elements of Magic, was a dud, I apologize. Next time, I'm actually probably either have the entire story, but broken into smaller posts, and then post it. And of course, if I could get other author's on here, all would be swell.

So, I do not disclose my real name, for obvious reasons. My pseudonym is the simple name of Twain, courtesy of Mark Twain, which was also a pseudonym. (Wow, I sound really proper all of the sudden.) It got me thinking, though. I'm a writer of fantasy, much different from the genre Twain's genre, but he is still is (or was), a great author.

Immature poets imitate. Good poets steal.

Now, apply this to writing. Pure out copying is plagiarizing, which is illegal, and bad. However, if you take a good idea from a book, and tweak it to your liking, it becomes yours. A good example of this is characters. Let's take the Percy Jackson Series. What if you really like the main character, Percy Jackson, and you want to use him in your story. Go ahead, use him.

Now, before you start whining that's that plagiarizing, I'm going to tell you. It is.

At first.

Take the character, and incorporate him into the story. Unless you are doing the same exact world of Percy Jackson, you can tweak the character(s) into your own.

Immature Authors imitate. Good Writers Steal

-Twain