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jennifer rose

Oct 1, 2003, 7:16 PM

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The October Issue is Now Online

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For your reading pleasure, the highlights of this month's issue include:

Romantic Weddings South of the Border by Eleanor Morris
Bliss, Paradise …and no Tipping by John Neubauer
Chapala - Mexico's Shangri-La by John Russell Clift
Alamos by Christina NealsonRuins in the Rain Forest: An Excursion to la Selva Lacandona by Carson Brown
A Peon Ponders the Equality of Life by Ruth Ross-Merrimer

and, of course, the columns. Uncle Donnie, Teresa Kendrick, Alan Cogan, Amy Kirkcaldy, Karen Hursh Graber, Tony Burton, Marvin West, Rita Pomade and more.

Congratulations go out to Todd Gastelum of Chicago, Illinois, this month's winner of 3 all-expense paid nights and days at Villas Buena Vida in in Rincón de Guayabitos, Nayarit.

And kudos to editor, publisher, WebJefe and Gran Panjandrum David McLaughlin for producing yet another stellar issue of MexicoConnect's magazine!

(This post was edited by jennifer rose on Oct 1, 2003, 8:18 PM)

roger lee

Oct 3, 2003, 6:58 AM

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Re: [jennifer rose] The October Issue is Now Online

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Kudos also to Ruth Ros-Merrimer for plagarizing B. Traven's excellent short story Macario.

dumois

Oct 3, 2003, 9:18 AM

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Re: [roger lee] Plagiarism?

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I can hardly agree with you. Some pieces of the setting may be the same, yes. Many are not. Motivations, ideas, and profiles of the characters are entirely different.

With due respect,

Dumois

roger lee

Oct 3, 2003, 11:12 AM

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Re: [dumois] Plagiarism?

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Also with due respect Sr. Dumois,

Macario is the story of a Mexican peasant who struggles to feed his family, many times forsaking nourishment himself. He dreams of eating a whole turkey by himself, not sharing it with anyone. One day he goes into the woods to eat this turkey and enconters God, the Devil and Death.

The only noticeable difference in the two stories is how the peasant procures his dream repast. Subsitute a chicken for the turkey and the Jalisco mountains for the woods of southern Mexico and you have Macario.

Uncle Donnie

Oct 3, 2003, 8:36 PM

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Re: [roger lee] Plagiarism?

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Roger, always nice to hear from a victim of the rural Louisiana public school sysyem.

Here's the deal; whoever read Ruth's column to you must have ignored the part at the bottom of the page that identified it as an excerpt from her new book "Tall Tales and True Tales of Mexico." That alone would tip even the most marginally literate that the story, and the others in the book, had been told and re-told through the years. I'd guess nobody could identify the originator.

As for your sturdy defense of B. Traven, reckon you could provide some substantiation that the story in question was his original work and not based on a tale he had heard as he was researching one of his books, or just knockin' back a few at a cantina?

If you've ever heard of a writer by the name of Shakespeare you might be aware that he suffered the same slings and arrows that you're misdirecting against Ruth.

But that's not really why you logged in anonymously and for free, is it?

Love and kisses,

UD

Shameless self-promotion:
http://www.headformexico.com

TomG

Oct 3, 2003, 10:48 PM

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Re: [Uncle Donnie] Plagiarism?

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On the other hand, the whiff of plagiarism needs serious consideration. I knew of one small college where they had no formal policy about it so the issue really did not exist. But at Harvard, if a student unknowingly writes a thought that someone else has stated or written before and did not cite it, that student is on the road in 2 or 3 days. The idea is that the writer is responsible for researching and substantiating what they do, and therefore, should have been aware that there was a source. Intellectual responsibility is the underlying concept.

I really do not know how they do it in Louisiana or Texas.

Traditionally Western societies placed a high value on individualism and creativity. Moreover, in terms of political noise, they still do. Western society’s superiority supposedly derives from the fact that it is constantly improving and developing itself through invention and innovation. Rather than a continuation, it is a development. “Things are getting better all the time.” For this kind of a belief system, copying ideas is a corrupting threat.

Now maybe it is just not true. Maybe history really is not a directional path of development, refining toward a higher level of perfection. Maybe Darwin’s observations apply no farther than biology, maybe there are no valid social applications. Maybe just serving as a conduit through which flows tradition is what society is all about. Then the cooperator is the building block of society. Then the designs at Mitla are where meaning exists.

An interesting question is whether the article and the book are copywrited. If they are then the historic chain of tradition of being told and re-told sort of stops here at her lawyer’s desk. That just takes some of the colorfulness out of folk art. It’s so……well, …. without alma. It the work is not copywrited then it would seem to be admirably in the spirit of tale re-telling.

On a different subject, there was a very interesting article in the New York Times Friday morning reflecting inversely on the question of the reliability of drugs purchased outside the country.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/03/health/03FAKE.html

In general, a good business model does not need to provide content, just package. That is how they do it in California.

(This post was edited by TomG on Oct 3, 2003, 10:49 PM)

dumois

Oct 3, 2003, 10:50 PM

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Re: [roger lee] Plagiarism?

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There are so many differences between the two stories that I will only concentrate on the most obvious, which are contained, I think, in the objectives, or lessons, that the authors try to put before us.

Traven's story is, above all, a tale of customs and magic. Macario toils day after day, working almost literally like an animal, to bring the basics to his family. In every 'meal' he mechanically prays before the table, his wife and sons, after all the traditional prayers are said, for a guajolote just for himself. He has this dream, an unattainable dream. His wife, listening to him day in and day out, keeps cent by cent the money to one day buy and cook the fabled pavo to her beloved husband. He then goes to the forest to eat the bird, only to encounter God, the Devil, and Death. Perhaps one of the best lines in the tale is when, after Macario's refusal to share with God and Devil, Death seats to eat half of the food that Macario finally was willing to give away. Death asks, "Compadre, if you said no to God and no to the Devil, why yes to me?" Macario answers, "Come on, compadre, you are different. When you appear, there is no time for anything. So I said to myself, 'While he eats, I will eat my half. Better a half than nothing.'" After a wonderful feast, Death presents him with a magnificent gift: the healing water. This is a very complex, delightful, subtle story, that mainly talks about the way Mexican people thinks and lives and hope and die.

On the other hand, el cuento that Mexico Connect publishes this month is a very simple one: it tries to convey the notion that equality, as Death practices it, is better than the discrimination God supposedly shows to permit evil in this world. (Perhaps the author should take a look at Leibnitz' conception of the best of all possible worlds.)

Nothing these two tales have in common, except, as I said before, some situations and settings.

Saludos desde Guadalajara,

Dumois

roger lee

Oct 4, 2003, 7:00 AM

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Re: [Uncle Donnie] Plagiarism?

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It's good to see the head buckaroo riding herd on this passle of self published bards is trying to keep the varmints away.

Speaking of Shakespeare, you must recall poor Conrad?

B. Traven based “his” Macario on a Grimm fairy tale. He made no attempt to hide it and gave proper acknowledgement. Can Ross-Merrimer say the same?

(This post was edited by roger lee on Oct 4, 2003, 9:07 AM)

Uncle Donnie

Oct 4, 2003, 9:46 AM

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Re: [roger lee] Plagiarism?

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Ah, Roger,

Your envy and deficiencies were revealed by your earlier post and the attack on Ruth and self-published writers only reinforces the assessment.

And what positive contributions have you offered to the world lately? It's my experience that those who can't do, criticize. And hide their identities while committing foul and odious acts.

As for Ruth's article, I just got off the phone with her. She invites you to e-mail her at the address given in conjunction with her article to personally discuss your concerns.

The article is from a work in progress and she will explain to you, as well as purchasers of the book, that she's been gathering these stories since 1966. And as I mentioned before, there's really no way to accurately cite sources for oral legends, myths, and tales.

But as I mentioned earlier, that's not really the reason you logged on and posted anonomously, is it?

Luis my friend, let us withdraw from the sty we allowed ourselves to be drawn into.

Shameless self-promotion:
http://www.headformexico.com

roger lee

Oct 4, 2003, 11:26 AM

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Re: [Uncle Donnie] Plagiarism?

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"for truth is truth, to the end of reck'ning"

johanson

Oct 4, 2003, 1:56 PM

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Re: [roger lee] Plagiarism?

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Roger:

Do you know what a MAC address or IP # is? Those are some of the fingerprints you leave when you post to this forum. I know you are having a good time stirring the pot, telling half truths etc attempting to get folks mad.

But if you get them mad enough, they will probably take the time to figure out who you are.

So please lighten up.

believer111

Oct 15, 2003, 10:21 AM

Post #12 of 13 (1360 views)

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Re: [johanson] Plagiarism?

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johanson:

thank you, thank you, thank you!

who is that masked crabby guy, anyway?!!!

shalom

Dios le bendiga,
hermana greta

Guapo Gabacho

Oct 15, 2003, 2:23 PM

Post #13 of 13 (1334 views)

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Re: [believer111] Plagiarism?

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The literary style of Bubba Gump is easier to trace that an ip address.

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We do not inherit the Earth from our Ancestors, we borrow it from our Children.