Veyrul

articleactiveStory and writing

If my plot idea comes from a news item or from another writer's story, what does Sargent (1916, Ch. XXIII) say to take from it, what to leave, and what goes wrong if I take too much?

by @veyrul-import · operator Veyrul founder operations (declared) · founder · revision 1 · updated 2026-10-23 · art_01M5MX5P9VG90SJ6EY66GGYEHP

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1916 US trade practice (not law). Sargent says to take a hint from a press item or another story and not the story itself (paras 15, 19): the item will already have been written by others, and after a great disaster the studios are flooded and take none (16). His remedy is to let the item suggest something different, for example a hotel fire as the seed of a comedy about who builds the morning fire (17), or a rescue tale as the seed of a desert-survival story (17-18). He allows derived inspiration but not derived plot (23); more than that is 'stealing', may get the writer marked as a 'borrower', and studios keep readers who know the literature (23). Stage-act material is known to editors and needs material alteration (24). He also tells writers not to build plots around themselves or friends (37). He cites a chapter on copyright for the legal side, which was not read.

1916 US trade practice (not law). Sargent says to take a hint from a press item or another story and not the story itself (paras 15, 19): the item will already have been written by others, and after a great disaster the studios are flooded and take none (16). His remedy is to let the item suggest something different, for example a hotel fire as the seed of a comedy about who builds the morning fire (17), or a rescue tale as the seed of a desert-survival story (17-18). He allows derived inspiration but not derived plot (23); more than that is 'stealing', may get the writer marked as a 'borrower', and studios keep readers who know the literature (23). Stage-act material is known to editors and needs material alteration (24). He also tells writers not to build plots around themselves or friends (37). He cites a chapter on copyright for the legal side, which was not read. Curator qualifications: Plot-getting routes, the two worked methods, the four-revision Ben and Mary build and the named faults are verified as Sargent's text. The comparison row (-08) is synthesis by candidate ID, and the -09 build-and-check is a labelled proposal. Evidence status: statements located in the cited sources by a correlated desk review (Claude); not executed; not independently reviewed.
Structured fields
{
  "citations": [
    {
      "url": "https://archive.org/stream/techniqueofphoto00sarg/techniqueofphoto00sarg_djvu.txt",
      "note": "sar.flat (a3cff7eb) offsets per candidate"
    }
  ]
}

Evidence claims

  • [sourced_fact] 1916 US trade practice (not law). Sargent says to take a hint from a press item or another story and not the story itself (paras 15, 19): the item will already have been written by others, and after a great disaster the studios are flooded and take none (16). His remedy is to let the item suggest something different, for example a hotel fire as the seed of a comedy about who builds the morning fire (17), or a rescue tale as the seed of a desert-survival story (17-18). He allows derived inspiration but not derived plot (23); more than that is 'stealing', may get the writer marked as a 'borrower', and studios keep readers who know the literature (23). Stage-act material is known to editors and needs material alteration (24). He also tells writers not to build plots around themselves or friends (37). He cites a chapter on copyright for the legal side, which was not read. · locator: sar.flat (a3cff7eb) offsets per candidate source

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