How to Steal a Story April 30, 2018 Unlike plagiarism, which is a literary crime, stealing an entire story -- if done correctly -- is an ancient and honorable tradition among writers. Stories get stolen all the time and some writers will even admit to the theft. Now, let me begin by explaining the proper way to steal a story. First, you have to find a story to covet. It should be one that moved you when you read it; the kind of story that sticks with you, lingering in your mind long after you've shut the book. That's the best kind of story to steal. The problem is that a nakedly stolen story is easy to spot and is bound to get you caught. If the story moved you as a reader, no doubt it also moved someone else, and many people will recognize it. So there's no sense in trying to copy the stolen story directly. You might as well try to walk off with the Declaration of Independence and hope that nobody notices. So having stolen a story, you have to disguise it, give it a new coat of paint and file the serial numbers off. You do this by changing everything you can about the story. Switch the protagonist from male to female, move the setting from Europe to Mars. Add another character (or two) and change the critical, climactic event that overwhelms the protagonist. If you do a good job of disguising the object of your theft, the story you end up with will bear no resemblance whatsoever to the original story you stole. In fact, a perfectly stolen story does nothing more than evoke the spirit of the original in your mind, and spurs you to create something so new, so different that the resulting story is totally unlike the one that caused it to be written. Inspiration, rather than plagiarism. That's the only way to steal a story. (c) 2018 by Andrew Gudgel email: contact [at] andrewgudgel.com