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The Neil Harman plagiarism scandal
News broke yesterday that respected tennis writer Neil Harman had plagiarized large swathes of at least three of the ten commemorative Wimbledon annuals that he had been commissioned to write between 2004-2013. Harman, the senior tennis correspondent for The Times (in London), has enjoyed an illustrious sportswriting career, including 40 years of covering professional tennis. Harman issued an apology and resigned from the International Tennis Writers Association, of which he co-founded and served as president.
The All England Club became aware of his plagiarism earlier this year and dismissed him from his job compiling its annual yearbook. However, this was not made public until yesterday, when fellow tennis writer Ben Rothenberg published (what turned out to be) the first in a series of articles on the subject at Slate.com.
Let me just say, from the start, that I abhor plagiarism. As a victim of plagiarism myself (albeit under slightly different and possibly sillier circumstances), I know how much it hurts to have your work lifted, changed, and published without credit. Its the sort of anger you can't understand until its happened to you. So, while I appreciate Rothenberg breaking this shocking news to the tennis world, I do not believe he has handled it in the best way.
1) I'm not completely convinced that Rothenberg should be the person writing this expose. He is a rival tennis writer, and is closely aligned with several of the writers who had their work lifted. He isn't exactly unbiased, and considering the way he's dribbling out examples of the apparently 52 passages that were plagiarized, I expect sooner rather than later he's going to reveal his own work was taken, mayhap as the ultimate cherry on top?
Rothenberg also has a tendency to throw shade at his fellow journalists. (This might have been a direct swipe.) He's also been hinting at this for nearly three weeks. (Confirmed here.) And, of course, there's the "mole" who sent an astoundingly accurate nonny tip to Deadspin the night before the articles dropped.
Unlike the people who were actually victimized (Jon Wertheim and Courtney Nguyen haven't "officially" responded in social media that I'm aware), Rothenberg chose not to take the high road with this, and is commenting freely. That's fine, but his behavior on Twitter since the release of the first article hasn't been very becoming, unless you enjoy watching people suck up and pull other, totally unrelated tennis writers into this melee, or swiftly counter contrary claims from Harman's defenders.
It's also curious that he chose to publish this at Slate instead of his usual stomping grounds at the New York Times. (He claims conflict of interest, but still. Curious.) NYT is certainly on the same prestigious playing field as the Times, so maybe someone there didn't care to rock the boat?
2) Why did Harman plagiarize for ten years and think he wouldn't get caught? Because he did. The Wimbledon yearbook is basically a commemorative fluff piece that, well, nobody really bothers to actually read. This is about as low-hanging of fruit as you can find in the tennis writing world, so I'm not surprised that Harman got lazy and sloppy with it. Why put any effort into it if nobody's paying attention anyway?
However, by making such a big deal out of this (and labelling Harman a "serial plagiarist"), Rothenberg is casting serious aspersions over the totality of Harman's writing career, which spans countless books and articles. This was a really stupid thing to do, don't get me wrong, but in the grand scheme of things, it sorta counts for nothing. It's a dumb little yearbook that Wimby sells to make a little extra dosh. Is that worth ruining a man's entire career over? Because Rothenberg can't be so naive as to think nobody was going to make that leap.
The Times has yet to respond (or pull/stop running Harman's articles), and the All England Club gave Harman press credentials for this year's tournament and allowed him to write articles for the program. They invited him to the Champion's Ball. That tells me that they don't see this as a big deal, either, so *shrug* We'll see.
3) This is basically a fandom wank war, so things might not be as they seem. Harman is the epitome of a BNF, a well-decorated journalist who has good relationships with other powerful tennis figures, not the least of which include tennis players themselves. Rothenberg is one of the 'newer' writers who evidently still feels the need to try to get into other, older, more respected writers' good graces. He's the ironic hipster with the sarcastic personality, great with one-liners and the like. An interesting fellow (I've enjoyed his tweets and articles), but one with not nearly so much power as Harman. Is this his breakthrough moment, bringing down the older, out-of-touch establishment? Or is this a genuine serving of justice to a man who's gotten away with literary murder for nearly half a century?
If it had been me, I would've laid it all out there once, let the chips fall as they may, and then move on. This trickle of information (two instances here, five instances there) is uncalled for, unless you're looking to stir up some drama. Drama can be fun, but its a delicate balance - you end up tipping your hand too early and losing your supporters before getting to the big finish.
I follow quite a few tennis players, fans, commentators, and writers on my tennis account (![[twitter.com profile]](https://p.dreamwidth.org/e0caa790ec10/-/twitter.com/favicon.ico)
tennishack12), and reading the fallout of this has been very, very interesting. Where the lines are drawn, and the pettiness with which they are drawn. I don't think this is over, not by a long shot. We'll see who comes out looking better at the end: the villain, or the hero who perhaps protests too much?
Update: The Times has suspended Harman indefinitely as it conducts its own investigation, and he deleted his Twitter account.
And there's only one person still talking about it in the tennis Twittersphere. Dude, just shut up already - you're only digging yourself into a deeper hole.
The All England Club became aware of his plagiarism earlier this year and dismissed him from his job compiling its annual yearbook. However, this was not made public until yesterday, when fellow tennis writer Ben Rothenberg published (what turned out to be) the first in a series of articles on the subject at Slate.com.
Let me just say, from the start, that I abhor plagiarism. As a victim of plagiarism myself (albeit under slightly different and possibly sillier circumstances), I know how much it hurts to have your work lifted, changed, and published without credit. Its the sort of anger you can't understand until its happened to you. So, while I appreciate Rothenberg breaking this shocking news to the tennis world, I do not believe he has handled it in the best way.
1) I'm not completely convinced that Rothenberg should be the person writing this expose. He is a rival tennis writer, and is closely aligned with several of the writers who had their work lifted. He isn't exactly unbiased, and considering the way he's dribbling out examples of the apparently 52 passages that were plagiarized, I expect sooner rather than later he's going to reveal his own work was taken, mayhap as the ultimate cherry on top?
Rothenberg also has a tendency to throw shade at his fellow journalists. (This might have been a direct swipe.) He's also been hinting at this for nearly three weeks. (Confirmed here.) And, of course, there's the "mole" who sent an astoundingly accurate nonny tip to Deadspin the night before the articles dropped.
Unlike the people who were actually victimized (Jon Wertheim and Courtney Nguyen haven't "officially" responded in social media that I'm aware), Rothenberg chose not to take the high road with this, and is commenting freely. That's fine, but his behavior on Twitter since the release of the first article hasn't been very becoming, unless you enjoy watching people suck up and pull other, totally unrelated tennis writers into this melee, or swiftly counter contrary claims from Harman's defenders.
It's also curious that he chose to publish this at Slate instead of his usual stomping grounds at the New York Times. (He claims conflict of interest, but still. Curious.) NYT is certainly on the same prestigious playing field as the Times, so maybe someone there didn't care to rock the boat?
2) Why did Harman plagiarize for ten years and think he wouldn't get caught? Because he did. The Wimbledon yearbook is basically a commemorative fluff piece that, well, nobody really bothers to actually read. This is about as low-hanging of fruit as you can find in the tennis writing world, so I'm not surprised that Harman got lazy and sloppy with it. Why put any effort into it if nobody's paying attention anyway?
However, by making such a big deal out of this (and labelling Harman a "serial plagiarist"), Rothenberg is casting serious aspersions over the totality of Harman's writing career, which spans countless books and articles. This was a really stupid thing to do, don't get me wrong, but in the grand scheme of things, it sorta counts for nothing. It's a dumb little yearbook that Wimby sells to make a little extra dosh. Is that worth ruining a man's entire career over? Because Rothenberg can't be so naive as to think nobody was going to make that leap.
The Times has yet to respond (or pull/stop running Harman's articles), and the All England Club gave Harman press credentials for this year's tournament and allowed him to write articles for the program. They invited him to the Champion's Ball. That tells me that they don't see this as a big deal, either, so *shrug* We'll see.
3) This is basically a fandom wank war, so things might not be as they seem. Harman is the epitome of a BNF, a well-decorated journalist who has good relationships with other powerful tennis figures, not the least of which include tennis players themselves. Rothenberg is one of the 'newer' writers who evidently still feels the need to try to get into other, older, more respected writers' good graces. He's the ironic hipster with the sarcastic personality, great with one-liners and the like. An interesting fellow (I've enjoyed his tweets and articles), but one with not nearly so much power as Harman. Is this his breakthrough moment, bringing down the older, out-of-touch establishment? Or is this a genuine serving of justice to a man who's gotten away with literary murder for nearly half a century?
If it had been me, I would've laid it all out there once, let the chips fall as they may, and then move on. This trickle of information (two instances here, five instances there) is uncalled for, unless you're looking to stir up some drama. Drama can be fun, but its a delicate balance - you end up tipping your hand too early and losing your supporters before getting to the big finish.
I follow quite a few tennis players, fans, commentators, and writers on my tennis account (
Update: The Times has suspended Harman indefinitely as it conducts its own investigation, and he deleted his Twitter account.
And there's only one person still talking about it in the tennis Twittersphere. Dude, just shut up already - you're only digging yourself into a deeper hole.