Does plagiarism matter?

I have noticed that writers get extremely hot under the collar when they suspect somebody of plagiarizing their work in some way. And I always wonder why. It seems to me that all the words of all the writers we have read echo within us for a long time without our realising it, and of course this is particularly true of the oft-repeated sayings of famous writers. I don’t think any of us would now write “to be” without hearing the echo of “or not to be” in our heads. And I was pleased to read the following yesterday in a book I bought at Stratford-upon-Avon after I had watched that marvellous actor, Patrick Stewart, re-create Shylock for me in The Merchant of Venice in a totally absorbing new way.

“Scholars have long and fruitfully studied the transforming work of that (Shakeseare’s) imagination on the books that, from evidence with the plays themselves, Shakespeare must certainly have read. As a writer he rarely started from a blank slate; he characteristically took materials that had already been in circulation and infused them with his supreme creative energies. On occasion, the reworking is so precise and detailed that he must have had the book from which he was deftly borrowing directly on his writing table as his quill pen raced across the paper.” (Stephen Greenblatt, Will in the World, Pimlico 2005, p 13)

I think Shakespeare would be flattered if he had realised how deeply his words have scored us. Inevitably, then, the chances of our inadvertently including some figure of speech into our writing, some juxtaposition of colouring or shape into a painting or some musical expression into a composition, all garnered from other writers, painters or composers, are extremely high, so high indeed that I was told that Andrew Lloyd Webber is so frightened of copying somebody else’s work that he refuses to listen to other people’s music for a time as he composes. I don’t know how true this anecdote is, but it certainly illustrates the fear that we may be accused of somehow not being original.

This has never worried me, since I am always happy to acknowledge my own debt to all the many writers I have ever read. Only a few days ago I heard the cadences of William Faulkner’s idiosyncratic and beautiful prose in a sentence I wrote. I know that behind every sentence of mine lie banked up many thousands of others’ writings which have each in their differing ways created the foundation upon which I build up my own thoughts in words. I am also flattered, rather than dismayed, if I find, as I do, echoes of my own words in other people’s writings, particularly in my field of acupuncture. One such incident comes to mind. When I started my acupuncture school in the mid-90s, I coined the, to me, happy and thought-provoking phrase, “An ancient form of healing for a modern world” to describe what we did, then took it as a compliment, rather than as something worrying, when another acupuncture college a few years later used nearly the same words in their promotional material.

I think thought should be free wherever this is reasonable, not circumscribed by lawsuits and trademarks. I suppose this depends on the level and amount of copying and the purposes to which it is being put. A student cutting and pasting large chunks of other people’s writings without adding anything of their own and without acknowledgement is obviously one thing. A writer echoing a few words or cadences of speech in an entirely new creation is quite another.

Somebody recently asked me whether I had protected the translation of my Handbook in its Chinese edition with enough copyright safeguards. I have done what I have been told is sensible to do, but if by some chance some publisher somewhere, perhaps in one of the far-flung countries, such as Indonesia or Venezuela, which read my blog, decides to bring out an uncopyrighted edition of any of my books, I think that I might say, “Good luck to them”, rather than pursuing them, usually fruitlessly, with the law. At least in this way more people will read the books, and what I may lose in money (and there is little enough, if any, money to be made in publishing these days), I will gain in readers, surely the aim of all writing.

Mandarin – here I come!

The translation of my Handbook of Five Element Acupuncture into Chinese (see my blog, Meetings with remarkable people, of 16 June) is a moment of completion for me, as if my journey into five element acupuncture, started more than 25 years back, has now come full circle, very satisfyingly. All the fears I had for five element acupuncture as I closed my school some 4 years ago have, in a surprisingly different way from any that I could have imagined, proved groundless. Here now the door back to China, and with it to all those countless people who still look to China to guide them in their approach to traditional Chinese medicine, has re-opened itself to this beloved discipline of mine, and invited it back in. I feel that my work has indeed been accomplished.

But not quite yet fully! For I am invited to China once my book appears on Chinese bookshelves, and to prepare for this I feel, as a former linguist, proud of trying never to travel to a country without at least some slight knowledge of its language, that it would be discourteous of me not to learn at least the rudiments of Mandarin in order to be able to respond to what my Chinese hosts will be saying. I have always been surprised that I have delayed so long before immersing myself in the Chinese language which underpins all acupuncture in a very profound way, particularly as I am now translating Elisabeth Rochat de la Valléé’s Les 101 Notions-Clés de la Médecine Chinoise (101 Key Concepts). Perhaps it was simply a matter of never finding the time, for I tried to start several times, or because I was afraid (and still am) that my increasingly deficient hearing will not pick up the nuances of Chinese speech. But now I intend to make up for this strange omission if I can, and am about to enrol in an intensive Mandarin course. More of this anon!

Why are actresses called actors now?

In my last blog I wrote about a film actor and actress, and found myself irritated yet again by the, to me, utterly ridiculous convention which appeared some years back out of nowhere, and I hope may at some time in the future disappear as quickly again, that of calling actresses actors. Is this political correctness gone mad? We still distinguish a husband from a wife, a girl from a boy, a widow from a widower, a prince from a princess, so why not an actor from an actress? Of course some professions only have one word to describe both male and female practitioners, such as a barrister or a doctor, perhaps because women were only admitted later to these professions, whilst actresses belong to a long tradition. And nobody appears to have thought of calling a female barrister a barristress or a female doctor a doctress, although this is what other languages do. But why replace a perfectly good word which has been used for centuries? And in an obscure way, I find its removal to be demeaning rather than respectful to women, as though we all need to make an effort to remember gender equality.

Interestingly, the convention has not yet crept into everyday speech, where people still talk about the actress Judi Dench, but in the written press and on radio or television it has been banished to the archives, the latter obviously by BBC edict. And yet I was amused the other day to hear a journalist stumbling over himself, the word “actress” coming out unbidden, before being quickly corrected to “actor”.

Can anybody tell me when and why the change from actress to actor took place?

Postscript to this, added today, 7 July:  I have read the following in the Independent of 5 July:  "...two of Hollywood's best acresses, Helena Bonham Carter and Gillian Anderson,...."!

The quality of tenderness

I have just seen a lovely French film, Potiche (Trophy Wife), with Catherine Deneuve and Gerard Depardieu. Watching Depardieu set me thinking again about that elusive quality called tenderness. This is a quality which this strange giant of a man (and he has now become almost gross in size) shares with another large actor, Robbie Coltrane. A friend of mine commented upon this after seeing the film. “What an attractive man Depardieu is”, she said with surprise in her voice. And I knew exactly what she meant. The tenderness shines out of his eyes, a quality of gentle loving-kindness which draws us to him. It is the eyes, those windows of our soul, which reveal the capacity of their owner’s soul to express love, and, in the case of these two actors, their eyes show it so unreservedly and warmly. It is worth going to see Potiche just for those few moments when Depardieu looks at Deneuve with love, and also for the beautiful scene in which the two of them, both middle-aged and slightly ungainly, dance gently together. This is more erotic than many much more explicit love scenes often lacking in any tenderness whatsoever.

It is a quality we need much of as acupuncturists.

“Protecting oneself from the eternities”

I have spent the last days re-reading one of my favourite books, The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim. If you haven’t read it, and want to emerge from the last page smiling and at peace, then do. It is a beautiful, heart-warming book. (And the film they made of it, surprisingly, recreates this warmth and beauty wonderfully.)

And, as usually happens when one reads, up popped some words which echo so much that I feel expresses my wonder at the depths and awesomeness of human life.

“She pulled her wrap closer round her with a gesture of defence, of keeping out and off. She didn’t want to grow sentimental. Difficult not to, here; the marvellous night stole in through all one’s chinks, and brought in with it, whether one wanted them or not, enormous feelings, - feelings one couldn’t manage, great things about death and time and waste; glorious and devastating things, magnificent and bleak, at once rapture and terror and immense, heart-cleaving longing. She felt small and dreadfully alone. She felt uncovered and defenceless. Instinctively she pulled her wrap closer. With this thing of chiffon she tried to protect herself from the eternities.”

Perhaps we can never truly protect ourselves from the eternities, nor should we. We should be awed by them, often frightened by them, but always, always acknowledge their presence.

Meetings with remarkable people

I am fortunate to have had that part of my life, the part into which five element acupuncture burst like some spray of stardust, its second half, illuminated (not too strong a word) by two remarkable masters, both of whom, in their differing ways, moved my life onwards in a different direction, but to me, looking back now, somehow in a pre-ordained way.

The first was JR Worsley, the second now is Liu Lihong. The first led me deep into a world of the spirit which has informed my acupuncture practice ever since. The second has only just appeared over my horizon, but is just beckoning to me from that vast region of the physical world which is China, and from that vast region of the spiritual world which is Chinese thought embedded deep in its past, the thoughts of the Nei Jing, of Lao Tse and of all the long and ancient lineage of practitioners of traditional Chinese medicine.

I started my acupuncture studies because I was curious to understand the profound reactions awoken in me by my own treatment. I only encountered JR Worsley late on in my studies, but my further studies with him, his visits to my practice and my many visits with my patients to consultation days with him deepened my understanding of his profound contribution to moving acupuncture forward into the modern world and widening it to encompass the psychological insights this modern world has provided. He represents the first stage of my encounter with acupuncture.

The second stage starts after I closed my acupuncture college a few years ago, and this was followed by a gap in time before the next part of my acupuncture life began about a year ago. It was then that I met Mei Long, a young Chinese acupuncturist practising in Holland, and my acupuncture path moved forwards in a different direction, this time towards China (see my blogs of 1st June, 2nd August and 8th Nov 2010). Mei has now completed her translation of my Handbook of Five Element Practice into Chinese, and it is now in proof form (it looks beautiful), awaiting an introduction to be written by Liu Lihong.

And here we come to my second important encounter, that with Liu Lihong, which took place at the Rothenburg Conference a few weeks ago. Having written a seminal book, Reflections on Traditional Chinese Medicine, which Mei tells me is a bestseller in China, he is determined to bring back to traditional Chinese medicine the spirit which has drained from it, and sees five element acupuncture as representing that spirit in the field of acupuncture (he is a traditional herbalist). He is encouraging me to come to China once my book is published over there, which should be in the next few months. So as one door closed upon my life as a teacher in this country, the next, beckoning me to continue my teaching in China, now opens for me. My acupuncture life has indeed been fortunate to have been blessed by two such important encounters with remarkable men.

Finally, lest anybody should think that it is only men who have taught me the great lessons of life, these encounters were preceded by one which brought to an end the first half of my life, for this part of my life was illuminated by the insights of a very great woman, Anna Freud, Freud’s daughter. She died just before I encountered acupuncture, and she would have been delighted to know the direction my life took not long after her death, for she was always encouraging me “to do something big”. I think I now dare say, a little hesitantly and I hope with due humility, that I have now done what she would have liked me to do. I am sure that without her encouragement I would never have dared do what I have done or write what I have written, including this present blog! Nor would I have been ready to accept the challenges my life has offered, and might instead have been tempted to turn my back upon them as I would have done in earlier days.

I give thanks for having been granted the rare grace of encountering three such remarkable people, each of whom in some way changed or is changing the direction of my life.

A lesson in humility

Without our being aware of it, we tend to overlook the shadows our own element cast over the patients we are treating, and which therefore inevitably to some extent distort the signals our patients’ elements are sending us. We all have one (or more) weak spots in recognizing specific elements, and if we are to be good practitioners we must learn to accept this and take this into account in any diagnosis we make. Mine is definitely distinguishing between Fire and Earth, something I find I have in common with many other practitioners. I see that this comes from the fact that both elements, in their differing ways, need people, and therefore respond to people with some eagerness.

In my case, I have come to see that one of the reasons for this may lie in the interaction between my own Fire element and Earth people and other Fire people, and the way in which my own Fire responds when confronting the needs of these two elements. My Fire need is to relate closely to each of my patients, and I will be tempted to interpret the warmth with which both Fire and Earth will respond to my warmth as though filtered through what I call my pink Fire spectacles. But Earth’s and Fire’s responses differ, as we know. Earth responds more because it is glad to be offered understanding, Fire more because it is happy to bestow warmth upon the practitioner. Both interactions will make my own Fire element happy, but for different reasons. With Earth I am pleased to see that my offerings are being so warmly accepted (we could say, taken in and swallowed), and I will bask in the warmth my Fire patients offer me.

The direction of movement is quite different in the two cases. Earth’s is to move back and take in, while Fire’s is to move forward and give.

I have been thinking a lot about this ever since a fellow practitioner said to me recently, “You know that famous film actress with the large smile? I see her as so typically Earth, with that mouth which you, Nora, have often called an Earth mouth, open like a baby bird crying out for food.” She was talking about Julia Roberts. I was taken aback because Julia Roberts is somebody I rather blithely included in my list of what I considered to be Fire people. Was it possible that my fellow practitioner was right, and was that, perhaps, the reason why Julia Roberts doesn’t actually make me feel warm inside, despite the great smile? So off I went to look at her on You-Tube, and indeed, when I looked more closely and more carefully, what I saw was somebody who demanded something of me, rather than somebody who gave me something.

This reinforces one of my mantras. Never allow yourself to be lulled into thinking you are absolutely certain about a person’s guardian element, but always keep open the possibility that you may be misinterpreting the signals coming from their elements. And always, always, remain humble and ready to learn. The uniqueness of each person is not easily encapsulated within the all-encompassing meanings contained in. one of five words, Wood, Fire…..

All the little relationships the Small Intestine is asked to enter into

A conference like the one I went to at Rothenburg in Germany last week, with its 1000 participants, makes special demands upon my Small Intestine. The little mediaeval town is overrun with acupuncturists, making it extremely likely that the person you pass in the street will be a fellow acupuncturist. This presents a particular challenge for anybody who is Inner Fire, like me, for every contact with another person, however fleeting, offers the potential for a tiny relationship to be formed. Each person I passed in the Rothenburg streets therefore placed a slight strain on my Small Intestine as it asked itself how wide it wanted to open the doors to my Heart, or whether it was wiser simply to look away and not engage.

These constant challenges to my Small Intestine meant that it could never really relax, for if it does so it would feel that it is abdicating its responsibility to protect the Heart. Luckily, the meetings with good friends of mine who were also there helped to lighten the load. When I was with them, all was well, my Heart beamed with joy and my Small Intestine could at last relax. But never entirely, however, for it is such a necessarily restless aspect of Fire, and always has to be on the go, sifting and sorting, sifting and sorting.

In an idle moment I sometimes wish I were another element! And if I had a choice as to which one, I think it would have to be Metal, so quiet and self-contained, so able to cut itself off from people without a second thought. It would have no such problems as I have in deciding who to smile at and who to ignore. But then I know that it, too, will of course have its own different, but less people-centred stresses.

The effect we have on others

None of us really knows the effect we have on others, for the spheres of influence we spread around ourselves are much more extensive than we think. Many is the time that somebody has said to me, “I remember what you told me…”, when I could not remember saying it, or even, sometimes, the person who came up to tell me that I had said it.

And just as many are the times when I have said, either silently to myself or to the other person, “I remember what you said”, and how far those words had spread their effects on me and around me down the years. One example of this is particularly vivid to me. Many years ago a friend of mine said, “I would never let anybody talk to me like that”, and I looked at her and saw that nobody would indeed dare talk to her like that. The signals she was sending out were telling those that approached her to beware. This was when I realised for the first time how a person’s aura (I would now say that this is a reflection of their element) envelops them so powerfully that it dictates the actions of those they encounter.

This realisation has been a profound lesson for me, for it means that the stronger and healthier a person’s elements become, the more they will be able to withstand the onslaughts of life and thus act as protection. This is a particularly valuable lesson for a five element acupuncturist, for it confirms that strengthening the guardian element enables the patient eventually to deal appropriately with stresses which before may have overwhelmed them. When in balance, a person’s element will be sending out messages to those we encounter telling them that they can go so far and no further. (This is why I like to call it our guardian element, for it does indeed, in balance, protect us from harm.) The protection it places around us may signal its presence often in very subtle ways, a look in the eyes, a firmness in the mouth, but it is so unmistakable that a person who may be minded to criticize may, as my friend showed me, decide instead to keep quiet. This is the way in which balanced elements show their power, and thus does nature, in balance, protect us.

Everybody, and not just acupuncturists, should learn about the elements

A former student of mine has just told me that she is no longer practising acupuncture, but writes that what she learnt whilst studying with us “yet remains a profound education and absolute awakening such that it has imprinted my being for a lifetime. I am deeply grateful to you and those years studying at SOFEA.”

This reinforced what I have been thinking for some time now. A desire to learn about the elements should not be confined to those wanting to use them to study acupuncture or a similar discipline, although this is predominantly how they are studied now. To understand how the elements manifest in each one of us helps us become more aware of our own and others’ strengths and weaknesses, and thus develop greater tolerance both of ourselves and others. This goes way beyond a concentration upon the needle and where to place it.

If I were to start my life again, (and who knows, perhaps I will in another time and another place, and perhaps, too, on another planet!), I would want to found a school of the five elements, with only a small offshoot dedicated to acupuncture, to which all the world would be invited, young and old, and from any walk of life. It still pleases me that one of my graduates who understands the elements most profoundly was a builder with little education but enormous insight. I still remember his brief essay on the elements in which, in the simplest terms, he captured quite perfectly the essence of each element. Here’s to you, Errol, and to our years together studying the elements, from evening class to graduation and beyond.

I would love to be able to offer the elements to many more Errols in another life.