The Last Chronicle of Kaavya: Part II

This story used to be amusing in a schadenfreudenish sort of way. Now it's just getting sad.

Little, Brown and Company, the publisher of Kaavya Viswanathan's book "How Opal Mehta Yadda Yada Yadda," has announced today that they will not publish a revised version of the novel as earlier reported, and Viswanathan's contract for a second book has been cancelled.

It has not yet been announced whether she will be flayed, branded, made to wear a scarlet P or burnt at the stake, but then it's only Tuesday. The week is young.

"Meanwhile," says Forbes.com, quoting the AP, "The Record of Bergen County said Tuesday that it will review the news articles Visvanathan wrote for the 180,000-circulation daily paper in northern New Jersey while an intern in 2003 and 2004. Editor Frank Scandale said The Record, which has written several of its own articles about the plagiarism allegations, will hire a service to vet the dozen or so light features she wrote while one of about 18 interns at the paper."

It seems that further investigation of "How Opal Mehta Yadda Yadda Yadda" has turned up even more examples of plagiarism from other authors. The Forbes.com story reports that "The Harvard Crimson, alerted by reader e-mails, reported Tuesday on its Web site that "Opal Mehta" contained passages similar to Meg Cabot's 2000 novel, "The Princess Diaries." The New York Times also reported comparable material in Viswanathan's novel and Sophie Kinsella's "Can You Keep a Secret?""

So Kaavya Viswanathan's humiliation is complete -- or at least, for the time being it's complete. She has been proven to be a conscious, deliberate plagiarist and her public explanation has been shown up as a total lie. I'm just hoping she doesn't get tossed out of Harvard for this, even though none of her alleged plagiarism (do we really still have to use the word "alleged"?) has anything to do with her schoolwork.

Should we (or should I) feel sorry for Kaavya Viswanathan? I didn't feel the least bit sorry for Stephen Glass, who invented stories that were published in The New Republic. I didn't mourn for Jayson Blair, whose lies turned the New York Times upside down (and cost his editor his job). I didn't bat an eye when Oprah Winfrey tore James Frey a new asshole on national television. So why cry for Kaavya? She's got parents with money and a Harvard BA coming a few years from now that will ensure that she can always write for "The Simpsons" when she gets out of school. And I suppose there's always the option of posing for Playboy if she really needs cash -- after all, she can hardly be accused of borrowing another woman's breasts or vagina (although, now that I think about it, with Photoshop that might not be true).

Am I wasting my pity on a plagiarist just because she happens to be young and attractive?

You tell me.

Tom Moran