The Art of the Padded Proposal

[ksmith]

I find the following interesting on so many levels:

http://www.wwd.com/issue/article/105067

In a small world like high fashion, did Davies really believe that she would really get away with cribbing conversations from the works of others and not be found out? That word wouldn't have gotten back to the fashionistas with whom she'd allegedly spoken?

If it turns out that she did pad that proposal, I hope she hasn't spent too much of that $900,000 advance.

Comments

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

There are so many layers of stupidity there, it's quite amazing.

"My memories aren't all that interesting so I plagiarized a lot of other people so I could sell the proposal! Of course I won't do it in the book!"

It is to boggle.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't mind fact-checking for a living. Given what's been going on lately, it would seem like a growth career.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Seriously.

Has this always happened or is it a sign of deep moral rot? We have a government overrun with pathological liars, a growth industry of fake memoirs, and an infestation of "reality" programming that turns out to be scripted and dramatized.

And the fiction market is, at best, flat.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Well, the article states that Davies left her job at the Times of London over issues with her expenses, so that fish started to stink at the head.

Flexible truth--I think the new term is "truthiness."

I think it's evidence of a need to invent alternate realities because the current one needs a lot of work. Because for some folks, it's boring. For others, it's inconvenient. And the energy invested in believing in these alternate realities leaves that much less that's available to invest in fiction.

Lunchtime seat-of-the-pants philosophizing. Back to work...

[torrilin.livejournal.com]

Hrm, sounds like she's a well read wannabe fashionista... who doesn't actually have suitable credentials to write a memoir. On the other hand, she's definitely got the credentials to write fiction, if she'd learn to polish off the serial numbers.

...so of course, she goes the memoir route. *snarls*

Seriously, the fashion world is full of stuff where I just boggle. If you made up a story like that, noone would believe it. Yet, it really does happen.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, she's definitely got the credentials to write fiction, if she'd learn to polish off the serial numbers.

She probably wouldn't get $900K for a novel.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

She probably wouldn't get $900K for a novel.

And that, I think, is a big part of the enchilada. Fiction just doesn't pay as well as non-fiction.

Then there's the fact that stories that wouldn't hack it as fiction (because who'd believe it?) works wonderfully well as non-fic (can you believe it!) because then they're True. Therefore, the more Truth you add, the greater the chance that you will sell your book for $$$.

So what if it's Borrowed Truth? No one was using it. It was just sitting there, gathering dust. And it was the right time period and everything, I mean. *Vintage Truth*.

It has been commodified. There will soon be a market for potential non-fiction authors in Truth Trading--hey, trade you your abusive childhood for my drug dealing in college. You sign my release, and I'll sign yours.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

All reality is virtual, and truth is what you make it?

I am so living in the wrong era.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Just wait until the pendulum swings back.

Some people are going to be knocked into last week.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

Some people are going to be knocked into last week.

I think that's where they are already.

Cadging someone else's memories.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

There are stories in there somewhere. But they're fiction, so they'll pay pennies a word.

[pbray.livejournal.com]

I keep waiting for that pendulum.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Hope springs eternal...

[torrilin.livejournal.com]

I think a lot of the wouldn't hack it as fiction aspect is (as I discovered to my shock today) the average person is woefully unaware of how the world works.

For example, chocolate manufacturing. *I* think of it as entirely ordinary process, best done on a very large scale for technical and technological reasons. Apparently, to quite a lot of people, the process of making chocolate is mysterious and rather unbelievable. The fashion industry is similarly very commonplace to me. The antics of Those At The Top have a goal, and that goal is sell clothes (and perfume, and cosmetics, and handbags, and whatever else they can think of that will be at a low enough price point). Yes, those antics are somewhat unbelievable. But they get eyeballs, and really for not very much money. And once you've *gotten* the eyeballs you can sell things to them.

[alfreda89.livejournal.com]

It has been commodified. There will soon be a market for potential non-fiction authors in Truth Trading--hey, trade you your abusive childhood for my drug dealing in college. You sign my release, and I'll sign yours.

Genius. Let's start a new trend.

I must agree with JT -- the levels of stupidity here are awe-inspiring. You can only make the mistake of doing anything stupid with a synopsis once -- and pray your agent catches it and fires it back in your face. Someone who left their last position under a cloud because of financial irregularities has used every "Get out of jail free" card she has . . ..

And now the president is making up whole cloth to open a third theater of war. As we used to say in Bloom County, Mass Dandelion Break.

[torrilin.livejournal.com]

Well, not a first novel. Not as an advance on the basis of a *proposal*. On the other hand, I doubt that the author of The Devil Wore Prada is doing badly. And that one was marketed as fiction.

[kristine-smith.livejournal.com]

Devil contained nice roman a clef chewy bits that set the world buzzing--well, the part of the world that knew from Anna Wintour--but I could see where being in line with that sort of book would garner BTDT yawns.