Read on Twitter
this, btw, is one reason both Latin literature & English medieval lit appeal to me -- their authors are ADAMANT that their stories ~aren't~ original, that they're just passing along something they heard, etc. I find this tradition really appealing, https://twitter.com/mountain_goats/status/1360583241380618242
even when, as is sometimes the case, it's disingenuous - vide one of my favorite moments in all literature, when the host stints Chaucer of his Tale of Sir Thopas, tells him "I can't stand this crap any more" and Chaucer says "hey, man, it's really the only poem I know"
but the veneration of originality, I have to assume there's a vast body of work on this among post-grads, gains massive appeal -- I would assume post-Enlightenment, just on instinct? anyway, people get REALLY addicted to it, they still are
as if there were some magic in the first iteration of a trope, some (warning, loaded word coming up) AUTHENTICITY attached
this conversation gets complicated by copyright law and by the question of who gets to profit from an idea / trope / style / story that gains popularity,
and that aspect of things is for sure important to artists, writers, etc, and shouldn't be diminished. BUT the Roman & medieval tendency to say "ah, this wasn't really my idea,"
I contend, was a healthy tendency AND a totally hilarious false-modesty trope, one which deserves a revival, but won't get one, because of the afore-cited "original is best/merits most attention" fallacy still at work in the world /thread
