Opal Mehta: Is this chick lit book Asian America's <i>Million Little Pieces</i>?

Neela Banerjee
April 25, 2006

I was imagining that little Kaavya had written some kind of poetic Sylvia Plath-esque South Asian Bell Jar, documenting the darker side of growing up different in America. Or perhaps it was a J.D. Salinger-esque outsider novel about a South Asian teenager growing up in the aftermath of 9.11. I had fantastic dreams that she was our Zadie Smith, appearing on the literary horizon to shake up the Asian American literary community like a laptop-toting Joan of Arc.

Then I found out that How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life is really – as the New York Times described – "a chick-lit-meets-admissions-frenzy novel." Okay, I admit, it sounds funny – the over-achieving Opal Mehta wants nothing more than to get into Harvard and when the admissions officer tells her that she must be more than just scores and grades, she and her parents create the HOWGAL plan, or “How Opal Will Get a Life.” This plan includes “reading Teen People, watching Beyoncé videos, wearing Jimmy Choo spike heels and Habitual jeans.” When I read that the book had been optioned for a movie, I knew I would go see it when it came out and be entertained but I was also, well, kind of disappointed.

I actually already discussed this feeling of disappointment in detail back in issue seven when I did a little survey of Asian American chick lit (“Can I Get a Purse with That?”). Here’s was my main question in that article:

[A]fter perusing a handful of the Asian American chick lit titles out there—Caroline Hwang’s In Full Bloom (Plume), Kim Wong Keltner’s The Dim Sum of All Things (Avon Trade) and Buddha Baby (Avon Trade), and Kavita Daswani’s For Matrimonial Purposes (G.P. Putnam’s Sons)—I felt the same kind of pride I did when Miko, Barbie’s Pacific Islander friend, was introduced back in 1988: Is this something I should really be proud of?

Go ahead, call me a snob. I’ll accept this label. But I am more interested in reading and supporting new Asian American authors who are pushing past the model minority stereotypes and writing about class struggle, passion and politics in a way that doesn’t have to include discussions of brand-names and, in this case, super-elitist academic institutions. I think my critique of Viswanathan goes beyond her chick-lit genre, because this critique applies to authors like Jumpha Lahiri as well, and is more about my frustration with the lack of fiction out there about the working class South Asian community. Can we only write about first generation immigration experiences, living in the suburbs or the homeland? I don’t mean to favor subject-matter over writing quality but I think if South Asian writers continue to write about the same subjects and place their stories in the same settings, we are just limiting ourselves.

Now that I have gotten my rant about what Opal Mehta is about out of the way, I can move onto the plagarism scandal. Mehta’s own Harvard Crimson, the school paper that has so recently touted her fame, came at her Smoking Gun style and said that her Opal Mehta was surprisingly similar to Megan F. McCafferty’s Sloppy Firsts. The Crimson even goes on to show “13 instances in which Ms. Viswanathan's book closely paralleled Ms. McCafferty's work” (NY Times).

My first reaction was : “Well duh, all chick lit books are alike, that’s why they suck!!” But then Hyphen fiction editor Sabrina Tom had a slightly less inflammatory and, well, smarter comment. She said: “I think this has to do with the heightened attention in the press right now given to author's accused of making things up (James Frey and the whole J.T. Leroy weirdness). It’s not just chick lit books. All authors, essentially, borrow and steal. Which author, under microscopic scrutiny, could claim total originality?”

Anyway, even if I am not totally in the Viswanathan fan club, I don’t think the plagarism was intentional. And even if Viswanathan’s plot closely parralelled McCafferty’s – Opal Mehta’s South Asian-ness sets the book apart and makes it an original.

So, what’s the moral of this story? I’m not sure, maybe just that I am and will always be a literary snob or maybe that there are no original stories out there. Regardless, I still hope How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life is made into a movie, because more than we need a South Asian American Zadie Smith, we need a South Asian American Lindsey Lohan.

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Comments

Comments

Negami wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 2:29pm
You're not a snob. You are a fool, however. 28 blatantly ripped off passages, and you're going to coddle her and swallow her lame excuse because she is South Asian? I believe they call that "reverse-racism."
Anonymous wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 3:34pm
"I still stand by the essential truths of the book."JAMES FREY, infamously fake author of "A Million Little Pieces" on Larry King Live, January 11, 2006"While the central stories of my book and hers are completely different, I wasn't aware of how much I may have internalized Ms. McCafferty's words."KAAVYA VISWANATHAN, soon to be infamous fake authorette of "HOW OPAL MEHTA GOT KISSED, GOT WILD, and GOT A LIFE" through her publisher, April 24, 2006She's a liar. You're an idiot.
j wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 4:44pm
wow, that's some awesome name-calling.... and how exactly is that reverse racism?
Kaylar Moore wrote on Mon, 09/04/2006 - 3:47pm
Since when is being in college an excuse for ripping a bunch of people off for a big-money book deal?No offense to all of you who think that she's only a kid, but she went to HARVARD. Of course, she knew better.Cheating is diffrent than plagerising. Both are wrong but cheating is normally a desprate measure to PASS a test.Plagerising is,in her case, a way to get a big-money book deal.I hope she is sued so badly that even her ivy-leauge education won't keep her above the poverty line.I hate it when people pull the race or age card. I'm a minority AND several years younger than her yet, i know she deseves some punishment.Why don't you?
reader wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 7:23pm
Sabrina Tom is either stupid or she has no taste for books. In either case, that's bad news for a fiction editor.If she (or whoever is the author of this article) bothered to read the article in the Crimson -- or all the follow up articles everywhere else-- they'd see that this has nothing to do with the cliche plots of both books. Rather, some of the phrases in "Opah Mehta's" alleged plagiarized sections are so idiosyncratic, either Viswanathan and McCafferty share exactly the same brain or someone copied the other.The author of this blog and Ms. Tom should try reading the news for a change, or maybe even some books.
reader - ps wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 7:24pm
Also, if you'd read the articles, you'd have known that the plots of Viswanathan and McCafferty's books are different.
someone somewhere wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 7:37pm
This "author" should be expelled from Harvard. Does anyone actually believe that she merely "internalized" the other book when she repeatedly copies it word for word?What a fucking joke.
jc wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 9:24pm
don't give me this death-of-the-author-nothing's-orginal-postmodernist -BULLSHIT.There is a huge difference between what ms.viswanathan--blatant, deliberate plagiarism--and the creative, acknowledged (re)use of other's work. the exact point is that WHAT viswanathan made up wasn't her fiction, it was that she DID make something up at all.sabrina tom's comment isn't smarter. it's pseudo-intellectual blather that hides behind pseudo-progressive politics.the closing comment represents the worst kind of identity politics. only skin deep. "South Asian-ness"?! this is just the commodification of race and has nothing to do with the specificity and heterogeneity of racial experience, let alone "class struggle."
anonymous wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 9:57pm
It is heart breaking what this teenager, this child is going through. Who among us in school or college have not cheated in some way either on a homework or a paper; we may have in a lazy moment read something somewhere and just rephrased it in our paper. It is not right, but we have the luxury of rethinking about our mistakes in private when we grow older. Assuming she lifted some material, this girl has no chance to privately learn from her mistake and grow. Her loss of face in front of her parents must be terrible. The shock and depression must be deep.I wish the world could go easy on her, perhaps crown publisher could let somethings pass. Is it really wrong to wish that?
claire wrote on Tue, 04/25/2006 - 11:19pm
negami, reader, and the first anonymous:"fool", "idiot" and "stupid"? name calling has no place on this blog, and i hope the hyphen staffers will delete any further abusive comments. it's not only possible, but easy to make pointed comments without making ad hominem attacks. grow up.the second anonymous:"Who among us in school or college have not cheated in some way either on a homework or a paper"??? are you kidding me??? I DIDN'T CHEAT! i suspect that most of my classmates didn't either, although a lot of them made jokes about it.HOWEVER, cheating in school is really a different matter from plagiarising a book YOU WILL BE PAID TO PUBLISH. plagiarism is simply illegal and the "author" is not a child. this is her lesson: she is being pilloried in public. if that doesn't teach her ... well, it doesn't matter, because she'll never be published again. and good riddance. there are plenty of mediocre trash writers out there who are fun to read even though they don't have to steal other people's work. let them get the five book deals.
majordomo wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 1:42am
Claire,Are you serious that you never did anything other than what was expected of you by your school or college??? So you never did any of the following:1) Make up an excuse (lying) for handing late a homework or paper?2) Getting an answer for a homework problem from a friend, when you were suppose to do it yourself?3) For a paper you write, you have never under reported the depth you owe to a particular book or source?4) You have never lazily looked at a book or a source passage and right away tried to incorporate the thought or idea in your paper? Of course you are suppose to read all your sources, forget the exact words (unless you are directly quoting) and only then start writing your paper in your words.If so then you and your friends exhibited good judgement and maturity at an early age.One more thing Kaavya didn't seek out big money, it seems that the admission officer at harvard forwarded her writing to the publisher and that lead to her contract. So may be instead of writing that paper at a young age, she had to write a published book.
erin wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 4:00am
Claire, thanks for your comment about the name-calling. i was appalled to read the first couple entries (minus "j"). why would Hyphen's readers treat our editors with such disrespect? why read us, then? and is this the caliber of human being our readership is made up of?intellectual cowardice or laziness is not surprising to me -- but the heated venom in these comments is. why such desire to scratch & maim? all of us at Hyphen do what we do out of our respect for and faith in our readers; when these prove to be misplaced, however, then i agree that malice should not be allowed to poison this space.
happybrowngrrrl wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 8:24am
Actually the admissions officer at Harvard did no such thing. According to articles, the woman her family hired to help her apply to the Ivies set her on the path to finding a publisher. This woman had a top flight agent of her own and she passed on Kaavya's work to them and from there more connections were made and she ended up with a publisher and a relationship with a "book packaging" company.I feel really bad for her because this is mortifying and who needs this kind of thing at any age, much less when you're in college. However, once you see ALL of the numerous similarities, it looks very suspicious and bad -- not like an accident. She's got some serious explaining to do, more than that half-hearted statement her publisher released.
majordomo wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 9:49am
You are right that it wasn't the harvard admission officer, but the ivywise admission consultant who forwarded Kavya's writing to a literary agent. But the point remain that it wasn't Kavya who was hawking a book to the publishing world.
claire wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 11:55am
here's an article from the harvard independent looking into the book packaging industry and how it relates to the opal mehta scandal:http://www.harvardindependent.com/ViewArticle.aspx?ArticleID=9921
Sonny Le wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 1:52pm
Do the names Doris Kearns Goodwin and the late Stephen Ambrose ring any bell?Though I am not familiar with the works of either Ms. Kaavya Viswanathan or Ms. Megan McCafferty and have no intention of reading their novels. Furthermore, I do not condone plagiarism, but the tone and the foul language, not to mention the passion, that are on this blog seem kinda hyperventalative. It is probably a lot worse elsewhere on other blogs and forums.Is it the six-figure book deal that is the cause all of the heated exchanges? Ms. Viswanathan's age? Or Gender? Or her ethnic background? Just wondering.I don’t recall people were up in arms to this extent when Ms. Goodwin, a noted presidential historian, and the wife of the well-respected Richard Goodwin, was accused of the same offense. Ms. Goodwin still makes the rounds as a pundit on presidential and other weighty matters.
justfyi wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 2:02pm
http://www.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2006/04/24/opal_mehta_vs_sloppy_firsts/
Neela wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 4:29pm
I think the Harvard Independent story is really interesting here. During the James Frey uproar -- which I KNOW is different but I think is related in the way that first-time authors are getting such huge media attention -- I thought there wasn't enough emphasis on how messed up the publishing industry is.As more and more details come out around this, I'm not sure what to think about Viswanathan's plagarism. Some of the language seems way too similar, it's true. I'm interested to see how this case goes down legally.In response to the name-calling in the discussion, I have recently been talking to other bloggers at sites like http://www.feministing.com about how the discussion aspect of blogging is both the best and worst part of this medium. I know the name-calling on this post was more childish but we have dealt with serious racist slurs before. At Feministing, they are often dealing with men or anti-feminists who come on posing as women or lying and try and engage people in commentary that quickly turns the site into an un-safe space. I think this is an issue that the blogging world will have to learn to deal with as time goes on.
claire wrote on Wed, 04/26/2006 - 7:48pm
i was thinking earlier that majordomo's comments about cheating in school were off topic. but upon reflection, i think s/he was right -- they DO relate to viswanathan's actions. i don't think a 17-year-old college student is a "child", but she is still in the educational system, and her experiences there will greatly inform her values outside of school.majordomo defined cheating as:
1) Make up an excuse (lying) for handing late a homework or paper?2) Getting an answer for a homework problem from a friend, when you were suppose to do it yourself?3) For a paper you write, you have never under reported the depth you owe to a particular book or source?4) You have never lazily looked at a book or a source passage and right away tried to incorporate the thought or idea in your paper? Of course you are suppose to read all your sources, forget the exact words (unless you are directly quoting) and only then start writing your paper in your words.
the first, lying about turning in homework late, is dishonest, but it's not plagiarism or "cheating".the second is more into the grey area. "doing the work yourself" really depends on the task at hand. if you need to put down how fast a train is going if it arrives in san francisco at 2:22 pm (etc.) and you KNOW how to do it but you wanted to go on a date instead ... well, that's clearly dishonest, but it's not exactly plagiarism. there's really only one way to solve a problem, and there's simply no way to prove how you arrived at the answer, short of a confession from you.the third, underreporting the depth you owe to a particular book, DOES indeed lay you open to charges of plagiarism, but this is also grey area. we know that there is nothing new under the sun and that great minds think alike and other cliches (yes, i did not cite those properly!) it's perfectly possible for a student to think something all on her own that an academic has thought before, and published. it's also very very possible for a student to read something, think it's unimportant and forget it, only to have it rise up again in slightly modified form as an "original" idea. only if the "under reporting" is done deliberately is it really plagiarism, and there's no way to prove that.the fourth one is pretty much the same as the third one.none of these amounts to outright provable plagiarism, which is using more than four words written by someone else without putting them in quotes. viswanathan did that, and repeatedly, in her book. she clearly stole not merely ideas and plots (which in certain circumstances IS acceptable, and we all steal in that way) but actual wording. as a harvard student she should know better. her ONLY excuse would be if she were not the one who put those words on the paper.
Babban Banarsi wrote on Thu, 04/27/2006 - 6:35am
Folks, please, stop pummeling a kid for a mistake (if the charges are true). This girl, excited by her achievements and further egged on by her publishers, tried finishing her book within a tight deadline -- and may have been tempted to resort to a quicker way to finish the job.But the fact is: (1) her ideas are very original and (b) even what is being quoted as 'plagiarism' is not quite correct. The words are different. Inspired? May be. But plagiarised? Absolutely not.And even if she did plagiarise, what's the big deal? She didn't tell lies and invade a country!Readers pay and buy books for the idea and story, which would remain unchanged even if the words were re-shuffled.
Samhita wrote on Thu, 04/27/2006 - 11:36pm
Yo-Good post Neela. You are a literary snob but what better kind of person to keep around!
Neela wrote on Fri, 04/28/2006 - 12:03pm
I guess it's over:http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2006/04/28/entertainment/e110334D33.DTL
Joy wrote on Sat, 04/29/2006 - 12:36am
The intended scenario of this strange ordeal was probably this: none of the parties really anticipated how successful and wide-read the book would become. It was never meant to be a hit, and she was never meant to be a star. I t started as something like a joke on her folks - for 10 grand you get to have your daughter's script read by a lit agent, and maybe see it printed and shelved in drugstores. Thus the idiotic oversight of copy-pasting 40 passages from a known author's books. In all likelihood it's an American freak success story. So come forward now, Kaviar Whatsinyourhead, and tell us the real story - that all you ever wanted was to get into Harvard without thinking really hard about books.
Can't defend i... wrote on Mon, 05/01/2006 - 10:02am
This morning, the New York Times ran an article mentioning two sentences from Opal Mehta that seem to been lifted, almost unmodified, from Salman Rushdie's book "Haroun and the Sea of Stories."Also, press coverage from before the date the plagiarism scandal broke have many examples of Kaavya Viswanathan pontificating about how her success is a result of good, old fashioned hard work, and she was just as surprised as anybody by the big advance. She never mentions "Alloy," the ghost writing shop that she hired to work with her on the book, and which shares copyright on Opal Mehta. She certainly never mentions the text from which is lifted sentences.Whatever her virtues, Kaavya Viswanathan is a hypocrit, and almost certainly a plagiarist. Can her parents be blamed? Can her publisher? Did anybody but Kaavya herself know what was going on?
MANOJ wrote on Wed, 05/03/2006 - 1:11am
In fact, Kaavya had not written the book "How Opal Mehta....". She only compiled that book by taking the contents from so many publications. The list is growing everyday. She by doing so spoiled the image of not only Indians but also all south east asians. She should be expelled from Harward and should be deported to India.- PUNEMANOJ
Anonymous wrote on Wed, 05/03/2006 - 2:59pm
Parallels between Meg Cabot's ''The Princess Diaries" andKaavya Viswanathan's ''How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, GotWild, and Got a Life"''The Princess Diaries," p. 127:Meanwhile, Paulo was picking upchunks of my hair and making thisface and going, all sadly, ''It must go. Itmust all go."And it went. All of it. Well, almost all ofit. I still have some like bangs and alittle fringe in back.''Opal Mehta," p. 57:The whole time, Frederic (I wondered if anyone dared callhim Freddie) kept picking up long strands of my hair andmaking sad faces. ''It must go," he said. ''It must all go."And it went. Not all of it, because after four inches vanished,I started making panicked, whimpering sounds that touchedeven Frederic's heart . . .''The Princess Diaries," p. 128:And it is sort of hard when all these beautiful, fashionablepeople are telling you how good you'd look in this and howmuch that would bring out your cheekbones . . . And I kepttelling myself, She's only doing this because she loves you .. .''Opal Mehta," p. 58:In my defense, it was hard to be uptight and prickly whilesurrounded by beautiful, fashionable people all telling mehow good I'd look in that shade and what this color would doto enhance my cheekbones. And I kept telling myself, it wasall for HOWGAL. Harvard was worth it.''The Princess Diaries," p. 129:Well, I for one will not stand for it. There isn't a single inch ofme that hasn't been pinched, cut, filed, painted, sloughed,blown dry, moisturized. I even have fingernails.But I am not happy . . . Because I don't look a thing like MiaThermopolis. Mia Thermopolis never had fingernails. . . . MiaThermopolis never wore makeup or Gucci shoes or Chanelshirts or Christian Dior bras. I don't even know who I amanymore . . . She's turning me into someone else.''Opal Mehta," p. 59Every inch of me had been cut, filed, steamed, exfoliated,polished, painted, or moisturized. I didn't look a thing likeOpal Mehta. Opal Mehta didn't own five pairs of shoes soexpensive they could have been traded in for a smallsailboat. She didn't wear makeup or Manolo Blahniks orChanel sunglasses or Habitual jeans or La Perla bras . . . Iwas turning into someone else.
Charles wrote on Wed, 05/03/2006 - 3:01pm
Parallels between Meg Cabot's ''The Princess Diaries" andKaavya Viswanathan's ''How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, GotWild, and Got a Life"''The Princess Diaries," p. 127:Meanwhile, Paulo was picking upchunks of my hair and making thisface and going, all sadly, ''It must go. Itmust all go."And it went. All of it. Well, almost all ofit. I still have some like bangs and alittle fringe in back.''Opal Mehta," p. 57:The whole time, Frederic (I wondered if anyone dared callhim Freddie) kept picking up long strands of my hair andmaking sad faces. ''It must go," he said. ''It must all go."And it went. Not all of it, because after four inches vanished,I started making panicked, whimpering sounds that touchedeven Frederic's heart . . .''The Princess Diaries," p. 128:And it is sort of hard when all these beautiful, fashionablepeople are telling you how good you'd look in this and howmuch that would bring out your cheekbones . . . And I kepttelling myself, She's only doing this because she loves you .. .''Opal Mehta," p. 58:In my defense, it was hard to be uptight and prickly whilesurrounded by beautiful, fashionable people all telling mehow good I'd look in that shade and what this color would doto enhance my cheekbones. And I kept telling myself, it wasall for HOWGAL. Harvard was worth it.''The Princess Diaries," p. 129:Well, I for one will not stand for it. There isn't a single inch ofme that hasn't been pinched, cut, filed, painted, sloughed,blown dry, moisturized. I even have fingernails.But I am not happy . . . Because I don't look a thing like MiaThermopolis. Mia Thermopolis never had fingernails. . . . MiaThermopolis never wore makeup or Gucci shoes or Chanelshirts or Christian Dior bras. I don't even know who I amanymore . . . She's turning me into someone else.''Opal Mehta," p. 59Every inch of me had been cut, filed, steamed, exfoliated,polished, painted, or moisturized. I didn't look a thing likeOpal Mehta. Opal Mehta didn't own five pairs of shoes soexpensive they could have been traded in for a smallsailboat. She didn't wear makeup or Manolo Blahniks orChanel sunglasses or Habitual jeans or La Perla bras . . . Iwas turning into someone else.
anonymous wrote on Sat, 05/13/2006 - 2:05pm
So young South Asian author from Harvard plagiarizes under great pressure under a huge book deal.I don't see why this story has had such a long shelf life in the media. I think it's racism.
a scholar wrote on Wed, 05/17/2006 - 5:20pm
It is REDICULOUS that where Kavvya Viswanathan is from becomes so emphasized by the media and some of these responses.How much is her achievements and faults related to where she is from? How much is her book "Opal Mahta" representitive of where she is from? Why don't people emphasize where she actually gets her many years of education?Think.