WRITER and astrologer Jessica Adams was guilty of plagiarism for ripping off an Agatha Christie short story, literary critics said yesterday.

In what is shaping as Australia’s newest literary scandal, one critic said her dog could spot the similarities after comparing Adams’s story The Circle with the 1928 Christie work The Idol House of Astarte.

Lyn Tranter, agent at Australian Literary Management, described the coincidences between the two works as “absolutely extraordinary”.

“It is a complete and utter rip-off. I’ve never seen anything like it. There’s the same characters, same character development, same structure, exactly the same murder and the same resolution.

“I mean, it’s absolutely mind-blowing. How she thought she’d get away with it, I don’t know. It’s absolute plagiarism. I’d bank my reputation on it.”

One of Australia’s leading literary commentators, Helen Elliott, said “prima facie, this certainly looks like simple plagiarism … but plagiarism is anything but simple”.

“There’s a fine line between plagiarism and its euphemism, stimulation,” Ms Elliott said.

She said Adams possibly “had a memory of the Christie story motivating her but as she wrote her own story she might not have noticed how powerful or concentrated that memory was”.

In a statement yesterday, Adams said she had never read the legendary author’s work, let alone ripped it off, and joked about therepercussions.

“It is frankly terrifying to be accused of copying an Agatha Christie by her ardent fans,” she said.

“Who knows where such an author will end up? Lead piping, nooses in the library, butlers with candlesticks in all the wrong places — I imagine nothing is too much for them. I am mystified — in a whodunnit kind of way — by any comparison being made between the two stories.”

Both works tell a tale of mystery, murder and the supernatural, focusing on a beautiful woman suspected of murdering a property owner in a circle of trees. The striking similarities were first exposed in The Australian yesterday.

“My dog could tell it’s plagiarism, it takes my breath away it is just so obvious,” novelist and critic Debra Adelaide said yesterday.

“So much has been taken, the actual structure is the same.

“I hate to think that another author has done this deliberately. I know Agatha Christie’s story might be more than 70 years old, but you do not steal from another person’s work,” Adelaide said.

Adams’s literary agent, Fiona Inglis at Curtis Brown, said there were “only so many stories to tell, and coincidental similarities of character and narrative structure do occur.” “In a real case of plagiarism you would find identical passages. The prose would be hardly changed.

“This is clearly not the case with Jessica’s story.”

Linda Funnell, the fiction publisher at HarperCollins, believes “there’s a substantial difference between someone taking the bones of Romeo and Juliet or Pride and Prejudice and clothing them in completely new costumes and someone deliberately plagiarising”.

“The question of intent is everything, whether it was deliberate or subconscious.

“If plagiarism is proved as deliberate, it goes to the heart of the publisher-author relationship — trust is central to that — and it would clearly have an impact on future relations. A writer’s reputation is their passport,” Funnell said.

Other industry experts were also forgiving. The 2004 Critic of the Year, Peter Craven, said he could not see what the fuss was about. He said while Agatha Christie may have been an unconscious influence and “there is a family resemblance between the two stories”, he saw “no direct evidence of plagiarism”.

Editorial — Page 12

Tale of two writers and one of the oldest plots in the book

Extracts from The Circle by Jessica Adams:

“So he went over to get her, offering a jacket, and then he fell near one of the stones and … he didn’t get up.”

“As in he didn’t get up at all?” Tom said.

“He just wasn’t moving. When Michael Barden went over to check, he said he thought he was dead. Paul Renouf followed him and then Tessa gave this kind of mad scream, and ran into the bush.”

Extracts from The Idol House of Astarte by Agatha Christie:

“He hesitated for a moment, then seemed to stumble and fall headlong.

“He did not get up again, but lay where he had fallen prone on the ground.

“Suddenly Diana began to laugh hysterically.”

“Michael Barden insisted on going back to The Circle again,” he said. “He thought we would have more rain during the night. He wanted to find the knife, or whatever the weapon was, before the ground turned to mud. And I tried to stop him. But he ignored me.” – – Adams

“It was then that Elliot Haydon drew me aside.

“Look here,” he said. “I am going back to the grove. That weapon has got to be found.”

“If there is a weapon,” I said doubtfully.

“… I was curiously adverse to his doing so. I did my utmost to dissuade him, but without result.” — Christie

“The next morning,” James continued, “I realised I had completely forgotten about Michael Barden — along with the rest of thehousehold. It was Paul Renouf who asked me about him first, and we both decided to walk back through the bush, to The Circle.”

“It was the last thing I wanted to do,” he continued. — Adams

“It was not until about seven o’clock in the morning that anyone thought about Elliot Haydon, and then Symonds suddenly asked where he was. I explained what Elliot had done and Symonds’s grave face grew a shade graver. “I wish he hadn’t. It is — it is foolhardy,” he said.

“You don’t think any harm can have happened to him?”

“I hope not. I think, Padre, that you and I had better go and see.” — Christie

“When we finally reached The Circle, he was there. Barely conscious, on the ground, with a long, hard piece of flint sticking out of his body, just a few inches to the left of his heart, He was lucky to be alive. The grass was covered in his blood.” — Adams

“We ran together over the grass. Elliot Haydon was unconscious, but breathing feebly and this time there was no doubt of what had caused the tragedy. A long, thin bronze weapon remained in the wound.”

“Got him through the shoulder, not through the heart, That is lucky,” commented the doctor. — Christie

YOU DECIDE

What prominent Australian critics thought of The Circle

* Debra Adelaide

“I don’t know why you need the opinion of a literary critic. My dog could tell you this is plagiarism.”

* Helen Elliott

“Possibly she had a memory of the Christie story motivating her, but as she wrote her own story she might not have noticed how powerful or concentrated that memory was.”

* Peter Craven

“I don’t see what all the fuss is about. Yes, there is a family resemblance, but I don’t see any direct evidence of plagiarism.”

* Lyn Tranter

“It is a complete and utter rip-off. I have never seen anything like it.”

You decide: The full transcripts of the Agatha Christie and Jessica Adams stories are on The Australian‘s website:

www.theaustralian.com.au