The Worst Form Of Flattery
The expression ‘Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery’ was first captured in print in 1820, by the writer Charles Colton. The saying ironically went on to be adopted, adapted and claimed by countless writers over the next 200 years, with its original source becoming increasingly muddied.
Oscar Wilde later took the saying, and added his own wonderfully Wilde-esque embellishment to the end of it: ‘Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocracy can pay to greatness’ — but we rarely get to hear the second half.
Copying might just take the prize as my greatest pet-peeve. The feeling of aggravation and unease that it stirs up inside me is one I can trace back to my nursery school days — when my best friend would use the exact same stencils as me, and end up with a felt-tipped masterpiece that looked exactly like mine. Since then, my resentment at being copied has been tested in various aspects of my life: my style, music choices, vocabulary and — most unbearably — my creative work.
Vocalising this, admittedly, feels a little ungracious — a sign of inflated self worth and vanity, perhaps, in thinking that my ideas are worthy of copying? I’ve also always feared that my intolerance of it was evidence of selfishness or lack of generosity. But upon researching the topic further, I was comforted to find that my feelings are, in fact, extremely common.
Being copied can often feel like identity-theft, like someone is encroaching on your individuality and uniqueness. To me, excusing copying under the guise that it is compliment seems a little dubious; the intention behind copying is rarely with the person being copied in mind, as would be the case with a compliment — so I find it hard to take it as one. I’d much prefer a verbal expression of admiration to any attempts to emulate.
Imitation is particularly grating when it comes from someone close to you, like a good friend. There is an unspoken understanding that friends are meant to support, champion and think highly of one another, whilst maintaining their own, separate identity. Celebrities are copied all the time, but they are far enough removed from it that it rarely touches them. With a friend, it feels personal and inescapable. What’s more, with it being such a sensitive matter to discuss, we usually end up biting our tongue and letting the issue fester.
In my teens, I had a close friend who, it was widely acknowledged, copied my wardrobe item-for-item. When I saw her each week, she’d be wearing a near-identical outfit to the one I’d worn the previous week— even as unsubtle as a pair of metallic silver trainers. This was at a point in time when I was desperately trying to define my own aesthetic and separate myself from the herd through what I wore. “You guys are twinning!” people would say to us, and my blood would spit like lava; I didn’t enjoy feeling like I was looking in a mirror all of the time. I would avoid wearing my favourite garments around her, in an attempt to preserve their originality, but I never felt I could address the elephant in the room without jeopardising our relationship.
Looking back now, I realise she was also en route to finding her own style — trying things on for size — and I was just a resource for that, as involuntary as that was. Mirroring the people around us is a natural human tendency — a means of social association and bond-forming that is integral to our teenage years — and I think she might have been genuinely oblivious to her own copy-catting. Some people are simply more impressionable than others (and some are just better at concealing it).
The lines that differentiate imitation from stealing, borrowing and ‘taking inspiration’ are blurry ones. When it comes to work, being copied can feel like someone is swindling you of the time, thought, energy and effort invested in an idea or creation; predating on the final outcome without having to undertake any of the graft it took to get there.
What I fear is that someone else will get the credit for my ideas, that I will end up like Charles Colton — the lesser-known predecessor. This fear has made me overly protective of my work, reluctant to put it out into the world in case it meets the same fate, and I end up looking like the sheep, not the shepherd. This desire to hide away my work is also completely counter-productive – it’s totally wasted if it’s just gathering dust on my laptop drive.
But what I have to accept, to some degree, is that imitation is fundamental to the evolution of society. Ideas don’t appear out of nowhere, they are progressions of what has come before. Though I like to think of my creations as brand-new, original and wholly mine, they are most definitely not; my work is a product of a multitude of different influences and micro-copies. Every famous artist we know will have taken influence from their fore-runners, and moved their ideas forward. The difference is that emulation is inspiration without the mind-power or creativity to make something new of it.
The humbling truth is that you are probably not the first person to be struck with this idea — as I’m not the first person to write a piece on copy-catting — and if it really is a good idea, it’s most likely that someone is going to copy you. Maybe imitation is, in fact, the clearest signifier as to the success of someone’s work?
As much as I might like to patent every aspect of myself, it seems imitation is merely inescapable. It’s clearly fundamental to our evolution, both as individuals and as a society; but I still can’t quite manage to take it as a compliment.
I wonder, were he to know how it has been appropriated since his time, whether Charles Colton would still stand by his words?