Monkey See, Monkey Do

Jane Goodall Apologizes For Borrowed Passages

Paragraphs lifted from websites like Wikipedia.

Monkey see, monkey do. The Washington Post has found at least a dozen borrowed passages in a forthcoming book by Jane Goodall, the eminent primatologist and expert on chimpanzees. A botany expert invited by the Post to review Seeds of Hope: Wisdom and Wonder From the World of Plants, noticed that as much as entire paragraphs were lifted from websites such as Wikipedia, and notified editors. The book, due out next month, is not about chimps but about plants, which is outside Goodall's expertise. She co-wrote the book with Gail Hudson, a freelance writer who's formerly the spiritual editor for Amazon.com. Hudson had no comment, but Goodall apologized and said that she was "distressed" to discover the lack of proper citations. "I hope it is obvious that my only objective was to learn as much as I could," she said. The publisher, Grand Central, said that a detailed plan has not been formulated yet "beyond crediting the sources in subsequent releases." Goodall said she would discuss the issue further on her blog.