Includes bibliographical references. / The aim of this study is a conceptual and theoretical exploration of literary plagiarism. Chapter One traces various definitions of plagiarism and contrasts plagiarism with copyright infringement. It is argued that plagiarism is a social construct which cannot be defined solely in terms of textual features and must be contextualised. Authorial intention and reader reception play a key role in the discourse of plagiarism, since both reveal the prevailing contemporary textual ethics underlying textual production. The literature review in Chapter Two analyses the ways in which plagiarism has been interpreted in the last fifty years contrasting essentialist definitions of plagiarism with postmodern theories of plagiarism as a discourse of power. Plagiarism is contextualised within modern and postmodern aesthetics. In Chapter Three, the discourse of authorship as a stable and unified category is destabilised and challenged. What counts as plagiarism is argued to be inseparable from changing valorisations of authorship. Paradigms of authorship are then contrasted to illustrate how textual values change from one era to another, affecting dominant representations of authorship and plagiarism. Originality is explored as the pivotal construct on which the Romantic model of individual authorship depends - the model in which our current views of plagiarism have their origin. The plagiarist or 'nonauthor' is commonly viewed as everything the author is not: a copyist, unoriginal and immoral. Chapter Four analyses this construction of the plagiarist in the context of a South African case study in which Stephen Watson, Head of Department of English at the University of Cape Town, accused writer Antjie Krog of plagiarism. An analysis is made of the debate which ensued in a South African online journal, as well as of the press documentation surrounding the case. An interview was also conducted with Watson once the debate subsided. The conclusion reached from this study affirms that plagiarism is not an easily definable phenomenon since it depends on cultural notions that are in flux. Social, economic and technological changes also bring to bear on the literary institution, models of authorship and the consequent treatment of plagiarism. By enlarging the range of motivations for textual practices traditionally labelled as plagiarism, this thesis argues for a new conception of plagiarism, one that engages various discourse participants and contexts.