The publishers of an award-winning novel by Haitian-Canadian author Thelyson Orelien have defended the writer against accusations he used artificial intelligence to write it, and said they stand behind him.
Orelien denied using AI tools to write “C’etait Ca ou Mourir” (“It Was Either That or Die”) on Tuesday, a day after a little-known X account called “Balance ton Claude” said that running passages through AI detection tool Pangram showed the novel “was written almost entirely by artificial intelligence.”
The controversy has ignited a debate about race, literary merit and originality that has roiled the French literary establishment.
The novel, Haiti-born Orelien’s first, has been longlisted for the prestigious Goncourt prize and won several others. It tells the story of a Haitian migrant who travels north through Latin America and the United States to Canada.
Denying the accusations against him, Orelien told French daily Liberation that they had come as a surprise, even if he had faced racist attacks ever since arriving in France.
“I did not expect attacks of this kind. I am not sad, but angry,” he said. “I am in the process of putting together a dossier with my publishers in France and Quebec to prove that what I am saying is true.”
