(via thecommentfactory.com)

Independent columnist Johann Hari announced a leave of absence from the British paper and returned his 2008 George Orwell prize last week, after an investigation into plagiarism accusations revealed he had been lifting material from his subjects' written works and passing them off as quotes given to him in interviews.

He also copped to vandalizing the Wikipedia pages of his rivals.

Mr. Hari blamed the former misstep on reportorial ignorance, and pledged to get remedial journalism instruction during his months away from the paper.

That appears to include The New York Times Book Review! This weekend the Times published Mr. Hari's review of Thomas Keneally's new nonfiction, Three Famines: Starvation Politics.

Of course, the review was assigned and probably even edited before the Independent had made a ruling on Mr. Hari's history, but the book review section is a good place to begin one's journalistic rehabilitation. No interviews required.