Duplicate Content Fix - Google

[futbolplayer]

I had originally created a website that used text from ecommerce websites that resulted in many of my website’s pages not being indexed due to duplicate content. When I read online about the fix, the recommended solutions are:
1) return a 404 error (remove from google index essentially)
2) 301 redirect to original source

No advice however recommended rewriting the content on the page. My question is, if I rewrite the content, will google later rank the page as non-duplicate content or is the page just dead? I have not found an authoritative answer for this question.

[aspkin]

Yeah, if you rewrite the content with some time Google will start indexing your pages. It may take many weeks or until Google bots index your page again. Your pages aren't dead.

[futbolplayer]

Appreciate the reply Aspkin. I guess I would further question if I kept the duplicate content but added unique content with it, would this help the issue? In my current situation, it’d be much easier to add more unique content with the duplicate content (affiliate feed generated), rather than rewriting all the affiliate content (prohibitively expensive).