Sensitivity Changes Keep Authors Relevant (but are also a cash machine for their great great great grand kids)

Submitted by mkbt t3_123r2br in books

A 'side benefit' to the sensitivity changes to the work of Ian Fleming and Agatha Christie is it allows their Estates and their publishers to re-assert copyright; this keeps the books out of the public domain, the prices high, and unable to be 'remixed'.

Fleming died in 1964, so his work is already free in the UK and Canada. (Not for long).

Christie died in 1976, but some of her work -- published prior to 1928 -- is in the public domain in the USA. (Again not for long.)

Roald Dahl and Dr. Seuss both died in the 90s so their estates are able to cash out until at least 2065. (And now much longer presuming their texts are altered in 2023.)

The incentives are all wrong here. It is in the publisher's interest to make changes. (Watch for Sherlock Holmes to stop smoking and doing cocaine in the next cynical attempt to claw back licensing fees!)

The argument for sensitivity changes is market-driven to begin with so finger waving at the Estates for this only gets one so far -- and there are other considerations* -- but this is literally stealing from the public good.

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*(As others have pointed out, Christie specifically manipulated her reader's expectations using stereotypes, so omitting and altering her words is beyond cosmetic. Not to mention the integrity, speech, and archivist causes.)

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Ground2ChairMissile t1_jdvwkjj wrote

You've got the wrong idea about how copyright works.

Re-publishing classic works with minor changes doesn't "re-up" the copyright on the original novel, it only asserts a new copyright on the new, changed edition. The original work will still fall out of copyright according to the laws of the nation you're in.

If you translate Les Miserables into English, you have a copyright on your translation. The descendants of Victor Hugo do not get a brand new copyright on a 150-year-old book, and don't get any slice of your translation, either. But anyone else can translate the book and publish it on their own.

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ZeMastor t1_jdvzy52 wrote

THIS!

Thank you! I was going to say something along those lines.

If copyright worked the way that OP had said, the estates and descendants of authors of works in public domain, or nearing public domain status, could simply tinker with a 100+ year old work by and keep resetting/extending the copyright (of the original) forever.

That's not how public domain works.

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NomDePlume25 t1_jdwbclp wrote

Yeah, I was thinking that was the case. Les Miserables is actually a really good example, because there are older translations that are in the public domain. You can read the original French text or an English translation from the 19th century on Project Gutenberg, but not any of the translations that are still under copyright. I believe there's even a copyrighted translation that is essentially a more modernized/easy-to-read version of an older public domain one, although I can't remember the translators' names off the top of my head. In any case, I assume these edited re-releases will work the same way.

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ZeMastor t1_je5re6e wrote

I concur. Victor Hugo does have living descendants, and one of them tried to stop a "sequel" from being written:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/jan/31/books.france

He lost the case, and rightfully so. He's several generations removed from the author, and whatever rightful royalties Hugo and his immediate family deserved has long expired, as well as the right to control the IP. The sequel might suck, but there is no denying the right to write one.

Everything by great authors like Hugo, Dumas, Dickens, Twain, etc. is in public domain and I'm always for modernized translations to encourage a modern audience to read them. No need to beg anyone, or pay off some estate or long-removed descendant to do this!

Les Miz is best known for the 1862 Charles Wilbour translation, and that one is free on the Internet. The more modern translations started with Norman Denny (1976) , and others, such as Fahnestock, Donougher and Rose had stepped in with alternate new translations, with the language varying from "slightly modernized but still based on Wilbour" to "ultra-modern using contemporary slang and terminology".

https://welovetranslations.com/2021/07/29/whats-the-best-translation-of-les-miserables/

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Salt-Alarm-9103 t1_jdvvo2e wrote

I think the Suess estate was acting in good faith when they pulled a tiny percentage of titles they never intended to edit the books. The unintended effect was disinformation that created a massive uproar along the lines of “Dr. Suess Canceled!” (Thanks Fox News) Which in turn spurred on a huge sales boom for all Suess books. I think others are trying to copy that success.

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