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Old 11-17-2010, 10:32 AM   #41
Galin
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Originally Posted by Mithalwen
(...) However it may be unfair to personalise this and equate the estate estate with Christopher alone.
That's true and I didn't and don't mean to do this. My post was poorly worded despite that I would guess CJRT has a notable voice in these decisions.

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However I think the key phrase is "Tolkien and his work". Christopher has spent over thirty years bringing us his father's work over 15 substantial volumes of it ...are we being greedy to demand access to that which isn't related to his work?
OK but I would still highlight more than work, in letters and the Estate authorised Chronology mentioned, for instance. And not that anyone disagrees but work illuminates the Man, even though personal letters are (obviously) a different animal.
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Old 11-17-2010, 11:05 AM   #42
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Oh it was a general point - though of course as Literary executor he is of course highly significant. There is a net wide tendancy to rather cast him as a pantomime villain and blame him for everything.

Yes there have been authorised stuff - I wasn't aware of the Chronology (RL has prevented me keeping up) but whether this matter crossed a line it is hard to tell from the outside. It is fair to say that the works mentioned are fairly concentrated on his work rather than private life - I suppose the exception would be the Tolkien Family Album. However on the whole they haven't cashed in as they might have done (wouldn't we all want to read Christopher's autobiography?). However I think this would have been a fairly niche market I don't think I have paid so much for a book myself.. Ł25 I think is my record for The road goes ever on and Artist and Illustrator.
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Old 11-17-2010, 03:09 PM   #43
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I think the interesting point here is that the Family (who effectively are the Estate) have released a great deal of 'personal' information in the years since Tolkien died - Carpenter's Bio, the Letters, the Chronology & Garth's bio of Tolkien's WWI service &, of course, the Family Album - all 'authorised'. We even had Christopher. Priscilla & Father John taking part in the documentary JRRT: A Film Portrait discussing their father's work & reminiscing about their childhoods. Given that they have agreed to the relase of so much 'personal information it would be difficult for them to argue that they have a 'right' to keep information about their father 'private'. If they had never released any personal info about him & adopted the approach they did with the movies, then they would have a stronger position. As it is, it looks like they are attempting to control what is revealed about him - in effect to 'create' a JRR Tolkien in their own image.

Using copyright in this kind of way begs a larger question - they may have a legal right to letters & documents created by JRRT, but do they 'own the man, the 'artist'? This, to me, is a vital question - does the Estate own JRR Tolkien to the extent that they have a right to stop information about him being made public? As far as I'm aware, facts aren't copyright, or copyrightable. One could argue that quoting, or even paraphrasing, a letter from JRRT telling Hilary that he went into Birmingham for tea one Sunday in September 1935 was protected by copyright, but the FACT that JRRT went into Birmingham for tea one Sunday in September 1935 is not copyrightable.
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Old 11-17-2010, 04:07 PM   #44
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Hmm then maybe it is a question of exploitation of the copyrighted material? Intellectual property may not be tangible but it doesn't mean it is a free for all and that makes the fact that the family has used it irrelevant. If you run a bed and breakfast are you supposed to tolerate squatters? If I gave someone a bag of my secret recipe fudge as a gift I would be pretty narked if they copied it and marketed it for their own benefit.

Catherine Zeta Jones' Hello v Okay law suit established rights to privacy I think even when in that case photo rights had been sold.
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Old 11-17-2010, 04:22 PM   #45
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Well, as I stated earlier - we may just be dealing with the Estate putting its foot down over letters that are the equivalent of 'Dear Hilary, went into Brum for a cuppa & forgot me brolly - Doh!, Yours Ronald'. But if its the alternative, & its facts about Tolkien they are attempting to prevent getting out then I think at the very least that morally questionable, even if its legally shiny. Either say nothing, or tell the truth, warts & all.
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Old 11-17-2010, 05:33 PM   #46
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bęthberry View Post
When will copyright run out in these matters? Apparently later rather than sooner scholarship will come to terms with the writer behind all that pipe smoke.
I believe the UK laws are virtually identical. In the US, anything created after 1978 the copyright lasts during the duration of the author's life + 70 years. Same goes for anything created, but unpublished before 1978.

So, it does appear like we'll have a while yet to wait.
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Old 11-18-2010, 05:10 AM   #47
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playing devil's advocate a little..

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Originally Posted by davem View Post
Well, as I stated earlier - we may just be dealing with the Estate putting its foot down over letters that are the equivalent of 'Dear Hilary, went into Brum for a cuppa & forgot me brolly - Doh!, Yours Ronald'. But if its the alternative, & its facts about Tolkien they are attempting to prevent getting out then I think at the very least that morally questionable, even if its legally shiny. Either say nothing, or tell the truth, warts & all.
Well no disputing that morality and legality are very different things ... but I don't think it is moral for example to take a yard when an inch has been given - which may also be the case.. I think saw somewhere that the earlier book breached copyright in which case it is hardly suprising the Estate clamped down.

Also there is a distinction between private and secret. If you have read Douglas Adams as well as Tolkien you will know that people telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth ends up with learning more than anyone really wants to know about frogs . Speaking for myself I have few scandalous secrets but there are plenty of things I wouldn't want broadcast to the nation. Privacy may be a disappearing concept in an era when people seem happy to bleat the most intimate details of their lives into their mobile phones on trains, but the older Tolkiens are certainly of a generation that did not believe in washing linen in public even if not very dirty. I don't see that saying something places a moral obligation to tell everything and that not doing so make you dishonest de facto.

Children may have a more relaxed view than grand children even as regards what is private to the family and may feel they want to keep it that way for their lifetimes at least. I don't think that is an immoral choice if it were the case. One thing is fairly certain that whatever their private feeling, the Tolkiens as a family of scholars are unlikely to have destroyed anything no matter how personal any "facts" are unlikely to disappear if they are held only in these letter - which frankly seems unlikely in the light of the Estate's statement . Seems to be much more "a boundary dispute" and a matter of principle.
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Old 11-18-2010, 09:23 AM   #48
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Since we have little idea what this was really about, it's hard to know the rights and wrongs of the case. It seems very harsh, though, that the authors were, for whatever reason, forced to withdraw their book at the eleventh hour. From Angela Gardner's own statement, it looks like they went to considerable lengths to accommodate the estate, and it still wasn't enough. It's a bitter and frustrating thing to have one's hard work end up being for nothing.

However, leaving aside the question of whether the Estate has acted like a bully in this case, I'd also like to say that I agree with Mithalwen on the general principle that there's nothing unethical per se in withholding information of that kind. I mean, there are times when you could argue that it is in the public interest for some dead person's private journal (or whatever) to be made public, and that this must override the wishes and rights of that person's heirs. But I think that only applies in certain, very extreme cases.

Mind you, I say this from the perspective of someone who is herself intensely private– or perhaps "secretive" would be a better word. Or perhaps even "paranoid", if you're feeling really uncharitable. I mean, I'd hate to think of people dissecting my personal life after I was dead. *shudders* I understand that not everyone feels that way, but anyway, I also find that the petty day-to-day details of a writer's or artist's life (including much of the "dirty laundry") tend to be both fairly uninteresting in themselves, and very limited in the amount of light they cast on his or her work. But then, maybe I'm just jaded from having known too many artists...

Quote:
Originally Posted by davem
But if its the alternative, & its facts about Tolkien they are attempting to prevent getting out then I think at the very least that morally questionable, even if its legally shiny. Either say nothing, or tell the truth, warts & all.
Well, that's one of those things you can't really argue about. You either hold that second statement as a principle, or you don't; I don't. (A difficult maxim to life your life by, anyway... but then I'm sure you don't mean it quite like that )
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Old 11-18-2010, 02:52 PM   #49
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"morally questionable"....

I want to clarify:

What we're talking about here is the use/abuse of copyright. Let's go back a bit
Quote:
"The coming into force of the Statute of Anne in April 1710 marked a historic moment in the development of copyright law. As the world's first copyright statute it granted publishers of a book legal protection of 14 years with the commencement of the statute. It also granted 21 years of protection for any book already in print. Unlike the monopoly granted to the Stationers' Company previously, the Statute of Anne was concerned with the reading public, the continued production of useful literature, and the advancement and spread of education. To encourage "learned men to compose and write useful books" the statute guaranteed the finite right to print and reprint those works. It established a pragmatic bargain involving authors, the booksellers and the public. The Statute of Anne ended the old system whereby only literature that met the censorship standards administers by the booksellers could appear in print. The statute furthermore created a public domain for literature, as previously all literature belonged to the booksellers forever.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright
the Statute of Anne was concerned with the reading public, the continued production of useful literature, and the advancement and spread of education. That's the point, & the only real justification for copyright - to enable artists to continue creating & to promote the arts - obviously, if an artist spends years creating a work & then as soon as its made public people copy it & sell it on without giving anything back to the artist then the artist will either find a different means of making a living, or starve. So, the purpose of copyright is to promote creativity - for example the writing of books. One cannot argue that the publication of these letters or the contents thereof are going to prevent JRR Tolkien writing any more letters to Hilary Tolkien.

Copyright was never intended to be used as cheap & easy means of protecting one's privacy - there are other laws intended for that purpose. Of course, one problem is that one cannot libel the dead, so to expand Morthoron's comment about J.R.R. parading about in women's clothing in a foxhole in France and being referred to as Jane Tolkien by his comrades one could actually state that he did without fear of prosecution -whether its true or not, because JRRT is dead. On the other hand one could not state that Christopher Tolkien got up to similar shenanigans in the RAF, because he's not dead. One could not, either, state that JRRT paraded about in women's clothing at home & traumatised his children by these antics, because his children are still alive & even though the statement concerns JRRT principally, it also makes reference to them.

Therefore, while the Estate's action in this case is certainly 'legal' in its use of copyright law I still say its against the spirit of the law of copyright, & is effectively doing the opposite of what Copyright is intended to do, by actually preventing a book being published, even though there is not a single suggestion from the Estate that the material in question was false in any way. Preventing facts being made public, is not, & never was, the purpose of Copyright.
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Old 11-18-2010, 03:51 PM   #50
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The odd thing is with how much misinformation runs amok over the internet and other biographies, you would think the Estate would be behind two quality authors who went through the grind of research and effort to get the "facts" straight. Instead of clinging to copyright laws to stop a book that actually attempts to put out reliable information.
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Old 11-18-2010, 11:24 PM   #51
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[Note: this is a reply to a deleted post]

Davem, thanks for the clarification; however, I don't think we're quite approaching this from the same angle. I'm aware that copyright laws were never intended to block information, and I generally think it's very bad indeed when they're used for that purpose, as has been all too often the case recently (especially with their misbegotten internet offspring, the DMCA). However, I think what we're talking about is a grey area. There are considerations other than either profit or defamation– I mean, I think it reasonable if a deceased person's family doesn't want some private material published simply because it happens to be embarrassing in a sub-defamatory way, or indeed just because it is private. Again, I know this wasn't the original purpose of copyright law. What I'm saying is that I don't think it's wrong to use a law for another purpose than what it was meant for, if that purpose is not in itself wrong.

All the above, though, relates to your own hypothesis that the Estate's real motivation is to suppress some juicy bit of scandal... which remains just an hypothesis, anyway.

Having said all that, I do consider that giving people permission to use material, then withdrawing that permission at a point where it makes everything they've done pointless, is indeed "morally questionable". If that's what Tolkien Estate did, then they were in the wrong.
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Old 11-19-2010, 12:43 AM   #52
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[ Again, I know this wasn't the original purpose of copyright law. What I'm saying is that I don't think it's wrong to use a law for another purpose than what it was meant for, if that purpose is not in itself wrong.
And I think that's what's gotten us all a long way down a very slippery slope with lots of nasty sharp rocks waiting at the bottom. There are constant attempts to extend the term & nature of 'Copyright' - some are demanding that copyright to be up for sale to the highest bidder & extended indefinitely, so that companies could purchase copyrighted material & keep it out of the public domain forever. That would be be concerning enough if we were dealing only with works of art, but when it includes personal letters & documents, then the danger to society is immense. Copyright is a bit of a bugbear with me (I check out Techdirt at least once everyday!) & my hackles rise at the casual use & abuse of it.

Quote:
All the above, though, relates to your own hypothesis that the Estate's real motivation is to suppress some juicy bit of scandal... which remains just an hypothesis, anyway.

.
Well, I could be flip & say - 'Who's fault's that? The Estate are not offering up any real explanation of what they don't want 'out there' - they are simply saying 'We own the copyright & we are not allowing this material out'. If this wasn't the Tolkien Estate, but Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation I don't think my reastion would be uncommon. In other words, there's a sense of 'Its the TOLKIEN Estate, therefore their behaviour can only be good & wise & done entirely for the best reasons. My response - yes, very probably. I don't think they're trying to cover up some terrible scandal that would shock the Tolkien community to the core & lead to public burnings of his books & himself in effigy. I suspect its more just a bit of mildly embarrassing stuff about Father Francis' prediliction for juggling stoats or some such.

Actually, no, it must be something beyond the range of silly but a bit embarrassing, because I doubt the authors & publishers of this book would have any issue leaving out material like that. Let's remember they have spent years researching & writing a scholarly work about Tolkien's brother & brought it right to the point of publication & clearly feel that the story cannot be told without the inclusion of this material. The Estate are making out this is just 20-odd pages out of 300 & its no big deal to remove it. The authors, after all their hard work feel that without it the book is missing an element so vital that there is no point publishing it. If I step back from an attitude of 'Oh, its the TOLKIEN Estate so there can't possibly be anything bad in what they're doing here' & look at this objectively, I see very big. very rich organisation preventing the publication of a serious work of scholarship because it contains information said very big, very rich organisation does not want in the public domain. That may just be material which is a bit embarrassing rather than deeply scandalous, but stopping this book going ahead for that reason is a bit of a scandal in itself (IMHO)
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Old 11-19-2010, 02:04 AM   #53
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[Note: replying to a deleted post]

Quote:
Originally Posted by davem
Quote:
Originally Posted by Nerwen
Again, I know this wasn't the original purpose of copyright law. What I'm saying is that I don't think it's wrong to use a law for another purpose than what it was meant for, if that purpose is not in itself wrong.
And I think that's what's gotten us all a long way down a very slippery slope with lots of nasty sharp rocks waiting at the bottom. There are constant attempts to extend the term & nature of 'Copyright' - some are demanding that copyright to be up for sale to the highest bidder & extended indefinitely, so that companies could purchase copyrighted material & keep it out of the public domain forever. That would be be concerning enough if we were dealing only with works of art, but when it includes personal letters & documents, then the danger to society is immense.
As I said in my first post, there are situations when it would clearly would be vital for private documents to be made public, and where this should override all considerations of copyright and privacy. If there isn't any legal provision in such a case, then there certainly ought to be. But that doesn't mean those considerations shouldn't otherwise exist. You apparently see this as an "all or nothing" deal; I don't. (I'd like to use the term "slippery slope" to describe your argument here, but, heck, you beat me to it!)

Still, Davem if society collapses into a bloody dictatorship as a result of people not being automatically able to read each others' diaries without permission, you can always blame me.

Quote:
Originally Posted by davem
Actually, no, it must be something beyond the range of silly but a bit embarrassing, because I doubt the authors & publishers of this book would have any issue leaving out material like that. Let's remember they have spent years researching & writing a scholarly work about Tolkien's brother & brought it right to the point of publication & clearly feel that the story cannot be told without the inclusion of this material. The Estate are making out this is just 20-odd pages out of 300 & its no big deal to remove it. The authors, after all their hard work feel that without it the book is missing an element so vital that there is no point publishing it. If I step back from an attitude of 'Oh, its the TOLKIEN Estate so there can't possibly be anything bad in what they're doing here' & look at this objectively, I see very big. very rich organisation preventing the publication of a serious work of scholarship because it contains information said very big, very rich organisation does not want in the public domain. That may just be material which is a bit embarrassing rather than deeply scandalous, but stopping this book going ahead for that reason is a bit of a scandal in itself (IMHO)
I'm sorry, but look, unless there's something you haven't told us, you don't have any evidence for this, have you? Just your own conjectures. As far as any of us know, this is just a straight copyright issue. And as far as I'm concerned, you and I have been talking about a purely hypothetical situation.

Once again, I'm not even trying to defend Tolkien Estate here. I'm certainly not taking the attitude that 'Oh, its the TOLKIEN Estate so there can't possibly be anything bad in what they're doing here'. I've already said it sounds like they may well be being pointlessly obstructive. I just think it's also possible to look at things "objectively" without making a foray into what, if you'll forgive me for saying this, is starting to look rather like borderline conspiracy-theory territory. (More in the phrasing than anything else, though– cf the passage I bolded.) And anyway, as I've said several times already, I do not believe that a moral duty exists to make any and all material public. It just depends.

Again, from my point of view the possible ethical violation here lies in giving permission and then withdrawing it for no good reason, wasting the authors' time and effort in the process.
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Old 11-19-2010, 02:48 AM   #54
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I noticed that one of the authors has posted a comment here:

http://www.tolkienguide.com/modules/...ode=0&start=10

In particular, they say:

"We wanted to include various letters in the book, some from members of Ronald's family, or failing that to give some account of their contents to illustrate how close and loving the family was and what they talked to each other about. This has been the sticking point that it has not been possible to overcome thus far.

I should also point out that the Estate have not been demanding money for permissions or anything like that."

AND

"The publication of the book had to be cancelled as there was not time to make further changes to the book and get it printed and bound in time for the launch. What happens in the future I really don’t know. Only time will tell."

So the book may still be published in the future.

The problem the Estate has is the publication of the letters - either in their full form or in paraphrased form.

Some have suggested that it is not a violation of copyright to paraphrase material - but that depends. For example, it is not a violation of copyright to do a 1000 word paraphrase of The Lord Of The Rings, but it would definitely violate copyright to do a 1000 page paraphrase of The Lord Of The Rings, because that would simply be an obvious rewrite of the book, which most definitely would not be allowed!
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Old 11-19-2010, 05:10 AM   #55
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For example, it is not a violation of copyright to do a 1000 word paraphrase of The Lord Of The Rings, but it would definitely violate copyright to do a 1000 page paraphrase of The Lord Of The Rings, because that would simply be an obvious rewrite of the book, which most definitely would not be allowed!
And yet, I'm sure I've read quite a few fantasy novels that fit that description pretty closely...
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Old 11-19-2010, 07:48 AM   #56
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(...) Again, from my point of view the possible ethical violation here lies in giving permission and then withdrawing it for no good reason, wasting the authors' time and effort in the process.
The Estate notes that ADC agreed not to publish the letters or paraphrase them, and then did the latter anyway. I'm wondering why anyone was given access to this material in the first place -- mistake on someone's part? Did party A assume something party B had not actually agreed to?

It seems possible that this material was provided as research to generally help with an accurate description of familial relationships -- without however using it in a very specific way, such as publication or close paraphrasing, noting the Estate's statement includes...


'... that were reproduced virtually verbatim.'

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Old 11-19-2010, 08:37 AM   #57
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Galin View Post
The Estate notes that ADC agreed not to publish the letters or paraphrase them, and then did the latter anyway.
Sorry, I should have read that more carefully.

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Originally Posted by Galin View Post
I'm wondering why anyone was given access to this material in the first place -- mistake on someone's part? Did party A assume something party B had not actually agreed to?
Well, it happens. Or perhaps they adopted a "write now, get permission later" approach since they had little idea at the outset what material they would end up including in the final version anyway. It's not an uncommon shortcut in some fields (don't know about biography), but it can lead to grief.
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Old 11-19-2010, 09:33 AM   #58
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Only time now to answer the easy point, Galin, the access issue is explained simply by the fact that copyright does not go hand in hand with ownership of the physical object. Copyright unless transferred belongs to the writer (unless they are commissioned or employed). So with a letter which by its nature usually is parted from its writer, the copyright stays with the writer and the manuscript goes to the recipient who is the legal owner of the artefact but has no right to publish the contents. So in this instance Hilary's descendent are the legal owners of the letters and of course may show them to whomsoever they wish. However noone may publish the letters without the consent of the estate. So the estate has no control over access to this material but it does over publication.
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Old 11-19-2010, 09:33 AM   #59
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Originally Posted by Galin
The Estate notes that ADC agreed not to publish the letters or paraphrase them, and then did the latter anyway.
I should note that I'm not sure exactly when ADC agreed to this, but that in any case they appear to have agreed at some point, and yet paraphrased the letters anyway. And so far at least, no one from the publishing company has spoken to this (that I know of).

That said, I don't know that the Estate ever agreed to using these letters in the specific ways that they object to in their statement, thus my...

Quote:
It seems possible that this material was provided as research to generally help with an accurate description of familial relationships -- without however using it in a very specific way, such as publication or close paraphrasing, noting the Estate's statement includes '... that were reproduced virtually verbatim.'
Ah didn't see your post Mithalwen... thanks for the information.
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Old 11-19-2010, 09:42 AM   #60
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Galin I think that my cross post will answer that point. The Estate would not have provided access then quixotically withheld permission. Access to the letters was not theirs to grant. If you look at the Trust accounts you will see that some correspondents have returned or bequested their letters from JRRT to the estate but most letters he wrote will have stayed with the recipients as is the normal course of things. Now an interesting question might be if when a letter comes up for sale and it is photographed for sale say on E-bay if copyright is infringed if the contents can be read. NB None of the Downer legal eagles should take that as instruction since I haven't a bean!

Must pop out and then decide if I can persuade a certain terrier to yield his rat
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Old 11-19-2010, 09:54 AM   #61
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Old 11-19-2010, 07:37 PM   #62
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If you look at the Trust accounts you will see that some correspondents have returned or bequested their letters from JRRT to the estate
For some reason I've thought for most of this discussion that that's what happened with these particular letters, but I'm not sure why, come to think of it.

This is now starting to sound to me like a bit of a storm in a teacup.
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Old 11-20-2010, 12:45 AM   #63
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This is now starting to sound to me like a bit of a storm in a teacup.
Well, unless you've spent the last few years researching & writing a book...

Actually, I've been looking into the Estate's attitude a bit more, & I'm still not sure whether this is about privacy or pettiness:

Quote:
Christopher Tolkien owns all copyrights to his father's works and the Tolkien Estate has an official editorial team that sifts through Tolkien’s paperwork and releases new sets of words from time to time.

Lúthien say she must tread carefully though when it comes to the words they publish and worries about legal issues should she include them in her dictionary because the Tolkien estate are very strict about their use.

The Tolkien estate has taken people to court in the past, most notably author Michael Perry for his book Untangling Tolkien: A Chronology and Commentary for The Lord of the Rings. Wired magazine reported back in 2001 how "Elfconners", the name given to those involved with Tolkien's unpublished writings, had acted as "informal copyright police" and attempted to prevent publications by other linguistic scholars.http://www.reghardware.com/2010/11/1...eks/page6.html
Quote:
Still, the Elvish scene is riven by all-too-human controversy. In 1999, Fauskanger received an email from an associate that included scans of two Quenya texts by J.R.R. Tolkien: unpublished translations of the Lord's Prayer and "Ave Maria." After writing a dense analysis of the texts, which are some of the longest Quenya writings by Tolkien known to exist, Fauskanger sent his 60-page manuscript to Christopher Tolkien for feedback. He also asked if he could publish a facsimile of Tolkien's original handwritten texts along with his own work. In return he got a curt letter from Cathleen Blackburn, the lawyer for the J.R.R. Tolkien Estate Limited, which continues to manage Tolkien's literary properties. Blackburn told Fauskanger that he could not legally disseminate his analysis, let alone a facsimile. Old flame wars on the TolkLang list were rekindled: Can you copyright an invented language or just particular texts in that language? Fauskanger believes he was well within the boundaries of fair use, but the Norwegian has no desire to alienate the estate. He just wants to publish an exceptionally obscure text in a tiny journal for no money.#The issue is compounded by the fact that a tremendous amount of Tolkien's linguistic material remains unpublished and in the hands of a fan cabal. In the early 1990s, the estate made thousands of pages of Tolkien's notes available to a handpicked crew of linguists known loosely as the Elfconners. The group includes a NASA scientist named Carl Hostetter and a Berkeley record store clerk named Arden Smith. After promising not to share the material with others, the Elfconners were supposed to prepare and publish at least a portion of these writings. But a full decade after the Elfconners first received copies from Christopher Tolkien, the clique has published only a few early lexicons in their increasingly irregular journals - a situation that recalls nothing so much as the Dead Sea Scrolls controversy. To make matters worse, the Elfconners have behaved as informal copyright police, pressuring other linguists not to publish their dictionaries and grammars. "It's against all principles of scholarship and decency for one scholar to try to use the law to prevent another scholar from publishing," says David Salo, who has yet to publish his 366-page analysis of Sindarin for fear of an estate suit. Unfortunately, all the Elfconners approached by Wired turned down requests for interviews. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/9...ic=&topic_set=
As has been pointed out previously this isn't the first time the Estate has prevented publication of a book which has gotten a very long way towards publication before suddenly deciding they don;t want it to go ahead (Michael Drout was about to publish Tolkien's translation of Beowulf originally working with the Estate's permission - which was then withdrawn.)

I'm not saying the Estate is behaving any better or worse than other copyright holders who regularly use copyright in a heavy-handed way, either to protect their privacy (a -mis-use of the spirit if not the letter of that law) or just to assert their rights over the material - even when it would make absolutely zero difference to them if the material was made available. Probably they aren't. But that doesn't make it right, it only makes it legal.
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Old 11-20-2010, 01:38 AM   #64
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Since I'm currently investigating issues surrounding access to those Tolkien manuscripts that currently exist in libraries (which by necessity also deal with copyright and the huge documentary editing project that is Christopher Tolkien's life), this whole kerfluffle is particularly timely. Because I'm still in the early stages of research, suffice it to say that I find the differences between Marquette University's access policy and the Bodleian's (which has been the Estate's repository of choice, although some additional LotR-based materials have made their way to Marquette) fascinating.

I just wanted to butt in to say that Fauskanger's analysis of the Our Father and Hail Mary did make their way up on his site and can be downloaded into a nice, hefty, 67-page Word file. His introductory remarks to the Quenya course also contain arguments about why you can't copyright a language, which I first read entirely ignorant of their context. But if they were in fact C&D'd I doubt they'd be up there.

And since the publication of the Wired article, Vinyar Tengwar and Parma Eldalamberon have come out with quite a few more issues, both new grammatical information and vocabulary--including Tolkien's sexy wordlist (turns out the Elves have a word for "hermaphrodite"). But they still hold the monopoly and will continue to publish at their own pace.

This is not at all, of course, to negate davem's point--namely, that this isn't the first time this has happened, and that the Estate's copyright policies have led to a lot of angst on the part of honest scholars. I just wanted to update some of the information in the article.

I hope to return to this thread when I have more information, if I'm not daunted away by it all first.
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Old 11-20-2010, 02:42 AM   #65
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Personally speaking, I am daunted - I happen to know a bit about the issues raised here, including details of the Perry book. This is not private knowledge, by the way. Anyone who's spent some time reading about Tolkien can glean this info.

Reports such as those pointd to by davem tend to be one-sided. I could comment - I've been meaning to, but I'm put off by the idea of being on the receiving end of a rant. This is a pity - I know I've not been active here very much, but davem's 'righteous indignation' as he may see it has put me off the Barrowdowns for good.

I'm sorry I've had to say this - there have been some enlightening posts by others here, who do try and hold a balance, but the overall effect of this thread seems sour (to me) and I fear that any facts I could bring to the discussion would be lost in a torrent of, well, opinion based to a large extent on one-sided internet chatter.

I don't have the energy for that sort of grief. I'm off. Thanks for listening.

garm

ps - purely as a matter of fact, the Perry book was published.

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Old 11-20-2010, 03:11 AM   #66
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As has been pointed out previously this isn't the first time the Estate has prevented publication of a book which has gotten a very long way towards publication before suddenly deciding they don;t want it to go ahead
I don't think they "suddenly decided" anything.
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Old 11-20-2010, 04:02 AM   #67
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[Note: replying to a deleted post]

Quote:
Originally Posted by davem
I'm not saying the Estate is behaving any better or worse than other copyright holders who regularly use copyright in a heavy-handed way, either to protect their privacy (a -mis-use of the spirit if not the letter of that law) or just to assert their rights over the material - even when it would make absolutely zero difference to them if the material was made available. Probably they aren't. But that doesn't make it right, it only makes it legal.
And I've said, they're quite possibly being petty and obstructive. But that doesn't make it immoral, just annoying. (I don't suppose there's much point stating again where I stand on the privacy issue.) As for the Wired article– well, again, I have no idea what the rights and wrongs of that business were and are; however from its general tone and use of loaded words like "clique" and "cabal" I think it might be as well to take it with a grain of salt.
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Old 11-20-2010, 11:48 AM   #68
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Hi Folks!

Real life is kind of busy today, so I can't participate in the discussion, which like all of our discussions here shows how many Downers can dance on the spot of a period.

I don't think anyone has written anything worthy of being upset over. I've been impressed with how Nerwen and davem have parried and thrust without bringing out flamethrowers or ranting. (And I speak as someone who has knocked heads with davem in the past.)

Tolkien may be near and dear to all our hearts, but so also is intellectual debate. Thanks to everyone for developing an interesting discussion on copyright issues.
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Old 11-20-2010, 03:01 PM   #69
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Good to see some people can distinguish between an arugment (albeit forcefully expressed perhaps ) & a 'rant'. I hope I've explained my stance, & we still have had no further 'official' clarification as to what the issue is. I am annoyed that yet again we have a big, wealthy organisation mis-using Copyright law to prevent information being published - if they'd resorted to privacy laws then I'd have more respect for them. And I think its clear by now that this is about the material contained in the letters as opposed to the copyrighted letters themselves - The Estate's statement (via Calcifer) is
Quote:
However, the Estate made clear to ADC that it had no issue with the publication of the book providing the material in question - affecting only 20 pages out of a total of some 300 - was removed.
Taken in conjunction with the publisher's original statement:

Quote:
Despite many revisions and changes made at the insistence of The Tolkien Estate it appears that The Tolkien Estate will seek to take court action to prevent the release of this book regardless. Everyone involved in the publication has worked hard to meet the requests of The Tolkien Estate time and time again, however it would be misleading to release a Biography on Hilary Tolkien without proper reference to his close relationship with his brother.
So, the Estate is threatening legal action to prevent publication of the book unless 20 pages which the author's feel is essential to the book is removed. They are using copyright law to achieve this - & that is totally against the original intent & spirit of that law.

Now, if Garm has more information as to what's happening here I'd be more than happy to hear it, & if it really explains what is behind all this I'd be grateful - my arguments here have been based on the information provided by both parties in the dispute.
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Old 11-20-2010, 04:00 PM   #70
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However, the Estate made clear to ADC that it had no issue with the publication of the book providing the material in question - affecting only 20 pages out of a total of some 300 - was removed.
The emphasis in the above quote is mine.

The seemingly cavalier attitude of the Estate regarding the removal of a "only" 20 pages of material is rather disconcerting. Depending on which are removed, even a single page could be disastrous for a publication. I, myself, could remove 20 pages from a book -- like The Fellowship of the Ring or The Return of the King, for instance -- and totally alter the book's intentions. Therefore, to say "only 20 pages out of a total of some 300" seems deleterious to me, and reason enough to completely stall the publication of a book -- which may well have been the intention all along (that is, if I were thinking like a cynical person).
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Old 11-20-2010, 05:44 PM   #71
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I wonder if there's any chance Calcifer could clarify something in the 'official' statement:

Quote:
The book in question was presented by ADC as a biography of J R R Tolkien's brother Hilary. However, the publication included numerous personal letters from J R R Tolkien to his brother and from other family members that were reproduced virtually verbatim.

The copyright in these private, unpublished letters belongs to the Tolkien Estate. As the guardian of these rights and of the privacy of the Tolkien family, both of which it takes great care to protect, the Estate quite properly declined permission for the letters to be reproduced in this way.

However, the Estate made clear to ADC that it had no issue with the publication of the book providing the material in question - affecting only 20 pages out of a total of some 300 - was removed.
First they seem to be saying the issue is with the personal letters being reproduced 'virtually verbatim', & that they "declined permission for the letters to be reproduced in this way." So, the issue seems to be the way the material was reproduced....

But then in the following paragraph they state they required 20 pages of material to be removed - ie, not re-written, or the material to be presented in a different way, but for it not to exist in the book at all.

So, in the statement they seem to be saying first the issue was the form the material was presented in, & then to immediately contradict themselves & state that it wasn't the actually the form it was presented in but the material itself that was the issue...

Seems that the issue is actually not the way it was produced at all, whether that was to be verbatim, virtually verbatim, in paraphrase, or in precis, but that it was to be even referred to in any way at all. If that is the case its hardly surprising that authors & publisher felt unable to proceed with the book. Key point around which this whole issue seems to revolve is in the words:
Quote:
As the guardian of these rights and of the privacy of the Tolkien family, both of which it takes great care to protect
Or, as I've been arguing all along - the Estate is using Copyright law as a quick, cheap & easy way to protect their privacy by preventing the publication of family documents. If a genuine issue of invasion of privacy is involved then privacy laws exist under which this matter could be dealt with, but it seems that the Estate don't feel able to take that route (possibly because the individuals concerned are dead & they wouldn't succeed), so they've resorted to Copyright law as the only option.
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Old 11-20-2010, 06:16 PM   #72
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Originally Posted by davem View Post
Or, as I've been arguing all along - the Estate is using Copyright law as a quick, cheap & easy way to protect their privacy by preventing the publication of family documents. If a genuine issue of invasion of privacy is involved then privacy laws exist under which this matter could be dealt with, but it seems that the Estate don't feel able to take that route (possibly because the individuals concerned are dead & they wouldn't succeed), so they've resorted to Copyright law as the only option.
The flaw in your argument, davem is that not all the members of the family are dead.

As Calcifer's statement from the Estate says,

Quote:
As the guardian of these rights and of the privacy of the Tolkien family
.
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Old 11-20-2010, 09:44 PM   #73
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Originally Posted by davem
(...) So, in the statement they seem to be saying first the issue was the form the material was presented in, & then to immediately contradict themselves & state that it wasn't the actually the form it was presented in but the material itself that was the issue...

That's not how I read it

Quote:
The book in question was presented by ADC as a biography of J R R Tolkien's brother Hilary. However, the publication included numerous personal letters from J R R Tolkien to his brother and from other family members that were reproduced virtually verbatim.
As I read it, this sums up the end result of what ADC did: the publishers reproduced the letters virtually verbatim by paraphrasing them closely.

Quote:
The copyright in these private, unpublished letters belongs to the Tolkien Estate. As the guardian of these rights and of the privacy of the Tolkien family, both of which it takes great care to protect, the Estate quite properly declined permission for the letters to be reproduced in this way.
'In this way' as in reproduced virtually verbatim, or 'paraphrased' (but can include the actual letters obviously). What about the sequence?

Quote:
However, the Estate made clear to ADC that it had no issue with the publication of the book providing the material in question - affecting only 20 pages out of a total of some 300 - was removed.
This arguably refers to the actual letters, because...

Quote:
Although ADC's response was to agree to this, what it then did in practice was to paraphrase the letters, something that had been made clear from the outset would not resolve the issue.
... ADC agreed to remove something -- the paraphrasing? that doesn't seem right because what it then did was to paraphrase the letters.

Now I could be wrong, but that's my interpretation, and I don't see that one need necessarily conclude that there is any contradiction here.

And even if I'm wrong about that much, I still see no necessary contradiction here: other possible negotiations of how these letters might or might not be used need not even be contextual in this part of the statement -- the Estate need only be referring to existing problematic 'ways' that were presented to them... two ways that would have to be removed in order to publish.
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Old 11-21-2010, 02:56 AM   #74
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The flaw in your argument, davem is that not all the members of the family are dead.


.
Which is why we have libel, slander & privacy laws - to protect the living: if Copyright was intended to include protecting privacy then you wouldn't need the others. If these letters were implying dodgy stuff involving living members of the family then the family would have a range of legal options they could make use of. To use copyright to prevent material being made public, implies that it is not material that relates to anyone living, but stuff that they don't want to come out about Ronald or Hilary
Quote:
'Dear Hilary, I was just thinking the other day about the jolly times we had dressing as Elizabethen ladies & cycling through the lanes round Sarehole after dark, throwing ferrets through people's windows....Happy days!'
Estate's response: Blimey! we have to stop this hitting the presses! Isn't that libelous?
Laywer: Er, no - you can't libel the dead! Besides, it looks like they might have done it - there were reports around the time of people in Sarehole waking up to find their front windows smashed & dazed ferrets on their fireside rugs.
Estate: Well, that's as maybe but surely other young bucks in those days did similar things? Look, just tell them the letters are copyrighted & they can't use them.
Laywer: Are you sure, that's not what copyright is for?
Estate: Just do it - A) its a bit embarrassing for the family for their dad & uncle to be seen as cross dressing ferret-tossers & B) we don't want the descendants suing us for the broken windows.
Its probably nothing more than something with a minor embarrassment factor at worst. I'm not even necessarily arguing that whatever it is should be published - just that using copyright in these circumstances is a bit off. After all the Estate have never implied that whatever it is that being referred to isn't true.

Last edited by davem; 11-26-2010 at 03:50 PM. Reason: v.minor edit to avoid sending the thread off track
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Old 11-21-2010, 07:19 AM   #75
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Its probably nothing more than something with a minor embarrassment factor at worst. I'm not even necessarily arguing that whatever it is should be published - just that using copyright in these circumstances is a bit off. After all the Estate have never implied that whatever it is that being referred to isn't true.
You are up to your old tricks again, in simply regurgitating innuendo and supposition and for that reason I'm becoming very bored with this.

I've already pointed out that nothing I heard or saw in any way was the least bit dodgy.

It is possible that the Family simply does not want any kind of reference to the children's and grandchildren's lives as they believe that has no merit in any literary questions about Tolkien's writing.

What I see is a very sad situation in which one member of the family invited the authors to undertake a particular kind of study using the material they owned. And that study has been repeatedly, despite significant changes and edits, rejected by the Family Estate, which owns copyright but not the material itself.

So I see two authors who have spent considerable time now with no likelihood of renumeration. I see scholars and fans of Tolkien losing access to information about his life, no matter how banal or trivial or personal. And I see a Family Estate that lacks unanimity. That must be very hurtful.

I had always wondered about the sibling relationship, how the elder was able to attend university and achieve a university career while the younger did not. In a class-ridden society, those occupational differences were substantial. (Yet in spite of that difference, the two families maintained close contact.) It is a sociological question to me, not a family question. Tolkien getting into Oxford strikes me as a story very similar to that of Patrick Bronte getting into Cambridge a hundred years earlier.

I'm trained as a scholar and I know countless stories of situations like this.

And having heard from the authors, the publisher and the Estate, that's all I'm going to say about this very unfortunate event.
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Old 11-21-2010, 07:55 AM   #76
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You [davem] are up to your old tricks again, in simply regurgitating innuendo and supposition and for that reason I'm becoming very bored with this.
By the way, davem has now deleted a post which followed post 60 (mine) and included an invented conversation indulging in the speculation being referred to here.

That's what Bethberry is (partially) quoting above. People are free to delete posts of course, but davem's deletion changes the context of Bethberry's response.

And I might as well add that I doubt even Fauskanger and Salo would consider the Wired article not to be one sided.
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Old 11-21-2010, 07:58 AM   #77
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You are up to your old tricks again, in simply regurgitating innuendo and supposition and for that reason I'm becoming very bored with this.
Ok - I've removed any potentially 'bothersome' stuff of mine from the thread & I'll opt out of this discussion from now on.

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By the way, davem has now deleted a post which followed post 60 (mine) and included an invented conversation indulging in the speculation being referred to here.
Yes - all of them. sorry of anything has been lost to the discussion but I probably shouldn't have joined in this discussion at all. There are some aspects of it I care too much about & some I don't care about at all but couldn't resist commenting on & that's a fatal combination.

Last edited by davem; 11-21-2010 at 08:02 AM.
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Old 11-21-2010, 08:27 AM   #78
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I would like to add that I don't really like to try and play at one of the 'thread police' and feel a bit petty for doing so.

On the other hand the deletion seemed a tad unfair to Bethberry and I hadn't realized you (davem) had deleted other material as well.

My apologies for jumping the gun davem. I should have given you the benefit of the doubt in any case, that you would note the deletion yourself.
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Old 11-21-2010, 08:56 AM   #79
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How amusing that a thread regarding deletions should result in deletions. Now, we have an incomplete thread as well as an incomplete book.
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Old 11-21-2010, 02:28 PM   #80
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davem, I regret very much that you deleted all your posts here. (There is an edit button, you know. )

Your point of view--as with everyone's-- is one which needs to be heard. Now there are many quotes from your posts interlaced with other posters' comments without the full context and that is a shame.

(Note, I'm not speaking about my post which refers to the invented conversation; because I have email notifications of all of this thread, I could simply edit my post to include it, but I didn't wish to copy the material when I wrote the post and still do not wish to do so now. I objected to the invented conversation not because it was "bothersome" subject matter but because you had already played that card.)

It is my understanding that on our forum software deleted posts can still be read or accessed by the moderators and administrators who can reverse the deletions. (If I'm wrong about this I'm sure I will be told.) Please reconsider your decision and ask one of our moderators to restore at least the majority of your posts.

And for the record, I don't consider one-sided articles necessarily to be beyond the pale as they can easily be criticised, refuted, and dismissed.
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