Re: Public Domain

On Tue, 26 Mar 1996, Natl. Fed. Abstracting & Info Serv. wrote:
>
> I have been following the Dead Sea Scrolls discussion here.
> But I have also noted that my King James Bible carries a
> copyright notice, as does my Pelican Shakespeare.

The KJV Bible text is public domain, except in Britain, where it enjoys perpetual Crown copyright. Editions of the KJV text which include various introductions, study notes, and other helps may legitimately claim copyright on those added portions but not on the KJV text itself. Some publishers of KJV Bibles with no notes, introduction, or anything but the KJV text still place a (c) notice on their publication; if so, such a copyright claim is wholly invalid and will not stand up in any court.

Similarly the text of Shakespeare is public domain, though the introduction in the Pelican edition is copyrightable (if written within the last 75 years), as also are the various notes which might be attached to the text. A bare text-only edition of Shakespeare is public domain.

> What exactly do such copyright claims mean?

Nothing as regards the text itself of public domain works.

> Do I need someone's permission to quote from the King James Bible?

Certainly not. However, in regard to other modern Bible translations which are under copyright, many of them specifically state that you can freely quote without securing permission or paying royalties up to 250 or even 500 verses, so long as no entire book of the Bible is quoted, and an appropriate (c) notice is attached stating the quoting was done "by permission". It does seem rather absurd to me to think that any religious text or translation thereof can be copyrighted and licensed back by publishers to the religious group(s) which originated the texts in the first place, but that's the way the law works. *;-)

> [A speaker from Canada at Federal Library and Information
> Center Committee meeting last week in D.C. noted Crown
> Copyright in the King James Bible. Could this possibly
> mean that I have to ask the Queen of England for
> permission to quote from the Bible?]

Not to quote therefrom, but (in Britain) to publish the KJV. A Royal license is required there, and such may be still the law in commonwealth nations and dependencies of Britain. Someone from Canada will have to chime in on this aspect for the KJV rights there.

> As another example, let's say I want to reprint a few lines
> from John Donne's "For Whom the Bell Tolls." The poem appears
> in many anthologies. Does the current publisher of a compilation
> work containing this poem have the right to give or deny permission
> in this case? Do I even need to ask?

Not at all. The text is purely public domain, and no permission is required. Compilation copyright only protects (very thinly) the compilation as a complete entity, and not the p.d. text of individual works contained therein.

> A recent permissions request to Dover Books (which specializes in
> printing what appear to me to be public domain works, and
> Dover itself doesn't print a copyright notice) has gone unanswered now
> for four months. My general experience is that publishers who
> are uncertain about the ownership of a work choose to be silent
> on permissions requests. What does one do when the publisher
> will not respond?

Many (but not all) of Dover Books' publications are indeed of p.d. works. Those still under copyright will bear the appropriate notice. The p.d. Dover reprints are usually of the original edition, and nothing is there to stop you from simply photocopying or reprinting the Dover reprint in such cases. Best bet is to look up the original publication date of any Dover reprint, and, if before 1920, it's p.d. with no strings attached. If new material (introductions, appendices, prefaces, etc.) are added to a Dover reprint, those portions of course are NOT p.d.

Maurice A. Robinson, Ph.D.           Assoc. Prof./Greek and New Testament
Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary     Wake Forest, North Carolina
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

<mrobinsn[_at_]mercury.interpath.com> Received on Thu Mar 28 1996 - 03:55:09 GMT