The estate of the late, great James Joyce has held publishing rights close to their hearts, to the extent that Joycean scholars had a time of it, trying to do their research.
One such scholar, Danis Rose, put together a collection of Joyceiana and plans to sell all the manuscripts...to the tune of 800 euro for the set.
He says he holds the copyright in the EU. Well, he's the first one to publish the manuscripts there, so in his interpretation of EU law, that makes him the copyright holder. As Mr. Joyce passed on seventy years ago, plus a year, that makes the manuscripts public domain.
In which case, the National Library of Ireland might end up owing the gentleman some money.
The National Library has been working on an online project for some time, and is ready to go live. They will put several of Mr. Joyce's previously unpublished manuscripts, which are part of the library's holdings, online.
For free.
No stranger to controversy is Mr. Rose (or should we be calling him Denis O'Hanlon?). He has run afoul of the Joyce estate and the Joyce Foundation in Zurich in the past for some of his publications that infringed on copyrights that they held.
He's not at all delighted by the news that what he anticipated would be a profit-maker will become worthless once the library's content is live.
He went to the trouble of getting his opus published in the U.S., where copyright law regarding material in the public domain is more clear than that of the EU. But isn't Mr. Rose saying he holds the copyright in the EU? Published in the States?
So confusing.
The fact is, the library owns the original unpublished manuscripts, and as a public body, it will make items in its collection available to the public. These days, that availability includes Internet access, which makes things much more accessible to everyone with a computer.
No need to fly off to Dublin to peruse the valuable items.
And no need to pay Mr. Rose (O'Hanlon) a large sum for the same access.
The Irish government is examining all the laws, just in case, but it's believed the library is within its rights. The Department of Enterprise, Jobs, and Innovation is taking a good, hard look at the issue, and it's likely that the law will be tweaked to rid it of any "ambiguities" that Mr. Rose might try to massage.
Don't expect the other Joyce scholars to jump to Mr. Rose's defense. He's irritated too many of them to find any sympathy.
And if a poor scholar can look at the manuscripts on a computer screen, they sure won't be supporting Mr. Rose's attempts to corner the market.
Which way might things fall?
We all know that once something is loaded, it's out there forever.
No matter who thinks they own the copyright.
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