Can I Use Quotes From A Book Under Copyright In A Book?

For the original text, The Estate of George Orwell (administered by the author’s literary agent) holds the copyright until it enters the public domain: in the US this will be 2041; in life-plus-50 countries this has already occurred as of 2021. Thus, for instance, commercial, non-transformative uses involving substantial copying require permission from the author’s estate, whereas non-commercial, educational, critical, or parodic uses are likely to fall under fair use/fair dealing, although this is by no means certain. Different formats (e.g. audiobooks, translations, films) have their own copyright holders, but the ideas, titles and short phrases from the original text can be used freely as they are. (Casual, non-profit sharing is very rarely challenged for copyright infringement. Big, formal, for-profit uses should contact the agent first. Any more detail on this would be greatly appreciated – I assume this is more complex than simply “who” but I’d like to be sure I understand the main points).

As mentioned earlier, some authors actually enable you to share their eBooks under specific circumstances. Examples for such actions by authors could be the promotion of a ‘share this eBook with a friend’ eBook. Please note though, that such actions explicitly grant you a temporary right to sharing, i.e. not anonymized, limitless distribution of PDFs via torrent sites. It’s also worth remembering that copyright is held by the author, and even where we might wish to help spread a work more widely, the author may have other ideas. If they say ‘please share’, we should. If there is no indication at all that they intend to allow sharing – even in the absence of explicit restriction via a ‘ban on sharing’ – then we should assume no permission is granted. Follow your favorite authors on social media as they announce sales, free periods of time to read their work and sanctioned events to share their work. The best way to read more books and support your favorite authors is within the legal structure of their copyright.

Wait a minute. So work in the public domain can contain be derogatory to minorities or other groups today. Then as a translator you have to decide whether to translate these parts faithfully or to adapt/modernize them. This is an enormous ethical and artistic problem that goes far beyond the legal. You have the right to translate this work because it is in the public domain, but you have no guidance on how to handle its problematic parts. That will be your problem.

There are scam websites which are selling PDF versions of novels by famous authors and claiming that they are selling “exclusive rights” to read the work. I have seen this done for works by Mark Twain such as The Prince and the Pauper and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. They are simply ripping off the free PDF versions found on websites such as Project Gutenberg and then charging people to read work that can be had for free. Always check out the work in one of the official free repositories before buying. The copyright status of a work is its friend and prevents it from being artifically scarce.

I want to make sure any PDFs I add to my collection are copyright compliant. I check where I got the PDF from. Reputable sites to download PDFs from are Project Gutenberg, Open Library and an author’s own website. On these sites you will find PDFs of works in the public domain and where the copyright holder has given permission for the work to be made available for download. Sites other than these (even if free to download) are generally best avoided. A second way to confirm PDF copyright compliance is to check for a copyright page or for a disclaimer within the body of the PDF that explains the terms and conditions of use of the PDF. This could be a watermark on the review copy that you have downloaded. Crosschecking the book's status on well known online stores such as Amazon.com or Google Books helps me to determine if the same book is being sold as a copyrighted work. I only download a PDF version of a book that I intend to read if it is available for sale through such stores, and I purchase or borrow a legal copy where possible. When dealing with older books, it is important to confirm whether or not the book is in the public domain. In the U.S. this typically means books published prior to 1928. I use the Copyright Office’s database as well as the HathiTrust to help confirm a book’s public domain status. If I’m unsure about a particular book then it’s best to err on the side of caution and avoid downloading the PDF. I also make sure to pay attention to the terms of Creative Commons licenses, such as CC BY-NC, which allow for non-commercial use and distribution but require that the creator be given proper credit for their work. By being mindful of these details, I’m able to ensure that my PDF collection is both legal and ethical.

I know this rabbit hole, and it looks something like this: yes, there are public books that you can print, sell, etc. etc., and they are in the public domain. That means Dickens, Jane Austen, H.G. Wells, etc. etc. etc. The only thing is that the particular edition you are using may not be public domain. For example, I couldn’t sell copies of this Penguin Classics edition of David Copperfield, even though the book itself is public domain, because Penguin’s copyright of the introduction, the footnotes, the typography and design, the cover art, etc. would be being infringed. To create public domain books to sell, you have to start with the raw, unedited text from a site like Project Gutenberg. And then there’s the marketing: watch out for trademarks in the book title and main characters. It’s a minefield of ‘buts’ and ‘excepts’.

The key issue here is to recognize that fans write fanfiction because they love the work and want to connect with others who also love it. This goodwill can be your best defense against a corporation attacking your fanworks. Fans are a very vocal group, and many have seen how companies like J.K. Rowling and Scholastic lost the “Harry Potter” fan site wars years ago. Today, the vast majority of corporations have social media teams, and they know that fan engagement is a huge asset. When it comes to legally publishing your fanfiction, all this means is that you have to publish in a way that supports the community and does not earn you any money. This is all part of an unwritten social contract that has so far worked far better than any written contract.

The work of 19th-century writers like Dickens is generally OK to use. In the UK, works created longer than 50 years after the author’s death passed into the public domain. If we use the life plus 50 years rule currently used in the UK for works created since 1954, then for example all of Dickens’ works passed into the public domain long ago. In international agreements such as Berne this period is extended in some cases but in general terms the work of writers such as Dickens created in the 19th century is safe to use. (You can even download the whole of his bibliography from Project Gutenberg without violating any copyrights.) The ‘©’ on the cover of a new edition of a Dickens book published by someone like Oxford University Press refers to the particular edition that they have published, not to the work itself by Dickens. In other words, no one holds the copyright on the novels themselves – they’re a beautiful example of how culture becomes a shared, the public domain, commons over time.

It's a case by case thing, and really depends on the legal status of the original work. Works in the public domain can generally be adapted for commercial purposes by anyone. Works that are freely available under certain licenses (such as Creative Commons BY licenses) can also be adapted for commercial purposes by anyone. But works available under licenses such as NC can not be adapted for commercial purposes. Monetizing would include selling annotated copies of the novel, illustrated editions of the novel, making an audiobook of the novel, making a film or video game of the novel, selling novel-related merchandise, etc. Even a free e-book could be monetized by crowdfounding a polished-up version of the work. If the work is not in the public domain, then the safest route would be to get a written license that spells out exactly what commercial uses of the work are allowed, and I’d try to find those lines in any license before putting too much time and money into adapting the work. It’s a work that I’d like to make into a really deluxe collector’s edition some day, assuming all the rights are clean.

Book summaries on YouTube are a HUGE and completely legal niche. As a fair use transformation for purposes of criticism and commentary, summarizing a book in your own words (with analysis) is perfect for YouTube. Sites like this are invaluable resources for people looking to get a better sense for a book (without taking up too much of their time), or to determine whether they’d like to read a particular work in the first place. This is the kind of book-related content that is perfectly suited to YouTube, which was made for this type of stuff. If sharing books is your thing, then make summaries for YouTube. This takes more intellectual effort than simply reading a book out loud, but the reward is greater and sustainable in the long run. Instead of just having a voice on YouTube that people can dislike, you build a reputation based on your insights and can get more out of it by collaborating with authors for interviews, getting advance review copies from publishers, and becoming a respected voice in the literary community. Content thieves verses content creators, it’s a simple distinction.