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What the Dickens? ‘Cut classics’! Concept applicable to e-books?
February 7, 2007 | 2:06 pm
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By David Rothman
Don’t mess with existing p-books to make them easier to read as e-books. That’s what TeleBlog readers overwhelmingly said in a small, totally unscientific poll.
But what about talking the scissors to p-books and simplifying old, rambling classics such as Anna Karenina, Moby-Dick, David Copperfield, The Mill on the Floss, Vanity Fair and Wives and Daughters? Will that work and pave the way for e-books versions—maybe with shorter paragraphs, too—despite the results of the TelePoll?
Legitimate fear: A world where you can’t find the originals of your favorites
I myself am all in favor of reader choice, but I also can understand people’s fears about the trimming project at the Weidenfeld and Nicolson imprint of Orion. What if someday the abridged versions of the classics are the only ones around? That, at least, is one argument for e-books over p-books since it’s easier to make both the originals and simplified versions accessible when shelf space is limited in libraries or bookstores.
Another problem: The budgets
But how about the budget angle, too–relevant to both e- and p-books? I hate it when I can find audio books online from public libraries but not e-books. That’s the risk. While public domain classics are free in theory, remember that it’s cricket to include a copyrighted introductory essay, thereby in effect making the whole file copyrighted.
Photo: Charles Dickens, via Wikipedia.
Related:Thoughts from Kathryn Huges and Jeff Gomez.
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Comments:
One interesting variation on the theme is Squashed Philosophers project, which condenses long works into a readable text of only the most important passages.
This is not changing the pbook for the e-medium; they actually sell POD p-books of that too. It is however a display of what is possible with public domain material. Now, if an ebook publication had the squashed version with the option of opening up the skipped parts, that would be using the e-medium for maximum advantage.
“While public domain classics are free in theory, remember that it’s cricket to include a copyrighted introductory essay, thereby in effect making the whole file copyrighted.”
This is indeed a perfectly acceptable and common practice, but it does NOT in any way make the whole file copyrighted. One need merely edit the file to remove the copyrighted content before reposting or otherwise copying it. US copyright law is clear that a copyright notice on PD content published with new additions (such as a critical intro) does not give any protection to the PD content.
I am working on a book for Distributed Proofreaders right now. The copy i have is a reprint with a modern critical intro. i simply omit the intro ans any other copyrighted content from the version uploaded to DP.