| | Hello January 1, 2013 - the start of another year, and the start of new life for cultural works whose copyright expired at midnight. Yes, it's Public Domain Day! Copyrights in millions of written, artistic, and musical works of the human mind and imagination are now part of the common cultural property in the countries where the general copyright term subsists for the life of the creator (or last-surviving of multiple creators), for X years after their death, and to the end of that year. Written works do not just include literature; they include written works in the humanities and social sciences, pure and applied sciences, biography and memoir, mathematics, and all fields and all languages. They join the artistic and musical works which have passed into the public domain in Canada and elsewhere in the life+50 copyright universe. The magic number for 2013 is 1962. Authors or other creators who died in that year see their works pass into the life+50 public domain today. Some of the more prominent or interesting transitions to the life+50 public domain today include life+ works by: - Canadian Arctic explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson
- Danish physicist Niels Bohr
- Canada's first female Senator, Cairine Wilson
- Nobel prize winning American author William Faulkner ("The Sound and the Fury", "Absalom, Absalom!")
- Danish author Karen Blixen (Isak Dinesen) ("Out of Africa", "Babette's Feast")
- British poet Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
- American screenwriter Carey Wilson ("Ben-Hur", "Mutiny on the Bounty")
- English writer Vita Sackville-West
- American First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt
- German-Swiss author Hermann Hesse ("Steppenwolf", "Siddharta")
- American cooking writer Irma S. Rombauer ("The Joy of Cooking")
- American poet e. e. cummings
- Austrian children's author Ludwig Bemelmans ("Madeline")
- American writer Fran Striker ("Lone Ranger" and "Green Hornet" creator)
- French writer Gontran de Poncins ("Kabloona")
- American juvenile science writer W. Maxwell Reed ("The Sea for Sam")
- American comic-book artist Lt. Dick Calkins ("Buck Rogers")
- Hungarian-American film director Michael Curtiz ("Casablanca")
- Yiddish-language writer H. Leivick ("The Golem")
- American anthropologist and archaeologist William Duncan Strong
- Newfoundland anti-confederate politician Chesley Crosbie
And many, many more (see fuller list below.) In the European Union and some other countries, copyright has unwisely been extended to the longer "life+70" term. In such countries, the magic number is 1942. Transitioning to the life+70 public domain are works by authors including: - Canadian author Lucy Maud Montgomery
- British barrister and politician William Mackenzie, 1st Baron Amulree
- German ethnologist Franz Boas
- English egyptologist Flinders Petrie
- American songwriter George M. Cohan ("Give My Regards to Broadway", "You're a Grand Old Flag")
- Canadian biographer and historian Beckles Willson
- Polish-born anthropologist Bronisław Malinowski ("Argonauts of the Western Pacific")
- Austrian writer Robert Musil
- German playwright Carl Sternheim
- American sculptor Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney
- Irish writer Peadar Toner Mac Fhionnlaoich (Cú Uladh)
- Austrian writer Stefan Zweig
- American artist Grant Wood ("American Gothic")
- British explorer and writer Francis Younghusband
- British physicist and Nobel laureate Sir William Henry Bragg
- French historian Alfred Coville
- French physicist and Nobel laureate Jean Baptiste Perrin
- Canadian politician J. S. Woodsworth
And many, many more. In the United States, previously unpublished works by authors who died in 1942 also became public domain this morning. Not so in Canada, where not a single additional unpublished archival letter or manuscript whose author died after 1948 will become public domain until 2049. So, while the published works of Vilhjalmur Stefansson, Cairine Wilson, and Chesley Crosbie are now unfettered under Canadian law, their unpublished papers are not. Whichever of the copyright universes you live in, celebrate, enjoy, and re-use the works which have become common cultural property in your country. Short live copyright, and long live the public domain! SOME OTHER AUTHORS WHOSE WORKS ARE NOW IN THE LIFE+50 PUBLIC DOMAIN Czech artist Max Švabinský
German art historian Paul Frankl
Chilean writer Antonio Acevedo Hernández
English illustrator Thomas Henry
Swiss historian and author Edmond Privat
French sculptor André Lhote
Estonian author Paul Viiding
German mathematician Wilhelm Ackermann
American astronomer A. E. Douglass
German artist Harold Bengen
English playwright and novelist Patrick Hamilton
English writer Richard Aldington
Norwegian writer Inge Krokann
American writer and historian Harold Lamb
American writer William Lindsay Gresham
German zoologist Ernst Schwarz
New Zealand botanist G. H. Cunningham
Swiss author and academic Pierre Gilliard
English writer Winifred Peck
German-American illustrator Anton Otto Fischer
American author Bernie Babcock
American philosopher Arthur Oncken Lovejoy
German-American writer George Sylvester Viereck
American entomologist R.E. Snodgrass
British explorer and ornithologist Robert Ernest Cheesman
Belgian mathematician Charles Jean de la Vallée-Poussin
American zoologist Albert William Herre
French intellectual Georges Bataille
Welsh historian Thomas Richards
American madam and author Polly Adler
Irish author Frank Gallagher
American author Burton Egbert Stevenson
Indian author Tripuraneni Gopichand
Canadian alpinist Sir Edward Oliver Wheeler
American writer Edward Lewis Wallant
English poet Ralph Hodgson
German author Will Vesper
British historian G. M. Trevelyan
French novelist Pierre Benoît
English botanist Arthur Disbrowe Cotton
American poet Robinson Jeffers
Australian writer Bill Harney
Austrian-born composer Fritz Kreisler
Brazilian artist Candido Portinari
Czech writer Jaroslav Durych
German botanist Werner Rothmaler
American children's writer Howard R. Garis
Russian writer Leonid Solovyov
Dutch novelist Maria Dermoût
Soviet writer Emmanuil Kazakevich
French philosopher Gaston Bachelard
French author Princess Marie Bonaparte
Chilean author and political figure Jorge González von Marées
Chinese philosopher and essayist Hu Shih
Turkish writer Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar
Algerian poet Jean Amrouche
American sociologist E. Franklin Frazier
American children's author Mary Augusta Dickerson
Indian social reformer Maharishi Karve
English writer and classical scholar Aubrey de Sélincourt
American author Gladys Malvern
French composer Jacques Ibert
Austrian composer Hanns Eisler
American diplomat Eric Wollencott Barnes
German political scientist Sigmund Neumann
English economic historian R. H. Tawney
American writer Nina Wilcox Putnam
American historian Garrett Mattingly
Slovak writer Ľudo Ondrejov
English biologist Ronald Fisher
Slovene architect Max Fabiani
German artist Gabriele Münter
English journalist Philip Gibbs
English artist and occultist Frieda Harris
English writer Clifford Bax
American jurist and writer Curtis Bok
Slovene writer Fran Saleški Finžgar
Lebanese poet Maroun Abboud
English writer Ethel Carnie Holdsworth
Tanzanian poet Shaaban Bin Robert
Austrian-American psychoanlyst Edmund Bergler
American politician Clement Woodnutt Miller
Swedish-German writer Clara Nordström
American composer Irving Fine
American children's author Mabel Robinson
American journalist and author George Matthew Adams
English-American classicist G. M. Hirst
American travel writer Harry A. Franck
Japanese author Ujaku Akita
American artist Eugene Speicher
American physician, novelist and transsexual Alan L. Hart
French neurologist Cécile Vogt-Mugnier
Japanese historical novelist Eiji Yoshikawa
American playwright Jules Eckert Goodman
French historian Daniel Halévy
English composer John Ireland
Soviet playwright Nikolai Pogodin
American ornithologist William Beebe
Japanese writer Hakuchō Masamune
American author Clyde Brion Davis
Romanian novelist Felix Aderca
South African ornithologist Alwin Karl Haagner
American architect Royal Barry Wills
French-American sculptor Herbert Haseltine
Norwegian novelist Trygve Gulbranssen
American artist Lillian Cotton
Indian writer Devudu Narasimha Sastri
Czech writer Josef Kopta
Austrian-American mathematician Emil Artin
Bengali writer Sulekha Sanyal
English graphic artist Donald McGill
British author Sir Duncan Swann
American biochemist and discoverer of niacin, Conrad Elvehjem
American sculptor Augusta Savage
British pacifist Ruth Fry
Filipino journalist and politician Arsenio Lacson
American pianist and organist Jesse Crawford
Scottish polar explorer and geologist James Wordie
Austrian artist Luigi Kasimir
Acadian politician and journalist Ferdinand Joseph Robidoux
Polish mountaineer Jan Długosz
Portuguese artist Bernardo Marques
Scottish politician William Darling
English dance critic Beryl de Zoete
American journalist Nils Nilsen Ronning
Swiss-American artist Kurt Seligmann
Japanese novelist and poet Murō Saisei
Russian-Israeli journalist and activist Abba Ahimeir
American painter Morris Louis
English mathematician Thorold Gosset
British geographer and military historian Charles Gwynn
Croatian artist Vladimir Varlaj
American illustrator and cartoonist John H. Striebel
English radical cartoonist and writer J. F. Horrabin
American novelist Caroline Lockhart
American journalist and author Albert Rhys Williams
Danish author Hans Kirk
Polish soldier and military historian Władysław Pobóg-Malinowski
English composer, geologist and author Ernest St. John Burton
Dravidian novelist and activist Jacques Chevalier
Australian artist Mary Cecil Allen
American socialist politician George A. Nelson
British fascist Ormonde Winter
English painter Arthur Spooner
Welsh-American author and playwright Lawrence Langner
English artist Jacob Kramer
Japanese poet Jun Kawada
British politician and playwright Robert Venables Vernon Harcourt
American sociologist C. Wright Mills
Australian poet Margaret Curran
Polish writer Leon Kruczkowski
American sportswriter Ernest Lanigan
American historian Reinhard H. Luthin
Czech author, musicologist, and politician Zdeněk Nejedlý
American ornithologist and geographer Carl R. Eklund
Ukrainian architect and designer Volodymyr Sichynskyi
Argentinian philologist María Rosa Lida de Malkiel
American architect and author John Vredenburgh Van Pelt
Canadian author Egerton Ryerson Young
French historian and mystic Antonin Gadal
American physicist William Coblentz
French writer and artist André Rouveyre
American historian and hispanicist Irving A. Leonard
American lawyer Gertrude Rush
Chinese-Indonesian playwright Njoo Cheong Seng
French philologist Louis Gernet
American poet Hyam Plutzik
British linguist and Indian government official David Lockhart Robertson Lorimer
Azerbaijani journalist and ethnographer Jeyhun Hajibeyli
Danish-American botanist and writer Jens Christian Bay
German physicist Heinrich Ott
Thai politician and writer Luang Wichitwathakan
Latvian-born composer Solomon Rosowsky
Dutch-American engineer and landscape architect Michiel Pesman
Croatian essayist and critic Branko Gavella
English architect and author F. R. S. Yorke
American children's author Emilie Blackmore Stapp
French artist Yves Klein
British scholar and translator Emily Anderson
British soldier and author Christopher Birdwood
American naturalist Ansel Franklin Hall
Romanian poet and theologian Sandu Tudor
American socialist James Oneal
Austrian philatelist Edwin Müller
Indonesian writer Muhammad Yamin
Indian political figure Abdul Majeed Khwaja |
