Copyright Watch has posted a list of the authors (including musicians and other creators of art) whose works went out of copyright as of January 1—or rather, two lists, one of for those countries (the majority) where copyright subsists for fifty years after the author’s death (Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Fadeev, Russian novelist; Pio Baroja, Spanish novelist; H.L. Mencken, American journalist and author; Art Tatum, American jazz pianist; Carl Brockelmann, German Semitic scholar; Walter de la Mare, English poet, short story writer, and novelist; A. A. Milne, English author…), and one for “the quarter or so of the world where the copyright term has foolishly been extended to life+70” (German historian and polymath Oswald Spengler; British ghost story writer M. R. James; Italian composer Ottorino Respighi; English author G. K. Chesterton; English scholar and poet A.E. Housman; pioneering American “muckraker” journalist Lincoln Steffens; Russian author Maxim Gorky; Spanish poet and dramatist Federico García Lorca…). As for Canada, unfortunately “there will not be another archival Public Domain Day for archivists, historians, genealogists, and others, to celebrate in Canada until January 1, 2049.” To read about the “short-sighted 1998 amendments to the Copyright Act” there, go to the post. I got this link from Matt of No-sword, whose post adds a list of Japanese authors who are now free for all to use. As CopyrightWatch says, “Short live copyright! Long live the public domain!”
Woo-hoo! Anybody wants a scanned copy of Brockelmann’s “Grundrisse der vergleichenden Grammatik der Semitischen Sprachen”?
That was my first desideratum.
Garci Lorca died in 1936, which would mean that 70 years copyright for all his works have passed and they are public domain. Am I correct? I am especially interested in “the Lament for Ignacio Sanchez”
Don’t know, but going to the site I find:
Wonder what happened?
Copyright Watch
Thanks, I changed the first link accordingly.
Paul’s link now goes to EFF, so I’ve substituted archived links in the post.
Happy Public Domain Day 2022!
WP has a series of articles “Year yyyy in public domain”, currently ranging from 2008 to 2022. Just change the date in the URL to get any intermediate year.
Bunin is now out of copyright.
2025 in public domain.
Thank you. Now I know that I probably have to withdraw a few of the translations from Antonio Machado that I’ve submitted to journals. (I hope my tone of typing and my digital expression convey gratitude for the information and annoyance at the situation and at myself for misunderstanding the copyright law.)
@Louis Mascolo, only ten years late:
It’s probably in the public domain everywhere but in the U.S., according to this authoritative-looking site, which says that in the U.S. you’ll have to wait till 96 years after publication, or 2031.
I suspect without having done a precise count that the life-plus-seventy countries may now outnumber the less-bad (but still bad!) life-plus-fifty countries. In the U.S. we’re still a considerable ways away from the life-plus-seventy system kicking in, which I believe will happen on 1/1/2049, when works created on or after 1/1/1978 by authors who died on or before before 12/31/78 will pass into the public domain.
I still cannot get over the fact that for the last few decades, America’s copyright system has been largely based on a law named after Congressman Sonny Bono, who lost his life skiing into a tree. It’s practically beyond parody, like imitation margarine.
Congressman Bono was himself a successful veteran of the copyright-favoring industries, and represented a district in a state where the copyright-favoring industries are economically significant and politically influential. So his regrettable interest in despoiling the public domain makes perfect sense. (My sense is that he also had good people skills in small-group settings, and many of his Congressional colleagues who were initially puzzled by the idea of a somewhat has-been show-biz celebrity* joining their ranks were then charmed by him and thus genuinely saddened by his demise.)
His unfortunate demise could perhaps be made part of a broader narrative about just how many American politicians of several generational cohorts got themselves into trouble by trying to be “Kennedyesque.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_L._Kennedy
*Accentuated by the fact that his public persona had been that of the doofus butt-of-jokes straight man to his more glamorous wife, although he had actually been a fairly canny behind-the-scenes operator.
I’m far from an expert on Spanish law, but as far as I can tell, the term of copyright for literary works in Spain after the author’s death has been 80 years for well over a century, which a transition underway to 70 years. See the 1879 law, the 1997 law, and the 1996 law. I hope no one was misled by the CopyrightWatch reference in the OP into thinking in any consequential way that Pio Baroja’s novels, or anything by anyone who died less than 80 years ago, was in the public domain in Spain.
(The 1996 law establishes 50-year durations for rights of computer programmers and performing artists.)
I’m impressed that people have discussed Sonny Bono’s copyright extension without mentioning *****y ****e, the first images of whom/which are now in the public domain here.
I may edit the 2025 Wikiparticle to say that it refers to the public domain in the country of origin, and a work in the public domain in its country of origin may be under copyright elsewhere.