Under current copyright law, if someone stumbled across the missing suitcase of Hemingway’s short stories (described in my post below) and his heirs decided — as they surely would –  to publish them, how long would the copyright last? Since Hemingway died July 2, 1961, does copyright in any newly discovered work by him run for 70 years from the date of his death — i.e., until July 2, 2031? Or would the lost manuscripts from 1922 fall into the public domain as works published abroad by a U.S. citizen prior to 1923?

The answer is:  neither of those. If Hemingway’s lost manuscripts had in fact been “published” in 1922 in the manner in which they ordinarily would have been sold, then they would be in the public domain. However (not to be too didactic), they were lost, and never published, and thus they would still be entitled to copyright protection. But they would actually be entitled to protection until January 1, 2032, as copyrights continue until the end of the year in which they expire.

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• Relax, You Already Have a Copyright
• Borrowing Genius

Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2010 Robert Scott Lawrence

Many artists operate under the mistaken belief that unless the copyright symbol © appears next to the title of their work, then their novels, screenplays, lyrics, poems, manuscripts and other assorted  jottings aren’t protected by the copyright laws.  Fortunately, this assumption — while historically accurate — no longer holds true today.  Under the copyright laws that were in effect before 1978, a work that was published without copyright notice automatically became part of the public domain. This rule was repealed, and copyright notice is not necessary for works first published after March 1, 1989. What you wrote last week is yours, and no one can use your work without permission (with some notable exceptions for sampling, fair comment, and parody). While different countries have different laws detailing what is necessary for a valid copyright, how long a copyright lasts, and who retains the copyright after an author’s death, in the United States the rule is relatively simple:  what you wrote yesterday is yours today, yours tomorrow, and yours for 70 years after your demise.

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Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2010 Robert Scott Lawrence