Good to see some people can distinguish between an arugment (albeit forcefully expressed perhaps
) & a 'rant'. I hope I've explained my stance, & we still have had no further 'official' clarification as to what the issue is. I am annoyed that yet again we have a big, wealthy organisation mis-using Copyright law to prevent information being published - if they'd resorted to privacy laws then I'd have more respect for them. And I think its clear by now that this is about the material contained in the letters as opposed to the copyrighted letters themselves - The Estate's statement (via Calcifer) is
Quote:
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However, the Estate made clear to ADC that it had no issue with the publication of the book providing the material in question - affecting only 20 pages out of a total of some 300 - was removed.
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Taken in conjunction with the publisher's original statement:
Quote:
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Despite many revisions and changes made at the insistence of The Tolkien Estate it appears that The Tolkien Estate will seek to take court action to prevent the release of this book regardless. Everyone involved in the publication has worked hard to meet the requests of The Tolkien Estate time and time again, however it would be misleading to release a Biography on Hilary Tolkien without proper reference to his close relationship with his brother.
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So, the Estate is threatening legal action to prevent publication of the book unless 20 pages which the author's feel is essential to the book is removed. They are using copyright law to achieve this - & that is totally against the original intent & spirit of that law.
Now, if Garm has more information as to what's happening here I'd be more than happy to hear it, & if it really explains what is behind all this I'd be grateful - my arguments here have been based on the information provided by both parties in the dispute.