Tolkien Estate blocks new Tolkien book

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by davem

Its probably nothing more than something with a minor embarrassment factor at worst. I'm not even necessarily arguing that whatever it is should be published - just that using copyright in these circumstances is a bit off. After all the Estate have never implied that whatever it is that being referred to isn't true.

You are up to your old tricks again, in simply regurgitating innuendo and supposition and for that reason I'm becoming very bored with this.

I've already pointed out that nothing I heard or saw in any way was the least bit dodgy.

It is possible that the Family simply does not want any kind of reference to the children's and grandchildren's lives as they believe that has no merit in any literary questions about Tolkien's writing.

What I see is a very sad situation in which one member of the family invited the authors to undertake a particular kind of study using the material they owned. And that study has been repeatedly, despite significant changes and edits, rejected by the Family Estate, which owns copyright but not the material itself.

So I see two authors who have spent considerable time now with no likelihood of renumeration. I see scholars and fans of Tolkien losing access to information about his life, no matter how banal or trivial or personal. And I see a Family Estate that lacks unanimity. That must be very hurtful.

I had always wondered about the sibling relationship, how the elder was able to attend university and achieve a university career while the younger did not. In a class-ridden society, those occupational differences were substantial. (Yet in spite of that difference, the two families maintained close contact.) It is a sociological question to me, not a family question. Tolkien getting into Oxford strikes me as a story very similar to that of Patrick Bronte getting into Cambridge a hundred years earlier.

I'm trained as a scholar and I know countless stories of situations like this.

And having heard from the authors, the publisher and the Estate, that's all I'm going to say about this very unfortunate event.

[Galin]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

You [davem] are up to your old tricks again, in simply regurgitating innuendo and supposition and for that reason I'm becoming very bored with this.

By the way, davem has now deleted a post which followed post 60 (mine) and included an invented conversation indulging in the speculation being referred to here.

That's what Bethberry is (partially) quoting above. People are free to delete posts of course, but davem's deletion changes the context of Bethberry's response.

And I might as well add that I doubt even Fauskanger and Salo would consider the Wired article not to be one sided.

[davem]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

You are up to your old tricks again, in simply regurgitating innuendo and supposition and for that reason I'm becoming very bored with this.

Ok - I've removed any potentially 'bothersome' stuff of mine from the thread & I'll opt out of this discussion from now on.

Originally Posted by galin

By the way, davem has now deleted a post which followed post 60 (mine) and included an invented conversation indulging in the speculation being referred to here.

Yes - all of them. sorry of anything has been lost to the discussion but I probably shouldn't have joined in this discussion at all. There are some aspects of it I care too much about & some I don't care about at all but couldn't resist commenting on & that's a fatal combination.

[Galin]

I would like to add that I don't really like to try and play at one of the 'thread police' and feel a bit petty for doing so.

On the other hand the deletion seemed a tad unfair to Bethberry and I hadn't realized you (davem) had deleted other material as well.

My apologies for jumping the gun davem. I should have given you the benefit of the doubt in any case, that you would note the deletion yourself.

[Morthoron]

How amusing that a thread regarding deletions should result in deletions. Now, we have an incomplete thread as well as an incomplete book.

[Bêthberry]

davem, I regret very much that you deleted all your posts here. (There is an edit button, you know. )

Your point of view--as with everyone's-- is one which needs to be heard. Now there are many quotes from your posts interlaced with other posters' comments without the full context and that is a shame.

(Note, I'm not speaking about my post which refers to the invented conversation; because I have email notifications of all of this thread, I could simply edit my post to include it, but I didn't wish to copy the material when I wrote the post and still do not wish to do so now. I objected to the invented conversation not because it was "bothersome" subject matter but because you had already played that card.)

It is my understanding that on our forum software deleted posts can still be read or accessed by the moderators and administrators who can reverse the deletions. (If I'm wrong about this I'm sure I will be told.) Please reconsider your decision and ask one of our moderators to restore at least the majority of your posts.

And for the record, I don't consider one-sided articles necessarily to be beyond the pale as they can easily be criticised, refuted, and dismissed.

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by davem

Ok - I've removed any potentially 'bothersome' stuff of mine from the thread & I'll opt out of this discussion from now on.

Davem, I never saw that last post of yours, but I believe you are mistaking what's been going on– that is, if as it seems you think people (other than garm, perhaps) were personally offended by your claims and arguments, rather than simply critical of them. There is a difference.

I'd also like to say this: removing these "bothersome" posts may seem like a nice peace-offering, but its effect is to make it hard for any newcomer to understand the debate. I also suspect such a newcomer might now get the impression that you had been flaming people, or alternatively, that everyone has been ganging up on you and reacting to nothing, which either way I'm sure isn't what you want.

[davem]

Right, so, apologies to everyone for my brainstorm there. I've asked for the posts I deleted to be re-instated.

Anyway....where was I?

Copyright. And the real issue here is: privacy vs knowledge. The Estate is using Copyright law to protect the privacy of the family (or the FAMILY). Yet in order to do this they are preventing the publication of a serious work of biography. Is this acceptable. Of course, no-one likes to be embarrassed, or be made to look silly- or even to have grandad, or great aunt Mary shown to have been a bit silly back in the day. But is that sufficient justification to stop a biography of great uncle George's family being published? Or in other words, setting aside our own discomfort with being made to look a bit daft, & our equal discomfort with seeing our family or people we respect being discomforted in that way, is that enough of a reason to stop a book being published - bacuse what is being done here is not a trivial thing. There is zero difference bewteen preventing a book being published in the first place & burning every copy of it after its been published in the second place. The Estate, in order to protect the 'privacy' of the FAMILY have effectively 'burned' this book. From that point of view this behaviour cannot be simply brushed aside with cuddlsome statements about 'privacy'. Using Copyright law as match & petrol in this way is a very questionable procedure - burning books is a big thing (or even a BIG THING). I've tried to inject a bit of humour into the debate - & got shot down for it - to the extent that I felt it better to remove meself & me comments - but that seemed a bit dumb in a debate on censorship (despite the fact that I actually owned the copyright on my posts, which in a way justified me doing it.....& therein lies the rub...