All poetry by Miguel Hernández and the works of Stefan Zweig, Arthur Conan Doyle or Fritz Lang are copyright free
As every January, the National Library of Spain (BNE) has published the list of authors whose works enter the public domain. Those that anyone can already edit, distribute, sell or modify without the permission of the copyright holders or their heirs. Among those “liberated” in 2023 are the poet Miguel Hernández or the artist Julio González. In the intentional sphere, the work of Stefan Zweig and all the work of Sherlock Holmes is ‘liberated’ in the US.
The legislation and the years that have elapsed since the author’s death before a work enters the public domain vary by country. In Spain, the term is 70 years, although for authors who died before 1987, an earlier law of 1879 applies, with a term of 80 years. This is how the works of the creators who died in 1942 enter the public domain.
In the United States, the 70-year rule applies and touches that of 1952, but any work created in 1927 is considered free. There are exceptions, such as the rights to “Peter Pan” in the United Kingdom, permanently reserved for the Great Hospital Ormond or London, or the ‘Dagboek van Anne Frank’ which enjoys particular attention in the Netherlands and France, as Anne’s father, Otto Frank, who died in 1980, is considered a co-author, who will extend the protection until 2051.
The BNE list lists 177 writers, journalists and artists. Notable among them is the poet and playwright Miguel Hernández (Orihuela, 1910 – Alicante, 1942), author of ‘El rayo que no cesa’, which spans the generations of 27 and 36. Self-taught and passionate reader, at the age of twenty he published ‘Perito in moons’. His famous ‘Nanas de la cebolla’, written on scraps of toilet paper in prison and dedicated to his second son by the poet, concludes the ‘Cancionero y romancero de ausencias’, his last and torn collection of poems, published in Argentina after the Hernández’s tragic death in a Franco prison on March 28, 1942.
Also released are the works of Stefan Zweig (1881-1942) -not the most recent translations-, the prolific, versatile and acclaimed Austrian writer who acquired British nationality and who, after fleeing Nazi terror, took his own life made in the Brazilian city of Petrópolis. Zweig was the most translated writer in the world in the 1930s and today he is a ‘long seller’. Author of essays, biographies and novels such as “The World Yesterday”, “Letter to a Stranger”, “Twenty-Four Hours in the Life of a Woman”, “Castellio v. Calvino”, “Fouché, the Dark Genius”, “Chess Novel” and ‘Stellar Moments of Humanity’. Alianza will re-release the last two and Páginas de Espuma’s ‘Complete Stories’.
On the BNE list appears Julio González, an influential and relevant sculptor and painter, a friend of Picasso in the Paris of the first avant-garde. Also Eustaquio Jiménez, brother of Juan Ramón and mayor of Moguer (Huelva), and the sculptor Julia Casagemas, author of opera and sister of Carlos Casagemas, another painter who was a close friend of Picasso. Also free of rights are Robert Musil, another relevant Austrian writer of a more philosophical nature and author of ‘The Man Without Qualities’; Roberto Arlt, Argentinian storyteller, playwright, journalist and inventor, author of novels such as ‘El juguete rabioso’, dramas such as ‘Trescientos millones’ and collections of articles such as ‘Spanish etchings’.
The last three Sherlock Holmes novels enter the public domain in the US, releasing all the works of the detective created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Anyone can now write their own Holmes and Watson stories or use them in other content without infringing any rights.
In the US, all works published in 1927 are unprotected, such as the legendary and influential ‘Metropolis’, an early silent science fiction film directed by Fritz Lang. ‘The jazz singer’, by Alan Crosland, is also regarded as the first sound film, although in reality this is not the case. Four years earlier, Concha Piquer appeared in the sound documentary ‘From far Seville’.
It is also released; ‘Wings’, silent war film and first winner of the Oscar for best picture; ‘Dawn’, FW Murnau’s first American film; ‘The Enemy of Blondes’, a silent film directed by Alfred Hitchcock and the first in which the legendary British director appears in a cameo, something that would be the hallmark of his films; ‘The King of Kings’, by Cecil B. DeMille, about the life of Jesus of Nazareth and ‘Seventh Heaven’, directed by Frank Borzage, one of the first films nominated for an Oscar and inspiring the end of ‘La La Land ‘.
The Public Domain Day website points out that works like Virginia Woolf’s “To the Lighthouse,” Ernest Hemingway’s “Men Without Women,” or William Faulkner’s “Mosquitoes” are also free.
The Internet offers readers web pages and digital repositories of works by many recently released authors that are universally accessible and free.
-Internet Archive
One of the best resources available online for finding almost any work, plus software, music, and historical websites. The Open Library section has more than 55,000 works published in various languages up to 1927. Most are in English, but more than 700 documents are in Spanish. (archive.org)
-Spanish digital library
It is the free portal of the National Library of Spain. Created in 2008 with some 10,000 works, today there are more than 222,000 digitized titles available for free download or viewing online. (bne.es)
– Project Guntenberg
Electronic book library with over 60,000 digitized originals available for download in a variety of formats such as ePub or Kindle compatible formats. (gutenberg.org).
– Trust Hathi
It is a gigantic digital library with 54,865 books published in the US up to 1927, of which 2,667 are in Spanish. (hathitrust.org).
-Standard ebooks
It welcomes eBooks from sources like Project Gutenberg and gives them a fresher format. Small in size, it houses the most popular titles. (standardebooks.org).
-LibriVox
Digital audiobook library where volunteers from all over the world work in the public domain to read aloud. They are free to download so anyone can access and listen to them. (librivox.org)
-Public domain
This website is an essential resource for accessing copyright-free works and contains many links to various institutions and organizations that also collect and offer books for free. (domainpublico.org.es)
Source: La Verdad
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