Copyright Question

George Morang lived from 1866 to 1937. Copyright Question, dated 1902, is a letter addressed to the Toronto Board of Trade. He had asked to appear before the board in person, but his request was refused, and the letter is therefore his written reply, in which he wanted to make his position plain.

The subject is Canadian copyright, a matter that was complicated at the time by the country’s relationship with Britain and with the United States. Questions such as who could print foreign books, and under what conditions, set different parts of the book trade against one another, and a letter like this one belongs to that debate. It is best approached as a primary source, a snapshot of one participant’s argument rather than a balanced survey of the whole question.

This is not a work of literature in the usual sense, but it is a curiosity for anyone interested in the book trade, in Canadian history or in the way commercial and legal debates were conducted in the early twentieth century. The recording is a single chapter of about forty minutes, read by a LibriVox volunteer named Esther. It is a good example of the unusual documents that volunteers choose to record, preserving texts that would otherwise be read by very few. Despite its narrow subject, the letter is short enough to be heard in one sitting. The question of who owns a book, who may copy it and who should be paid for it is far from settled even now, which gives this old argument an unexpected familiarity. Listeners who enjoy first-hand historical documents, such as speeches, petitions and open letters, will find it a rewarding change from fiction.