Let the Posting Commence

I'm going to start reposting and crossposting here from the writerly blog I have on Blogger. I'm still waiting to see more styles options and to get a sense that this place will grow significantly, but I figure I should actually use it, too.  I'm really not sure how or if this will work, but I won't know til I try.

Owning Your Characters

An aritcle in the June 22, 2009 issue of Publishers Weekly about the Catcher in the Rye case -- a Swedish writer wrote a book based on J. D. Salinger and his famous character, Holden Caulfield, at age 76, which he claims is not a sequel despite the publicity to the contrary. What the author, Fredrik Colting, says in the article:

"My only intention was to explore the relationship between Caulfield and Salinger." ... "I wanted to explore what happens to characters. When a book is finished, do the characters cease to exist, or do they live on somehow."

Isn't that what fan writers do? Isn't that the core issue for fanfic writers for tv shows no longer being produced, movies already made, books already written? The whole "further adventures" thing? Even if there are official sequels?

And is it realistic of Salinger, who, according to the article, has refused over the years to ever allow any adaptations of the book, because, as explained by his agent, Phyllis Westberg,

"He feels strongly that his fiction and his characters remain intact as he wrote them."

How does that reconcile with classroom discussions of Catcher in the Rye, which is a longstanding staple of school reading lists, and book discussions groups, where readers will bring their own interpretations of the characters? Who really "owns" the characters once they're released into the wild and find an audience? Legally, it's the author? But emotionally? Spiritually? The readers. Like it or not, the reality is that characters become a collaborative entity of the creators and the audience. Who I think Caulfield is and who Salinger thinks he is and who Colting thinks he is, and who any other reader thinks he is might be very different or similar yet subtly different characters. And for many in the audience, the character doesn't cease to exist when the book is already read, the movie or tv show viewed. They live on in our minds, our hearts, our imaginations. And some of us write about them.

It'll be up to the courts to decide if we have the right to distribute those works. In Colting's case, if he has the right to distribute them in the US.

Some Recent Links of Interest

This article in Publishers Weekly (May 18, 2009) -- Rip My Book, Please -- is an interview with Chris Anderson, auhtor of Free: The Future of a Radical Price. Anderson makes some interesting points about the benefits of giving away content -- for FREE!!! -- online as a way to stimulate sales.  In an excerpt from the book, he quotes Tim O'Reilly, a publisher:

"...the enemy of the author is not piracy, but obscurity."

Neil Gaiman's offers of free downloading of a couple of his books for a limited time to promote them, resulting in increased sales of all his books, is also mentioned. There's some real food for thought here re: the changing economics of publishing online that could change the publishing industry for the next few decades. I might have to read that book. On my new Kindle. :)

~~~o0o~~~

Jonathan Karp offered his ideas in the recent issue of Publishers Weekly.

Too much fun, had to share.