The Century Volume 30 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1885 Excerpt: ...on our authors. While the writers of Great Britain are without protection in the United States, the writers of the United States will be without protection in Great Britain. In the present state of the case a double wrong is inflicted on the American author: (1) at home he is forced to an unfair competition with stolen goods, and (2) abroad he has no redress when his goods are stolen. In his "English Note-books" Hawthorne records a visit in 1856 to the office of an important English publishing house--he gives the name in full--where he met one of the firm, who "expressed great pleasure at seeing me, as indeed he might, having published and sold, without any profit on my part, uncounted thousands of my books." Cooper and Irving have fared as ill at the hands of the English pirate as Hawthorne did. The number of American books republished in England is increasing every year. In proportion there is as much piracy in Great Britain as in the United States. Time was when there was no sarcasm in the query, Who reads an American book? Time is when that question may be answered by saying that the English now read American books--and by the hundred thousand. A glance at a railway bookstall in England will show that a very heavy proportion of the books which cover it are of American authorship--just as a glance at an American news-stand will reveal a very heavy proportion of books of British origin. In both countries the most of these literary wares are stolen goods. Half a dozen English publishers have series or libraries in which a good half of the books are of American authorship. It would not be easy to make out a list of the rival British editions of " Little Women," of" Helen's Babies," of "Democracy," of "U...