She wouldn’t. She was blind, deaf, and suffered diminsia at that point… and her sister who had been caretaker and gatekeeper to her legacy conveniently dies after revealing her condition.
Then her lawyer/caretaker conveniently finds a very VERY early draft of TKAMB and paws it off as a new book…
My God they didn’t even let the fuckign corpse stop MOVING before sinking teeth in.
“Professional descendants”
Nice one!
Sure, for now. What’s the secondary market for TKAM like in 10 years?
Aaannnd Martin Shkreli buys up all available paperbacks in 5…
Yes. Pocket size paperbacks were a boon to schools, because they could either buy the book cheap, or have the kids buy their own copies. When I was in school, we never had novels in hardcover, though I assume that happened in previous decades. I would thing that pocket paperbacks meant more novels were read or studied, and presumably they could shift from “classics” to more recent popular novels because the cost of the paperbacks was so low.
In high school in the seventies, I remember “Dandelion Wine”, Steinbeck’s “The Pearl”, “Fahrenheit 451” yes, “To Kill a Mockingbird”, all in cheap paperback editions. They would need replacing, but replacement was relatively cheap, and not every copy had to be replaced each year.
I’m not sure how that works today. I’m thinking of when pocket paperbacks had 75 cent over prices, slowly going up from there. Now they are ten or eleven dollars, not sure if they are still “cheap”.
I’d also point out that there seems a move away from pocket paperbacks. I don’t know if print runs are generally lower, so the industry has changed. Or maybe it’s “prestige”, authors and publishers wanting a more “respectable” book. Or maybe they figure they can charge more for “trade paperbacks”. Or maybe novels have become so thick that pocket size is less viable, the spines break too easily.
But other than Clive Cussler level best sellers (and even those now come in a somewhat larger “small” size, the trend is to larger books. So Heinlein’s juveniles are now coming as trade paperbacks, at least from one of the publishers.
This is sad, when we think about the impact that cheap pocket paperbacks have had for decades.
Maybe they’ll commemorate this dick move by changing the title to To Kill To Kill a Mockingbird.
No, that was the name of the documentary I was going to make about the dick move. However, I got a cease and desist notice, so I have to move on. My next project will be To Kill To Kill To Kill a Mockingbird, about them suppressing my documentary.
You’re going to have to change the copyright law.
Good luck with that.
On the flip side, finding a digital copy online is also extremely easy. A resourceful teacher could email a pdf o the entire class. I know, not 100% legal, but resourceful teachers have been copying media for decades. I highly doubt anyone is going to catch them, and even if they did, the bad publicity suing wouldn’t be worth it.
I am going to have to agree with you here.
I guess a lot of people think of copyrights protecting Disney and other media giants. And while that is true, there are many, many more people who eek out a living by writing prolifically, though never making the best sellers list, and many more who might have a decent book or two, but that’s it. What if your magnum opus was at 25, you should only get paid for reprints until you’re 45? Hope you didn’t blow it all on hookers and blow, but wal-mart is always hiring…
I agree that some companies use the copyright law for outright abuse. But if the author or musician, or artist is alive, I thin they should get paid for reprints.
You’re not wrong here, of course. But think of the implications of making teachers choose between doing their jobs and staying on the right side of the law. Like all the little victimless “crimes” proliferated by our unaccountably swelling legal code, it turns common men and women into criminals. For all that it might not be politically expedient today to prosecute all of them, it suspends a little Sword of Damocles over every teacher, over every citizen, a little lever of political control in the hands of whoever happens to be sitting in the seats of power.
It’ll be “to kill a what now?” I’d imagine.
I had to wade through 48 posts before somebody mentioned digital media.
This was my first thought - pff, epub that shit.
It’s eke.
I was trying to make a mouse pun… yeah, that’s it. Like Walt Disney’s early years.
Well, again, even tripling the budget to buy 100 books isn’t exactly going to break the bank (unless maybe you teach in Kansas).
But come on, teachers copy shit ALL THE TIME. Ever been in band? A even teachers that TRY to be legit about sheet music end up making copies. Sure a lot of copying may fall under fair use, but a lot of it doesn’t.
At any rate, in a world where the average person will download a CD or the next episode of Walking Dead off the internet, forcing them to pirate a book isn’t exactly a moral dilemma.
“Although Sarah had an abnormal fear of mice, it did not keep her from eeking out a living at a local pet store.”
A Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest winner from a few years back.
So you’re suggesting teachers make copies for their students of an entire book? That could well cost more than the book itself, not to mention all the time all that copying would take!
Wait! I thought teachers got all summer off, where all they did is lounge around the pool and travel to exotic locales on their overpaid salaries? Why don’t they just do it then? /s
DIGITAL copies. As I said in the post above it, the teacher could email a PDF copy to the entire class. I spent 30 seconds and found dozens of PDF copies of the book, and I am hardly a l33t haxor.
Sure, but the book isn’t in the public domain is it? There could be repercussions for using downloaded copies, rather than have the school pay for e-books. But even with e-books, there is still the problem of not all public school children having access to computers, tablets, e-readers, or even smartphones.
