Beth Henley Quotes
But here's the thing: what you do as a screenwriter is you sell your copyright. As a novelist, as a poet, as a playwright, you maintain your copyright.
Henley, Beth. Interview by Jackson R. Bryer. The Playwright's Art: Conversations with Contemporary American Dramatists, edited by Jackson R. Bryer, Rutgers University Press, 1995.
In early America, the United States did NOT participate in the European International Copyright convention. The American purpose of copyright was not to protect authors and intellectual property owners, but to promote knowledge and culture. The original purpose was to limit the time during with an author could control his/her creative work so that the society as a whole can get maximum benefit. With the rise of large corporate intellectual property owners with strong lobbyists, they have been able to change the copyright law to greatly enlarge their time and methods of control. The Pirate Party wants to go back to the original intention of the Founding Fathers.
Note that the only reason given in the constitution for protecting intellectual property was to promote the progress of science and useful arts. Inventors, would keep secret their inventions and techniques of manufacture and use in order to protect their economic interests. No one else would be able to benefit by understanding the invention and taking it further and increasing knowledge and understanding. So the Founding Fathers told Congress to establish a system where inventors would get a guarantee of a reasonable time to profit exclusively from the invention in exchange for making the invention public. The plans, methods and drawings had to be made public and until the 20th century a model of an invention had to be supplied to the Patent Office. Anyone could get an inexpensive copy of any patent and come and study the models. Today, most people believe that the reason for a patent system is to protect the intellectual property of the inventor, but that was not a purpose or even a serious consideration. The reason however was educational and to demystify technology and produce more science and technology which it did.
Guthrie was one of the many people who used the copyright law to prevent someone else from restricting the information and allowing wide utilization of their proprietary material. This is sometimes called “copyleft.” This quotation collection is another example of copyrighted material with broad encouragement of utilization.
1st Baron Macaulay. The speech was in opposition to the extension of copyright to 60 years after the death of the author. The American Congress in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act did not take his advice and extended the time to 100 years. This was a radical change from the practice of our Founding Fathers who did not allow copyrights at all. America did not join the copyright convention until the 19th century and then for a far shorter period. When corporations started accumulating intellectual property, they made political contributions and hired lobbyists to increase the period of “evil” so they made windfall profits that were not expected.
Elizabeth Becker Henley is an American playwright, screenwriter, and actress. Her play Crimes of the Heart won the 1981 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the 1981 New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for Best American Play, and a nomination for a Tony Award. Her screenplay for Crimes of the Heart was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.
