Here's a great resource which has been making the rounds in various blogs this last week: Stanford University Libraries'
Copyright Renewal Database. Here's why it's important:
The period from 1923-1963 is of special interest for US copyrights, as works published after January 1, 1964 had their copyrights automatically renewed by the 1976 Copyright Act, and works published before 1923 have generally fallen into the public domain. Between those dates, a renewal registration was required to prevent the expiration of copyright, however determining whether a work's registration has been renewed is a challenge. Renewals received by the Copyright Office after 1977 are searchable in an online database, but renewals received between 1950 and 1977 were announced and distributed only in a semi-annual print publication. The Copyright Office does not have a machine-searchable source for this renewal information, and the only public access is through the card catalog in their DC offices.
The database only contains U.S. Class A (book) copyright renewals.
Henry Reed appears three times in Stanford's catalog, for the American editions of some of his translations:
Perdu, by Paride Rombi;
Père Goriot, by Honoré de Balzac; and
Three Plays, by Ugo Betti (copyright renewed by Reed himself, in 1984!).
The Copyright Monographs Database at the
U.S. Copyright Office is a collection of records of a variety of works, including monographic literary works, works of the performing and visual arts and sound recordings, and renewals of previously registered works of all classes.
A quick search of the "
Books, Music, etc." module for
last-name, first-name "reed, henry" brings up 20 records, 16 of which are for our Henry. These include his translations of Ugo Betti (
The Burnt Flower-Bed, Summertime, The Queen and the Rebels, and
Crime on Goat Island); Luigi Pirandello's
All for the Best; Dino Buzzati's
Larger Than Life; Paride Rombi's
Perdu and His Father; and Balzac's
Père Goriot.
The database also has records for the copyrights of two poems set to music by
Sir Arthur Bliss: "The Enchantress" (1951), and "Aubade for Coronation Morning" (1953). "The Enchantress" is a translation of Theocritus's "
Second Idyll," while "Aubade" was one of ten modern madrigals commissioned for a concert on the eve of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II (
A Garland for the Queen).
For more copyright fun, check out the
WATCH project: Writers, Artists and Their Copyright Holders.
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1536. L.E. Sissman, "Late Empire." Halcyon 1, no. 2 (Spring 1948), 54.
Sissman reviews William Jay Smith, Karl Shapiro, Richard Eberhart, Thomas Merton, Henry Reed, and Stephen Spender.
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