“Copyright and Credit: Understanding Reprinting in Nineteenth Century Newspapers."

Résumé En

With respect to copyright law, newspapers have followed a different trajectory than books, and much of that difference has to do with their heterogeneous nature. Beginning with the copyright reform of 1909, newspapers could obtain blanket copyrights that covered most of their contents, but this logic did not apply to the much more fluid textual universe of the nineteenth century. The timing of the first copyright claims, and the extent to which these claims were respected, depended upon evolving attitudes toward the genre and subject matter of the texts in question. Serial novels were treated differently than poems, biographical sketches, or political essays, not to mention telegraphic dispatches or price lists. In the absence of clear legislation, editors of periodicals policed each other, arguing over what could be copied and how such copied material should be acknowledged or given “credit.” As they complained about or encouraged copying, authors and publishers debated the shifting boundaries of what Meredith McGill has called the “culture of reprinting.” Changes in the copyright statute only came later, after individuals had experimented with existing laws and tried to create new norms for the republication of texts.