To Kill a Mockingbird (first edition cover)

Forfatter/Opretter:

The credit "Jacket design by Shirley Smith" is found on the left jacket flap. (There is very little information online about Shirley Smith; this presents a possible problem for use of the image in countries that do not recognize the rule of the shorter term. It is not known whether Smith is living or dead, which would be needed to measure a copyright term of the author's life plus a set number of years.)

Kredit:

Nate D. Sanders auctions (direct link to jpg). Cropped, retouched.

Shortlink:

https://dkwiki.dk/b/aad3

kilde:

Wikimedia Commons

størrelse:

1427 x 1764 Pixel (876515 Bytes)

beskrivelse:

First-edition cover of To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) by the American author Harper Lee.

Licens:

Public domain

Kommentar på licensen:

No permission is required.

1. First, the photo is a mechanical scan/photocopy of the original cover and does not qualify for independent copyright protection.
2. Second, the dust jacket was first published prior to 1978 without a valid copyright notice. To Kill a Mockingbird was first published in 1960; the hardcover book itself carried a copyright notice, so its contents remain copyrighted. However, the first-edition dust jacket did not carry a separate copyright notice. According to The Compendium of U.S. Copyright Office Practices: Chapter 2200, § 2207.1(C) at p. 15:

"A notice of copyright on the dust jacket of a book is not an acceptable notice for the book, because the dust jacket is not permanently attached to the book. Likewise, a notice appearing in a book is not an acceptable notice for the dust jacket or any material appearing on that dust jacket, even if the book refers to the jacket or material appearing on the jacket."

Numerous sources can be used to verify the dust jacket's lack of a copyright notice:

• Adrienne Raptis's "To Kill a Mockingbird First Edition Issue Points" at Raptis Rare Books – a guide to identifying first editions of the book
• To Kill a Mockingbird at the Gianakos-Safos Collection – a collection of images of a first edition, which together show the dust jacket in its entirety.
• Listing at Whitmore Rare Books
• Listing at Peter Harrington (with complete scan)
• Eleven Classic Covers of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird at Flashbak – first image is a full scan of the dust jacket.

And so on.

Keep in mind that the pre-1989 requirements for copyright notice were highly formalistic and, other than a few enumerated exceptions, required these three elements:

1. "The symbol © or the word 'Copyright' or the abbreviation 'Copr.' or an acceptable variant such as "(c)";
2. "The year of first publication for the work"; and
3. "The name of the copyright owner, or an abbreviation by which the name can be recognized, or a generally known alternative designation of the owner."

If just one of these elements is omitted, the work is deemed to be published without notice and is not eligible for copyright protection. Neither the year "1960" nor a copyright symbol (or any acceptable variant) appear anywhere on the dust jacket. Credits like "Jacket design by Shirley Smith" do not meet the requirements, nor do the identifications of the publisher and author.