By Connor Dillingham
The Public Domain is an an interesting concept. The public domain refers to creative materials that are not protected by intellectual property laws such as copyright, trademark, or patent laws. The public owns these works, not an individual author or artist. Anyone can use a public domain work without obtaining permission, but no one can ever own it. And often times, these works are pieces of fiction.
Many stories have entered the public domain over the years. Some are because they existed before copyright laws existed, such as the myths of various mythologies and the Brothers Grimm fairy tales. Some because the authors weren’t able to properly copyright their works, such as H. P. Lovecraft, creator of the Cthulhu Mythos. And sometimes, the copyright for a work simply expired, allowing it to enter into the public domain, such as with L. Frank Baum, author of the Wizard of Oz. This is the case with Winnie-the-Pooh, which as recently entered the public domain, which allowed the film Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, a Horror reimagining of the children’s story to exist.
Winnie-the-Pooh isn’t the only work to enter the public domain recently. Some of these works are The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser, A Daughter of a Samurai by Etsu Inagaki Sugimoto, and many others. These works can be a great tool for future writers to tell stories, as they can make different retellings of these tales that are still unique enough to stand on their own. They can also be used to tell versions of the stories that can really show what you can do with the public domain, such as the aforementioned Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, which reimagines the yellow, honey loving bear and his friend as murderous slashers(admittedly not the most original idea in the grand scheme of things, but it does show how one can use the public domain in unique ways).
There are several works that often adapt public domain stories and become more famous than than the original work itself. And while the source material is public domain, and thus can be used by any creator in any way they wish, these more famous adaptations are not. For example, in the famous 1939 adaptation of The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy Gale’s Ruby Slippers that she uses to get home are, of course, red. However, in the original novel, they are silver. This change was done to take show off the new Technicolor film process of the time. However, since the film adaptation is more iconic than the source material, this change may prove more challenging for creators in the long run. For while the original Silver Shoes are in the public domain, their more iconic film counterpart, the Ruby Slippers, are owned by Warner Bros. In fact, when Disney made the 1985 film, Return to Oz, they had to pay Warner Bros. royalties to use the Ruby Slippers in their film, due to being more iconic than the Silver Shoes. SO it’s important to know what is public domain, and what is a recent creation, as that can be the difference for a lawsuit for any potential creator.
References
Welcome to the Public Domain. Stanford Libraries. https://fairuse.stanford.edu/overview/public-domain/welcome/
Di Placido, Dani. (August 31, 2022). ‘Winnie The Pooh: Blood And Honey’ Shows The Power Of The Public Domain. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/danidiplacido/2022/08/31/winnie-the-pooh-blood-and-honey-shows-the-power-of-the-public-domain/?sh=24d0d05c6c39
Hill, Nicole. (January 6, 2021). Books Entering Public Domain in 2021. Book Riot https://bookriot.com/public-domain-books-2021/
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