September 30, 2008

Denis Diderot, the Encyclopedia, and Copyright: A question (or two)

Category: Academic,IP Law — Biella @ 11:19 am

Although I doubt there are any French historians who read this blog, there may be a few IP historical wizards who can help me answer the following question about Denis Diderot, the editor and one of the main writers of the famous Enlightenment Encyclopedia, who apparently was a pro-copyright kinda guy.

According to this Carla Hesse article, Diderot, who participated in the emerging debates around idea of copyright, “argued that products of the mind are more uniquely the property of their creator than land acquired through cultivation” (Hesse, p. 34). She furnishes us with the following quote from Diderot that captures this moral sensibility:

What form of wealth could belong to a man, if not the work of the mind. If not his own thoughts … the most precious part of himself, that will never perish, that will immortalize them? What comparison could there be between a man, the very substance of a man, his soul, and a field, a tree, a vine, that nature has offered in the beginning equally to all, and which the individual has only appropriated through cultivating it”

My first questions is, if this is the case, did he differentiate between the literary efforts of, lets say a novel, which he wrote as well, and his Encyclopedia whereby the former would be eligible for copyright protection (as it has to do with personal thoughts and originality) whereas the later would not because it was less about originality and more about cataloging human affairs, actions, and knowledge (though of course it did require work of the mind). Another more simple way of putting this is: did he desire/seek copyright protection for the Encyclopedia?

It is also worth noting that a good chunk of the Encyclopedia documented the practical arts or in other words, craft. As Richard Sennet describes it in his amazing book on craft making as follows: “It volumes exhaustively described in words and pictures how practical things get done and proposed ways to do them” (2008: 90). Remember too this was a project of collaboration and he apparently collaborated with many scientists as well.

So the subject matter was a domain of knowledge whose utility, so to speak, could come to fruition if it had an ability to be passed on person to person, generation to generation. This makes me want to know even more than I do (and I do want to know) whether he viewed copyright as appropriate for a literary work that basically described the practical arts and which was also created through the hands and minds of many (though he did did seem to sweat and labor more than anyone else.). Any thoughts? Answers?

3 Comments »

  1. i wouldn’t be surprized to learn that diderot was pro-copyright (most writers in the past centuries were pro-copyright, and still are. most writers also didn’t grasp economic matters very well, and still don’t), but that quote seems more like an argument pro-attribution than pro-copyright, and even if he was pro-copyright maybe that doesn’t apply in our current situation, and maybe he was wrong even back then.

    Comment by c.d. — September 30, 2008 @ 1:03 pm

  2. I really only have the author of the article to guide me but she does claim hey approved of copyright. Concdorcet, on the other hand, believed in it, but in a far more limited capacity as he had a more social view of how knowledge was created (but part of the problem was that he seemed to be talking more about science and Diderot seemed to be talking more about creative works).

    I want to say more but I actually need to run…

    Comment by Biella — September 30, 2008 @ 1:14 pm

  3. I know he, like every other early encyclopedist I can think of, did plagiarize from others. (Though, as I note in my dissertation this didn’t stop them from trying to protect their own works.) In France, the work preceded copyright, but he did have a royal “Privilege” that was suspended in 1759 as the work was frequently censored/banned. (Yeo, “Encyclopedic visions”, 2001: 195, 231; Darnton, “The Business of Enlightenment”, 1979: 12-13).

    If you find an English translation of Hesse’s source, I’d be interested in looking at it. Two Diderot essays that might be pertinent — and have been translated in bits — are:

    * “Letter on the Book Trade: Excerpts Selected and Translated by Arthur Goldhammer”
    * “The Encyclopedia (1755)” in Rameau’s Nephew.

    Comment by Joseph Reagle — September 30, 2008 @ 1:16 pm

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