Classics Gain New Life As Copyrights Run Out

Nearly a century ago, the publisher Alfred A. Knopf released a slim book of spiritual fables by an obscure Lebanese-American poet and painter named Kahlil Gibran.

Knopf printed around 1,500 copies. Much to his surprise, the book, “The Prophet,” became a huge hit, and went on to sell over nine million copies in North America.

Until now, the publishing house that bears Knopf’s name has held the North American copyright on the title. But on January 1, “The Prophet” entered the public domain, with works by thousands of others, like Marcel Proust, Willa Cather, D. H. Lawrence, Joseph Conrad, Edith Wharton, P.G. Wodehouse and Rudyard Kipling.

The shift will have profound consequences for publishers and literary estates, which stand to lose both money and creative control. But it will be a boon for readers, who will have more editions to choose from, and for writers and other artists who can create new works based on classic stories without facing a lawsuit.

The deluge of available works dates to legislation the United States Congress passed in 1998, which extended copyright protections by 20 years. The law reset the copyright term for works published from 1923 to 1977, lengthening it from 75 years to 95 years after publication.

Over the next few years, the impact will be particularly dramatic, in part because the 1920s were such a fertile period. Each January will bring a fresh crop of works into the public domain.

Once books become part of the public domain, anyone can sell a digital, audio or print edition on Amazon. Fans can publish and sell their own sequels and spinoffs, or release irreverent monster mash- ups like the 2009 best-seller “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.”

Google Books, which has over 30 million scanned works in its online library, is to release full digital editions of works published in 1923, including Edgar Rice Burroughs’s “Tarzan and the Golden Lion” and Edith Wharton’s “A Son at the Front.”

Some publishers and the writers’ heirs fear that losing copyright protections will lead to inferior editions with typos and other errors, and to derivative works that damage the in-

Fans can publish their own spinoffs and sequels now.

tegrity of iconic stories.

But some experts argue that the law has skewed toward enriching companies and the heirs of writers and artists at the expense of the public.

John Siciliano, the executive editor of Penguin Classics, wanted something to distinguish its edition of “The Prophet.” He hopes a new introduction from Rupi Kaur, a Canadian poet whose large social media following has helped build an audience for her work, will bring new fans to Gibran’s book.

“Having multiple editions of these works and renewed publication energy behind them enlarges the market rather than cannibalizing it,” Mr. Siciliano said. “It’s an opportunity to breathe new life into these works.”