Jackson Jambalaya

The Wall Street Journal published a story Friday about the efforts of the Faulkner Estate to wring every bit of revenue out of the scribe's legacy. The recently reported lawsuits against Sony Pictures and Northrup over the use of Faulkner quotes were only one front in the battle as the copyrights to his work begin to expire in ten years. The estate removed Mr. Faulkner's Nobel Prize medal from Ole Miss and put it up for auction at Southeby's. The medal went unsold. Fortunately. The Journal reported:

At a recent Sotheby's sale of fine books and manuscripts, an unusual lot came up for auction: William Faulkner's 1949 Nobel Prize and drafts of his acceptance speech, written on Algonquin Hotel stationery. In the speech, Faulkner said: "I feel that this award was not made to me as a man, but to my work…So this award is only mine in trust."

The medal and speech were among the most anticipated lots of the afternoon, estimated to sell together for $500,000 to $1 million. The bidding reached $425,000, but stalled. The prize went unsold and will remain with Faulkner's heirs.

Lee Caplin, the agent for the Faulkner estate, sighed when the auction ended. He'd been expecting a good price. After all, Francis Crick's heirs had just sold his Nobel Prize for $2 million in April. "And he didn't even invent DNA," muttered Mr. Caplin. "He just discovered it."

Yes, Mr. Caplin. He "just" discovered DNA. Just like Columbus "just" discovered America. Newton "just" discovered the laws of gravity. Einstein "just" discovered the theory of relativity. You could remove Faulkner's legacy and literature wouldn't change that much whereas removing the work of Watson and Crick would change modern science a great deal. The Double Helix anyone? Back to our story:

Mr. Caplin, a former federal prosecutor and independent movie producer, is leading a full-frontal assault to capitalize on Mr. Faulkner's works. As the legal representative of Faulkner Literary Rights LLC, which owns the rights to all of Mr. Faulkner's books and personal property, Mr. Caplin represents Mr. Faulkner's heirs—the three children of his late daughter, Jill Faulkner Summers, as well as her widower.

He's co-producing a slate of Faulkner films and television shows, including James Franco's coming movie "As I Lay Dying." He's filed two copyright-infringement lawsuits, one against Sony Pictures Classics for using a Faulkner quote in Woody Allen's "Midnight in Paris" without permission, which a judge dismissed last week. And, along with the Faulkner family, he's tried to sell the Nobel Prize medallion—which had been the centerpiece of the "Mississippi Room" in the library at the University of Mississippi, where it was on loan for almost six decades.

The moves are raising complex questions about what happens to the works of great writers after they die. They also highlight the delicate balancing act between protecting a literary reputation and profiting from it. Some legal experts say the Sony lawsuit was frivolous. And the attempted sale of the Nobel Prize in particular hit the wrong note with officials at Ole Miss, which owns Rowan Oak, Faulkner's home in Oxford, Miss. University officials now wonder if the family plans to sell more of the items inside the home.

"When Lee and the family reclaimed the medal, it set off bells of alarm," says Robert Saarnio, director of the Rowan Oak museum. "There was a feeling of anxiety across the university."

Mr. Caplin says he is merely attempting to create a revenue stream for the family that will endure long after the writer's copyrights run out. "In the wake of Jill's passing, some serious attention needed to be paid to estate planning," Mr. Caplin says.

For their part, Faulkner's heirs say they aim to both honor the writer's work and raise funds. "I think my grandfather would come back to haunt me in my dreams if he felt what we were doing was out of place," says Paul Summers, Mr. Faulkner's 57-year-old grandson who owns a vineyard in Charlottesville, Va. "This is a legacy we want to protect, but it's also a family asset."

It's a situation shared by the heirs of other prominent American writers who have faced the expiration of copyrights on their works. According to U.S. copyright law, works published between 1923 and 1978 are protected for 95 years after the publication date. Any work created after 1978, when the law changed, is protected for 70 years from the author's death. Descendants of Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and other writers from the same era will confront the same issue in coming years.

Faulkner wrote "The Sound and The Fury" in 1929, which means it will enter the public domain in 2024, at which time anyone can make the movie or republish the novel, free, without the permission of the estate.

Robert Spoo, a law professor at the University of Tulsa who specializes in copyright law, says the Faulkner family's efforts are understandable. "Any popular author whose works came out in the '20s and '30s—their works are all ripe for expiration in the next 20 years or so. They need to be looking toward their opportunities."

Last year, after coming across some letters and poems of Faulkner's in a backyard shed, the family decided to reassess their holdings and sell some of the items on loan to both Ole Miss and University of Virginia. "I think it was simply a decision by the family to try to perpetuate Mr. Faulkner's legacy, and also do some overall estate planning," says Larry Martin, the co-executor of the estate. "The two things are not mutually exclusive."

Nicole Bouche, who oversees the Faulkner collection at the University of Virginia, says the family's decision to sell was completely appropriate. "These items were on deposit with us for a time, and its not unusual that the family wanted them back," she says.

But officials at Ole Miss worry what the family may decide to sell next. The university bought Rowan Oak from Jill Faulkner Summers in 1973, but the furniture and personal effects within it belong to the family. "Rowan Oak doesn't have a future as a public site without the artifacts within," says the museum's director, Mr. Saarnio. More than 20,000 visitors a year come through the home.

Since the Nobel medallion was removed from the university library, Ole Miss sent out a call to donors in an effort to raise money to purchase the items within the home, including the typewriter where Faulkner poured his unique vision of the Deep South onto paper. Rest of article

The Nobel medallion is a state treasure and should be treated as such. The state or Ole Miss should use the powers of eminent domain to seize the medallion and compensate the estate. Since the item went unsold at auction, the estate lost some bargaining power as to what the fair market value should be.