Page:The copyright act, 1911, annotated.djvu/33

Rh even under existing law, to take a plot and re-write the story, and there is no doubt that under the Act the stealing from a play of a substantial portion of a plot and the utilisation of it as the basis of a non-dramatic work of fiction would be an infringement.

Copyright will include performing right, and every work will be protected in respect of performing right notwithstanding the absence of dramatic form in the work as first produced. Paragraph (c) merely emphasizes this principle by giving the most common case, dramatisation of a novel for the stage, as a specific instance of the exclusive right which every author has of turning to account, for his own profit, any dramatic element which the work contains.

Existing law.—The representation on the stage of a dramatic version of a novel is not an infringement of the author's right in the novel. Copyright under the Act of 1842 does not include performing right, and unless the author produces his work in the form of a, dramatic piece he gets no protection under the Dramatic Copyright Act, 1833. Printing, typing, or writing a dramatic version of a novel may infringe the copyright. It has been doubted whether it does so, if nothing but the plot is taken and the dialogue is entirely original ; but if any substantial passages from the novel are introduced into the play as part of the dialogue the printing, typing, or writing such play is undoubtedly an infringement of the copyright in the novel. In Warne v. Seehohm, a novel was dramatised without the author's consent and four typed copies of the dramatic version were made. It was held there was an infringement of copyright, and an injunction was granted. As a copy of every dramatic work must be sent to the Lord Chamberlain before it is produced on the stage the decision in Warne v. Seehohm did in substance confer uiion the author of novels the exclusive right of dramatisation.

The exclusive right to make any record, perforated roll, or cinematograph film is, again, merely a specific instance of the author's exclusive right to all forms of user. All forms of mechanical instruments appear to be included in the specific words of paragraph (d). It was stated in Grand Committee on the Bill that it was not intended to give a musical composer the exclusive right of making