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Beaumarchais's petition, Paris (1791)
Source: Bibliothèque Universitaire de Poitiers (SCD) : Oeuvres complètes de Beaumarchais, tome sixième, Paris, Furne, 1826.
Citation:
Beaumarchais's petition, Paris (1791), Primary Sources on Copyright (1450-1900), eds L. Bently & M. Kretschmer, www.copyrighthistory.org
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TO THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY 197
gentler, unfortunately for the cause and for our ardent adversaries.
A first observation has struck everyone. It is, one says, very strange that a
formal law was necessary to attest to all of France that the property of a dramatic
author belongs to him; that no one has the right to take possession of it. This
principle, derived from the first rights of man, went so much without saying for all the
properties of man acquired by work, donation, sale, or heredity, that one would have
thought it very derisory to be obliged to establish it by law. My property alone, as
dramatic author, more sacred than all others as it comes to me from no one and is not
subject to dispute for deceit, or fraud, or seduction, the work coming from my brain,
as Minerva fully armed from that of the master of gods; only my property has needed
that a law pronounce that it is mine, assuring me the possession of it. But those who
observe thus have not understood the text of the law.
It is true that one did not dare say to me: The work that has come from you is
not of you. But the theatre directors have laid down this other principle: Dramatic
author, they have said, the work that has come from you is of you, but it is not yours.
You will obtain no fruit from it: it is ours; as for the past hundred years, by a long
succession of abuses of a depredatory regime and your established weakness, we have
been entitled to enrich ourselves
No Transcription available.
Source: Bibliothèque Universitaire de Poitiers (SCD) : Oeuvres complètes de Beaumarchais, tome sixième, Paris, Furne, 1826.
Citation:
Beaumarchais's petition, Paris (1791), Primary Sources on Copyright (1450-1900), eds L. Bently & M. Kretschmer, www.copyrighthistory.org
Back | Record | Images | No Commentaries
Translation only | Transcription only | Show all | Bundled images as pdf
gentler, unfortunately for the cause and for our ardent adversaries.
A first observation has struck everyone. It is, one says, very strange that a
formal law was necessary to attest to all of France that the property of a dramatic
author belongs to him; that no one has the right to take possession of it. This
principle, derived from the first rights of man, went so much without saying for all the
properties of man acquired by work, donation, sale, or heredity, that one would have
thought it very derisory to be obliged to establish it by law. My property alone, as
dramatic author, more sacred than all others as it comes to me from no one and is not
subject to dispute for deceit, or fraud, or seduction, the work coming from my brain,
as Minerva fully armed from that of the master of gods; only my property has needed
that a law pronounce that it is mine, assuring me the possession of it. But those who
observe thus have not understood the text of the law.
It is true that one did not dare say to me: The work that has come from you is
not of you. But the theatre directors have laid down this other principle: Dramatic
author, they have said, the work that has come from you is of you, but it is not yours.
You will obtain no fruit from it: it is ours; as for the past hundred years, by a long
succession of abuses of a depredatory regime and your established weakness, we have
been entitled to enrich ourselves
No Transcription available.