André Brink

On 19 October 2009, Kopinor hosted an international seminar on human, authors’ and publishers’ rights in Oslo which was held at the House of Literature, the Norwegian capital’s meeting place for culture and debate. Fay Weldon, William Nygaard, Helge Rønning, and André participated in this eye-opening event.

Some of the issues discussed:

- the e-book and the threat of digital technologies to authors’ and publishers’ rights vs. the widespread opinion that information should be freely accessible

- internet as a tool of expression which is becoming increasingly a tool of surveillance

- the controversies surrounding China’s participation at the Frankfurt Book Fair

- Universal Declaration of Human Rights: the question today should not be whether these rights are universal, but how to make them universally available

- human rights vs. people’s sense of entitlement

- Albert Camus’s understanding of human rights based on the notion of revolt

- suggestion to introduce the right to dream as a universal human right

- the essentiality of copyright for authors and publishers in all media; the protection of this right as a moral imperative

- the threat of monopoly in the digital media

- the danger of self-censorship in a demand-orientated market (the pressure on the writer to write what is acceptable and not what s/he wants)

- the relationship between rights and ethics

- the Google settlement

In her contribution, Fay Weldon reminded everybody that the power of the writer is great indeed, no matter how hopeless certain circumstances might seem. She named three examples:

1) Salman Rushdie is alive.

(William Nygaard, Salman Rushdie’s publisher in Norway, survived an attempted assassination in Oslo in October 1993, following the issue of the fatwa against Rushdie. Nygaard refused to surrender, speaking out for the freedom of speech on countless occasions. The Price of Free Speech (1996), to which Rushdie wrote an introduction, is Nygaard’s collection of essays and speeches about this crucial topic.)

2) Apartheid has been swept away.

3) Women’s rights have advanced tremendously over the last few decades.

Two remarkable quotes of the day:

“Book, this wonderful machine!” Helge Rønning
“Good luck, the future is yours.” Fay Weldon