[Vwoolf] Editions of Woolf for teaching

Caroline Webb caroline.webb at newcastle.edu.au
Sun Jan 3 23:55:18 EST 2021


P.S. I didn’t realise I was responding to the tail end of a discussion, sorry.  I’d left the US before the Harcourt annotated editions came out, and am sorry I didn’t have the chance to work with them, as I gathered that they were excellent.

I’ve always found the introductions and (usually) endnotes by scholars, not to mention actual editing, lend great value to Oxford World’s Classics, Penguin Classics, etc.  As far as I can tell from my students’ choices, however, they are picking up what is cheapest rather than looking for an editor/introducer of either scholarly or popular-cultural status.  I doubt they’d pay attention to an introduction having been written by Cunningham, especially at this stage—The Hours is no more (and probably less) a current bestseller than Mrs Dalloway itself, and I don’t think his more recent writing has been particularly successful in this country at least.

Caroline Webb
The University of Newcastle, Australia
From: Vwoolf <vwoolf-bounces at lists.osu.edu> On Behalf Of Caroline Webb via Vwoolf
Sent: Monday, 4 January 2021 3:22 PM
To: vwoolf at lists.osu.edu
Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] Editions of Woolf for teaching

Where copyright still exists, different publishers often hold the rights to authors’ works in different countries—it can sometimes be a maze getting quotation rights if one is working on several books with complicated publishing histories.  For years Penguin didn’t publish in the US as most books to which it held the copyrights in the UK and most of the Commonwealth were owned by different publishers in the US and sometimes Canada.  The recent mergers of publishers into a few vast international behemoths is changing that.  (I never expected to see 1950s American sf texts offered by Hachette!)

Mrs Dalloway, like Woolf’s other work, came out of copyright about ten years ago in Australia and I think many other countries, as copyright on published work here expires 70 years after the death of the author.

Caroline Webb
The University of Newcastle, Australia
From: Vwoolf <vwoolf-bounces+caroline.webb=newcastle.edu.au at lists.osu.edu<mailto:vwoolf-bounces+caroline.webb=newcastle.edu.au at lists.osu.edu>> On Behalf Of Diana Swanson via Vwoolf
Sent: Wednesday, 30 December 2020 2:22 AM
To: mhussey at verizon.net<mailto:mhussey at verizon.net>
Cc: vwoolf at lists.osu.edu<mailto:vwoolf at lists.osu.edu>; Dr T Tate <tt206 at cam.ac.uk<mailto:tt206 at cam.ac.uk>>
Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] Editions of Woolf for teaching

Isn’t the issue US copyright law? As I understand it, Mrs Dalloway comes out of copyright in the US in 2021. Or am I mistaken?

Sent from my iPhone

> On Dec 29, 2020, at 9:02 AM, Mark Hussey via Vwoolf <vwoolf at lists.osu.edu<mailto:vwoolf at lists.osu.edu>> wrote:
>
> The Harcourt editions are not available in the UK, I know, but are the OUP
> ones available in the USA? I couldn't tell from the website just now (though
> there is a notice about the effects of Brexit on placing orders from the
> EU!). I always liked the Penguin editions (Julia Briggs et al.) but they
> were never available in Americanland.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Vwoolf <vwoolf-bounces+mhussey=verizon.net at lists.osu.edu<mailto:vwoolf-bounces+mhussey=verizon.net at lists.osu.edu>> On Behalf Of
> Dr T Tate via Vwoolf
> Sent: Tuesday, December 29, 2020 9:34 AM
> To: vwoolf at lists.osu.edu<mailto:vwoolf at lists.osu.edu>
> Subject: [Vwoolf] Editions of Woolf for teaching
>
> Dear Woolfians,
>
> Re. the discussion of editions of Woolf for teaching.
>
> I find the Oxford World Classics good for teaching. They usually have a
> readable introduction by a good scholar, and the notes are generally useful
> and useable but not overwhelming. The font has become rather tiny in recent
> years, which is difficult for some readers (not least we ageing teachers)
> but apart from that issue I think they are usually very good.
>
> Do lecturers in the US find the Oxford World Classics useful?
>
> Best wishes,
> Trudi
>
> ---
> Dr Trudi Tate
> Assistant Senior Tutor
> Clare Hall
> Cambridge CB3 9AL
>
>
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