The Reader’s Bill of Rights

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  • The right to not read
  • The right to skip pages
  • The right to not finish
  • The right to re-read
  • The right to read anything
  • The right to escapism
  • The right to read anywhere
  • The right to browse
  • The right to read out aloud
  • The right to not to defend your tastes

…………….from BETTER THAN LIFE
………………………..by Daniel Pennac

Do you have any you would like to add?
Or any you really, really disagree with?

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Comments

The Reader’s Bill of Rights — 5 Comments

  1. How about the "right to criticise what you read"?

    Shouldn't there be an author's bill of rights too. I can think of a few rights there.

  2. Darn. Wrote a reply and the computer swallowed it. Ok, see if I can remember what I said:

    I like that "right to criticise".

    An author's Bill of Rights would be a difficult one, though. We have very few rights, I think. And almost everyone you think of has to be followed by a proviso:

    The right to write whatever you like, but not the right to publish whatever you like…

    The right to pinch ideas – but not if it is plagiarism…

    And so on.

    What rights does an author have in fact?

    Even copyright seems to be in doubt thanks to the Google Book Settlement!

  3. What was the Google Book Settlement? I haven't heard of it.

    How about the right to be read properly by a publisher.

    The right to be treated as well as an established writer.

    I know, pie in the sky, but still.

  4. Nope, Jo; we have no right to expect to be read by a publisher or to be published, or to be treated like Dan Brown…lol.

    The Google Settlement I am not going into. It is too complicated, but it calls into question whether someone else (Google in this case) has the right to publish part or all of our work online if we don't specifically notify them – for each work, in detail – that they can't.

  5. I think you should have the right to be read by a publisher, if not necessarily published.

    As for Google, that seems grossly unfair to me.

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