Sale of Murakami manuscript raises issue of who has ownership rights

Writer Haruki Murakami in the March issue of a monthly magazine accused one of his editors of selling several of his manuscripts to bookstores without his permission.

A list of writers' manuscripts for sale by a secondhand bookstore in Tokyo is seen atop pages written in longhand by author Haruki Murakami.

The accusation has raised questions in the publishing industry as to who has ownership rights to manuscripts and whether such unpublished writings should be on the market at all.

In the article, Murakami, the noted author and translator whose most recent novel is "Kafka on the Shore," described the behavior of the now-deceased editor, who was a longtime acquaintance, as a type of theft.

The Japan Writer's Association, headed by writer Senji Kuroi, is now looking into the issue. It plans to issue a statement saying writers own their manuscripts.

Tokyo's Jinbocho antiquarian book district is full of manuscripts by famous authors. One by Junichiro Tanizaki is on sale for 4.5 million yen, another by Yukio Mishima has a price tag of 6.5 million yen and one by Shugoro Yamamoto is going for 2.5 million yen.

They were sold to the used bookstores by the writers or their editors, and most of the old manuscripts -- anywhere from several dozen to 100 writing pads of 400 Japanese characters per page -- are barely legible.

Murakami wrote his novels in longhand until the latter half of the 1980s, when he began to use a computer.

One of the manuscripts he claims was sold is a translation of "The Ice Palace" by F. Scott Fitzgerald, which was published by then Chuokoron-Sha Ltd.

The 73,400-character manuscript was sold by a shop for more than 1 million yen.

Manuscripts might end their lives when they are published as books, but some die-hard fans want to possess something written in an author's own hand.

"The fan (who bought the Murakami manuscript) was very pleased. I think the price was reasonable," said a bookshop owner who sold one manuscript.

Manuscripts are also important in the study of literature, as they are used to trace how a work evolved from the original draft to the published version. Museums buy manuscripts from secondhand bookstores for this purpose.

"For writers, manuscripts are like empty shells. To dig them out and put a price on them means they are being treated as important cultural assets," another bookstore owner said.

Whether they should be put on the market is an issue between writers and their editors and is not for bookstores to decide, the owner said.

Ownership rights to manuscripts have been undefined for a long time.

"Ownership of manuscripts belongs to the writers," said Minoru Nakamura, a lawyer and poet who is also the director of the Museum of Modern Japanese Literature.

"But there was an age when it was natural for publishing companies and newspapers not to return manuscripts. Most writers also had little understanding of their ownership rights and did not ask for manuscripts to be returned."

The Japan Writer's Association held an executive meeting in mid-April after Murakami's accusation was published and decided to come up with a document stating that writers have ownership over their manuscripts.

Murakami said in the magazine article that no one knows where many of his manuscripts have ended up, as the editor responsible for them has died.

Random House Kodansha Co. has announced its first annual contest for unpublished literary works, which will include publication of the winning manuscript in both Japanese and English.

The Tokyo-based publisher will accept Japanese manuscripts of any genre and on any subject until next March 31 for the first award. The manuscript must be between 250 to 350 pages, at 400 characters per page.

There is no prize money, but the winning work, chosen by the publisher's editors, will be published in its original Japanese and then released in English by the Random House group of the United States.

The winner will be announced on the company's Web site in September 2007 and an award ceremony will be held in New York.