BOOK REVIEW #1: Harry Potter and the Order of the Court: The J. K. Rowling Copyright Case and the Question of Fair Use by Robert S. Want

Since I have been reading Steve Vander Ark's "The Lexicon" book and was intrigued by the discussion on the court case from a few archived PotterCast episodes, I thought it would be wise to understand (as completely as possibly) the nature of the case.

This book is a useful tool, in that it briefly summarizes both the plaintiff's (in this case J. K. Rowling with Warner Bros. involvement as her licensees) and the defendant's (RDR Books with Steve Vander Ark) positions as well as some background on the Judge hearing the case (Judge Patterson) and his decision, etc. The book then moved into how the fair use doctrine works and how it has applied to cases in the past. These passeges are also available online at Stanford's Fair Use Project website, as they were written by an author other than Want himself, who had the permission to reproduce them for his book.

Page forty-one on through to the last page contains important court documents (which are public material) including Patterson's decision. This makes up the majority of the book, but to Potter fans they are key as they contain the whole of Rowling's testimony. She is eloquent as ever.

Anyway, an interesting book and another one to be used while studying the history of the Harry Potter phenomenon as well as how Harry Potter has changed an aspect of society, in this case a legal proceeding.

The book is available, to my knowledge, through both Amazon.com and barnesandnoble.com, and I'm sure it's available elsewhere online. I wonder how many bookstore stocked this book.