J.K. Rowling shows off a copy of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”

J.K. Rowling, the author of the hugely successful Harry Potter series, got her wish today when a federal judge in New York permanently blocked the publication of a Harry Potter encyclopedia.

Steven Vander Ark, a Harry Potter fan, operates a website called “Harry Potter Lexicon.”  When Vander Ark and a Michigan based publishing company, RDR Books, attempted to publish a reference guide using material from the website, Rowling filed a copyright infringement lawsuit, last year.

Vander Ark and RDR Books argued “Harry Potter Lexicon” was protected under the “fair use” doctrine, which allows materials of critical works to be used in reference books.

However, U.S. District Judge Robert P. Patterson ruled Vander Ark’s book pulled too much material from Rowling’s creative works.

Also, the judge awarded Rowling $6,750 in statutory damages.

“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” was published last year. It was number 7 and the final book in the series. The Harry Potter books have been published in 64 languages and so far have sold more than 400 million copies. A movie franchise based on the Harry Potter books has raked in at least $4 billion at the box office.

The Penguin Group and heirs of John Steinbeck’s third wife, Elaine, won a major victory in the 2^nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals today.

The New York court reversed a lower court decision that was in favor of a son and granddaughter of the late author.

Today’s ruling returns to Penguin the rights to 10 of the author’s earlier works including, “Of Mice and Men,” “Tortilla Flats,” and “The Grapes of Wrath.” Steinbeck is one of the best-known and most widely read authors of the 20^th Century.

He was born in Salinas, California in 1902 and attended Stanford University before seeking his fortune as a writer. He won a Pulitzer for “The Grapes of Wrath” in 1940 and a Noble Prize for Literature in 1962 as well as many other honors. Steinbeck died in 1968, leaving his copyrights to his wife, Elaine.

In 1994, she signed a new licensing agreement, replacing contracts made in the 1930s, for a number of Steinbeck’s works with Penguin. Steinbeck’s widow passed away in 2003. 

A court battle followed. In 2006, a lower court terminated the agreement with Penguin and awarded the copyrights to the author’s only surviving son, Thomas Steinbeck and granddaughter, Blake Smyle.

 Today, the  federal appeals court upheld the agreement between Penguin and Elaine Steinbeck.