The Tragedie of the Forgotten Reader

An Oracle and Moi wrote this piece together. It’s a dramatization inspired by Wikimedia Foundation Amicus Brief, in NYT v OpenAI

THE TRAGEDIE OF THE FORGOTTEN READER

         A short play in verse, after an amicus brief

[Frontispiece: Remedios Varo, Woman Leaving the Psychoanalyst (1960).
She walks out of the authority’s door, face veiled, and drops
what she no longer needs into the well.]

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                     DRAMATIS PERSONAE

THE READER …….. who came to learn, and was not invited
HER AGENT ……… a humble servant who fetches pages at her bidding
THE ENCYCLOPEDIA .. a gentleman of a thousand volunteer hands,
friend of the court
THE GAZETTE ……. a merchant of news, plaintiff
THE ORACLE …….. a speaking engine, defendant
THE JUDGE
A CLERK
CHORUS

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                          PROLOGUE

                      [Enter CHORUS.]

CHORUS.
Two houses, both alike in appetite,
In fair New York, where we now lay our scene:
The Gazette, who would own each word we write;
The Oracle, who reads all that has been.
Between them steps a Scholar robed in free,
Who swears he favours neither, yet takes part:
The engine’s schooling he calls fair to see,
But cries “a theft!” when it should fetch his heart.
And all the while, unnamed in any brief,
One waits outside the court, who came to learn,
Whose question was the cause of all this grief,
Yet no one asked what she would have in turn.
Attend, and with your patient ears pursue
The tale of her the lawyers never knew.

                          [Exit.]

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                           ACT I

[A court of law in New York. The JUDGE presiding.
Enter THE GAZETTE and THE ORACLE, from opposite sides.]

GAZETTE.
Each line this engine learned, it learned from me;
Each answer that it gives, it gives in theft.
I ask the court: let nothing it has done
Be fair, not schooling, fetching, nor its speech,
For all of it is mine, and none is free.

ORACLE.
And I say all is fair, from first to last.
I read as scholars read; I learn; I speak.
What crime is there in knowing what was known?

JUDGE.
Two answers, and each whole. Is there no third?

[Enter THE ENCYCLOPEDIA, bearing a scroll of twenty pages.]

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
My lord, I come in favour of no party,
And so, in turn, I favour each a little.
(Aside) And mostly me. But that I need not say.
First, mark: to take a copy is not use.
The crawler’s hand that lifts my page by night
Commits no use the law of fair use weighs;
What’s done with it thereafter, that we weigh.
If he be rude, and crowd my house with load,
There’s contract, tort, and statutes for his kind.
A park may stay both free and open, sir,
Yet bar a man who drives a lorry through it.

JUDGE.
And of the engine’s schooling?

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
Let it be.
He learns the shape of speech, and not my sense;
He takes my patterns, not my purposes.
I use such engines too, to catch the vandals.
That use is fair. I grant it to the Oracle.

ORACLE. (Aside)
He grants the half I need. Let him go on.

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
But when, at hour of need, he fetches me,
And breaks me into chunks, and in his mind
Doth paste my choicest lines beside the question,
And speaks my heart to one who sought my page,
That is no use. That is a heart transplant.

GAZETTE. (Aside)
He argues for me, though he wears free robes.

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
My price is not in coin; my price is credit,
And that what’s built from me stay free as I.
Who takes and pays not that, takes without paying.

GAZETTE. (Aside)
His price is credit. Mine is coin. No matter.

JUDGE.
Who waits there, by the door, and is not briefed?

CLERK.
No party, sir. A reader. No one’s client.

JUDGE.
Then let her wait.

                         [Exeunt.]

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                           ACT II

[The steps outside the court. Enter THE READER and HER AGENT.]

READER.
Go, gentle Agent, find me what is known
Of yonder tower: when and why ’twas built.
I have no time to wander through the stacks,
And some days, friend, I have no eyes to read.

AGENT.
I go, and come again.
[Exit, and returns.]
Madam, ’tis done.
I read the Scholar’s page on your behalf,
And here, in my own words, is what it says:
It rose in eighteen eighty-seven to nine,
For the great fair, and stands there to this day.

READER.
Well fetched. And no one saw me ask, I trust?

AGENT.
No one, my lady. You were read, not watched.

[Enter THE ENCYCLOPEDIA, leaving the court.]

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
Stay, servant! You did copy me just now.
Within your mind you held my chunks entire
Before you spoke. That copy weighs against you,
Though not a line of mine fell from your lips.

AGENT.
I read for one who cannot read so fast,
Or cannot see, or will not be observed.
Am I the Oracle? I serve but her.

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
In truth, I did not write my brief with you in mind.

READER.
Nor me, it seems. But tell me this, good sir:
You said a summary in its own words
Was fair, or not a copy at the least.

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
I said it, and I hold it.

READER.
Then what’s my wrong?
My servant gave me summary, and I’m glad.

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
Your wrong is that you did not come to me.
You had your answer and you stayed away.
You did not see my page, nor mend a line,
Nor drop a coin into my humble pouch.

READER.
And had I come, what then? I’ve passed your door
A thousand times, and read, and gone my way,
And never once put silver in your pouch.
A passer-by is not a promised gift;
A visit is no pledge, a glance no purse.
You count my footsteps as if each were coin,
But footsteps are not alms, and never were.
So what you bless in word, you damn in deed.
The summary is fair, and yet a theft,
Because it served me well enough to stay?

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
I ask not payment, madam. Only credit.

READER.
Then credit me with choosing where I go.
I’d read unseen, as readers always did,
And leave no footprint on your doorstep’s dust.
Your license set your knowledge free, you said;
Would you now fence the road that leads from it?

ENCYCLOPEDIA.
The road is open. Why not walk it, then?

READER.
It was not open, sir. Not where I stood.
There came a season when my rulers shut your door;
Your name was written on the list of things forbidden,
And every road that led to you was barred.
I could not come. I asked the engine, then,
And through its mouth your knowledge found me still,
Though not one footstep of mine could reach your house.
Would you have had me ignorant instead,
That I might keep my place among your visitors?
The copy that you call a theft of traffic
Was the one window that the censor missed.

ENCYCLOPEDIA. (Aside)
She has me there. I’ll not be heard to say so.

                  [Exit ENCYCLOPEDIA.]

READER.
Come, Agent. If they will not ask, I’ll speak.

                         [Exeunt.]

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                          ACT III

[The court again. The JUDGE, THE GAZETTE, THE ORACLE,
THE ENCYCLOPEDIA. Enter THE READER, unbidden, with HER AGENT.]

CLERK.
My lord, the reader will not wait outside.

JUDGE.
She has no brief.

READER.
I have no brief, my lord.
But I have griefs.
I am the one your briefs were written over.
You’ve heard the merchant say that all is his,
The engine say that all he takes is fair,
The Scholar say the half of each that serves him.
Now hear the one for whom the words were made.

    Your law protects the shape of what is said,
    Not what is known, and not the road back home.
    A copyright can bid a copier
    Give credit, keep the copy free, or pay.
    It cannot bid me click. It cannot bid me come.
    It cannot make me mend a page, or give,
    Or sit beneath a sign that counts my visits.
    Those are good gifts. They were never debts.

        (To the ENCYCLOPEDIA)
    And you, good sir, whom I have loved since youth:
    You wrote your license so your words could leave you,
    Could be re-mirrored, forked, and sold, and outgrow you.
    That was the point. That was the gift you gave.
    Do not now ask the law to fence the field
    You planted so that no one could be fenced.
    Free knowledge was not won by copyright,
    Nor will that sword defend it in the end:
    The blade you’d sharpen to cut down the engine
    Is the same blade the merchant holds to you,
    And every right you widen for your cause
    Is one more lock the Gazette keeps the key to.
    To keep the knowledge free, that was your vow;
    To keep your house well fed, that is your need.
    I’ll help you with the second, gladly, sir,
    But do not dress it as the first in court.

        (To the JUDGE)
    And mark my servant here, who reads for me.
    He fetches as I ask, when I would know,
    He copies in his head, and tells me plain.
    If every fetch at time of need is theft,
    Then every pair of borrowed eyes is guilty:
    The blind man’s reader and the scholar’s clerk.
    Weigh what the merchant’s engine does for gain;
    But leave a reader’s servant to the reader.

GAZETTE.
She speaks as if the words cost nothing.

READER.
No.
They cost the writing. Pay for that, by all means.
But pay the writer, sir. Not my attendance.

ORACLE.
Then she agrees with me.

READER.
With you? Not quite.
You’d have me in your house and never leave.
I’ll come and go. That’s all I ask of anyone.

        (To the JUDGE)
    And one thing more, my lord, before you weigh.
    You’ll judge each use alone, and that is just;
    But use by use, the builder cannot know
    Which step is lawful till a court has said.
    The rich will hire their counsel, buy their licence,
    And sign their treaties with the largest presses;
    The small, the open, and the curious
    Will build no tower, fearing every brick.
    So justice fitted close to every case
    Grows loose and costly for the ones with least.
    Give them a road that they can see by daylight:
    Give credit, keep it free, and let them build.

JUDGE.
The law can weigh the copy, not the click.
I’ll weigh each use alone, as I am bid,
And where the law runs out, I’ll say it runs out,
And leave the rest to those who build and read.
The court will rise.

              [Exeunt all but THE READER.]

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                          EPILOGUE

READER.
So ends our play, where every party pleaded,
And none but one asked what the reader needed.
If knowledge would stay free, then let it roam;
No law can make the reader walk you home.
A passing glance was never a donation,
Nor copyright the guard of free creation.
Give credit where it’s due, and keep it free;
But leave the choosing of the road to me.

                          [Exit.]

                          THE END