METHODS OF DEALING
As with same-language territorial rights, there are two ways of handling translation
rights: a coedition where the originating publisher develops the project,
presells it to a range of foreign partners and prints for them; and a straightforward
licence arrangement, where the foreign licensee manufactures their
own edition. In both cases, the responsibility for finding suitable translators
and the cost of the translation work will normally lie with the licensee.
Also as with same-language territorial rights, it is essential for the licensor
to check that permission has been cleared for the reuse of textual or illustrative
material belonging to external copyright holders in any foreign-language
edition published under the imprint of sublicensees. For projects planned from
the start as international coeditions, this will involve the clearance of world
rights in all languages, including the right to sublicense for publication under
other imprints. For titles with less obvious potential, the cost of such clearance
may be prohibitively high; in such cases it may be necessary to re-clear
permission only as individual languages are licensed, which can be timeconsuming
and more expensive.
It may be possible to transfer the onus of the clearance work and the payment
of fees to the licensee, in which case it will be necessary to provide a list of
the relevant names and addresses; it is also wise to require evidence that clearance
has been completed satisfactorily. If the licensor is to undertake the
clearance work on behalf of the licensee, the cost should be charged on to
the licensee with the addition of a handling charge of no less than 15% of the
total fees. If the licensee is from a less affluent country, it may be possible to
negotiate preferential rates far lower than those charged to the original
publisher for a substantially larger market; however, not all external copyright
owners will agree to this. Alternative solutions (for licences rather than
coedition deals, where illustrations are crucial) would be to include only a
selection of the external illustrations in the licensed edition, to allow the
licensee to substitute illustrations of their own finding or to omit the illustrations
altogether; in all cases the author should be consulted for approval.
Again, it should be remembered that to supply duplicate production material
to a licensee could result in a breach of contract with an external picture