Using titles from other work

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Omri

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Hi all, I'm currently sitting at home with a stinking cold and I thought I'd might as well use the time to try a bit of writing. Anyway the point of this post is to ask what people's opinions are on using the titles of other work (although not fiction on BC etc.)

In particular I was thinking of nicking the title of a recent BBC documentary called “All watched over by machines of loving grace”, which in turn lifted its title from a poem written in the 60s. As you can guess I’m thinking of something SciFi ish and dystopian, I could come up with another title but I did quite like that one. It will probably take quite a while to write anyway given my usual writing speed and the fact I still haven’t finished the story I started at Halloween so I won’t be posting until it’s finished. Still I thought I’d ask this question as I wasn’t sure whether lifting titles like this was ok?

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Comments

If you're not writing for profit

and give an acknowledgement at the end to the source of the title, I don't see how anyone could object, unless they are objectionable.

Angharad

Titles not copyrightable

It's as simple as that. Unless they are trademarked, like Tarzan, you can re use a title.

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

In Hebrew....

...tarzan means (or meant) a dandy, or a fop, something like the Scarlet Pimpernel, so you could easily use "Tarzan," as long as he didn't swing through the trees and scream the terrible hunting cry of the great apes. The usage is antique, these days, because Tarzan (the Ape-man) became wildly popular in Israel*, and it's hard to reconcile "sissy-boy" with a hulking English Lord with muscle out to here and there, although of course Tarzan would be a potent source of parody, which is always fair game. Like they say, a good man is hard to find, and a hard man is good anywhere.

Cheers,

Puddin'

* Few people realize that the Jews invented comic book superheroes. It's a cultural thing, going all the way back to that mild-mannered kid with glasses who became King David.

A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style

Cheers,

Puddin'

A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style

How about Sunman?

Or in ancient Aramaic, Samson. :)

Hugs,
Erin

= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.

Kal-El

RAMI

Nu, so, the proof is in the name. Kal-El, (in Hebrew, El is one of the names for Ha'Shem /G-d and Kal is likely a corruption of kol or voice, so Kal-El is the Voice of G-d)leaves Krypton, and is forced by circumstances (planetary destruction/pogroms to leave his home planet (country). The first thing that occurs when he gets to America is that he changes his name to Clark Kent, so he can fit in better.

Rami

RAMI

And...

Superman was created by Jerry Siegel and Joseph Shuster, both Jews. It's a franchise.

Superman: His Mysterious Origins (the very first ret-con)

Cheers,

Puddin'

A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style

Cheers,

Puddin'

A tender heart is an asset to an editor: it helps us be ruthless in a tactful way.
--- The Chicago Manual of Style

Thanks all I was just

Thanks all I was just worried in case doing that was a big no no but you've put my mind to rest on that :-)

God Bless the Child

I used the title God Bless the Child for my novel. Let's look on Amazon.

God Bless the Child Starring Akuyoe, Obba Babatunde, L. Scott Caldwell, et al. (Feb 12, 2004) -- movie

God Bless The Child by Blood Sweat & Tears - Music

God Bless The Child by Shania Twain - Country Music

There are 5 books by the same title, not including mine which is no longer in print (eh hum- Erin)

That being said, I'm thinking there has something to do with the uniqueness of the title whether or not you can use it or not. I am sure you can't use Lord of the Rings or Moby Dick (unless it's a porno), but common phrases that appear in everyday conversation; like a boy and his dog. I think are free game.

K.T. Leone

My fiction feels more real than reality

Katie Leone (Katie-Leone.com)

Writing is what you do when you put pen to paper, being an author is what you do when you bring words to life

The Holy Bible, by Laika Pupkino

All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace is a fantastic title. If you don't use it I will.

I think it's always best to come up with your own perfect title and attach it to a work so perfect that for centuries to come people will be stealing this title from YOU, but we're not always that brilliant and inspired. It's okay to borrow a title, but it's best to do this only if it really fits, especially in a way that subverts or plays off of the original, putting a new slant on it; not just borrowing a title because the title is recognizeable---a "brand name" for your piece---and you're lazy. For example, you wouldn't believe all the articles about downtown Reno I've seen in local periodicals called A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT. Because a river runs through it, yuck yuck. To me that's just cheap and hoaky.

Seems better to me to name a story after a song, or a song after a line from a poem than a story from a story; I don't know why. After a lot of agonizing and trying different titles I named my homelessness novel after the environmentalist Jefferson Airplane song ESKIMO BLUE DAY, because the song invokes the era (the 1960's) that the characters identify with, and there's a certain irony in this, their claiming to be hippies when the hippie thing was dead and gone by then and they were really just bums. Anyway this worked for me, and it seemed like a title worth stealing, kind of obscure for them, not horribly overdone like say WHITE RABBIT...

The only titles I'd be hesitant to borrow are those from works that put my meager talents to shame; that I wouldn't presume to compare my story to. The Bible. War and Peace. Gravity's Rainbow.

What I usually seem to do is pun existing titles. A story about a homosexual in a scary dystopian future supposedly free of them became A CLOCKWORK FRUIT. A fruit being old-time slang for a gay person, and the clockwork being all the genetic tinkering, and some mind control stuff that echoed that in Burgess's novel. My Christmas horror story THE SILENCE OF THE NIGHT mixed the famous serial killer novel and film with a spiritual and hopeful christmas carol, and did the job of warning the reader what she'd be getting in to. OH BROTHER WHAT ART THOU had nothing at all to do with the Coen Brothers film that was one word different from it (a title they lifted from a fictional film that the character in a Preston Sturgis film wanted to make, which Sturgis had lifted from the Old Testament or somewhere...) but it was too good a pun to pass up.

~~hugs (We Heed the Police in Different Voices); Veronica

.
What borders on pure insanity?
Canada and Mexico.
.

The first time I heard the

The first time I heard the title of the documentary I thought "wow that's a good title I wonder if I can nick it for something" and I think I've come up with a plot that at least justifies using the title (in fact the plot came first and then I thought I could use the title for the story). Whether it's any good of course is another matter of course.

Strangely enough I'd never thought of using punning titles, will have to think about that, thanks.