Permission to use song lyrics in book?

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newgreekwriter

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That makes sense, of course. But (irrelevant to the topic of song quotations) a few times it happened when I wrote a sentense, which, after rational consideration, served no particular purpose. I removed it. Or replaced it. Without it though, the whole extract "read" differently: was harder, dryer, didn't "ring" as it should have... I'm kind of really puzzled about those: if I cannot formulate what those sentenses bring- do they REALLY bring anything at all?


To me, if you cannot, then...they must not bring anything at all. Whatever connection I make to a song or well-known novel, or even a TV show, must show something and be vital.
 

IceCreamEmpress

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The response I got back was that they would wait until a publisher wanted the book then they wanted to know projected sales & what the price of the book was going to be set at before they gave me a price. Needless to say, I concentrated querying on something else.

I don't understand this. If you want to use the lyrics and you understand that you have to pay for the permissions, why not query the project? The fees are not in the thousands of dollars; even for big mass-market books with printings of 50,000 or more, they're in the hundreds of dollars.
 

newgreekwriter

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I agree with IceCreamEmpress. You should still query. The most that will happen is, "Take out the lyrics." Big deal.
 

Fredster

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Here's one - what about using a single line from something, but not actually as lyrics from a song?

For example:


Billy slowly climbed the ladder leaning against the oak tree and knocked lightly on the trapdoor overhead. It opened a crack, and a bright eye looked him over.

"Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?" the boy above asked.

"Spongebob Squarepants," Billy said.

The trapdoor opened completely, and Billy climbed into the treehouse.
 

katiemac

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Here's one - what about using a single line from something, but not actually as lyrics from a song?

For example:


Billy slowly climbed the ladder leaning against the oak tree and knocked lightly on the trapdoor overhead. It opened a crack, and a bright eye looked him over.

"Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?" the boy above asked.

"Spongebob Squarepants," Billy said.

The trapdoor opened completely, and Billy climbed into the treehouse.

I'm no expert, but you can avoid any headaches by rewriting the lines outside of the lyrics:

"Where does the sponge live?"

"In a pineapple under the sea."
 

djf881

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Here's one - what about using a single line from something, but not actually as lyrics from a song?

For example:


Billy slowly climbed the ladder leaning against the oak tree and knocked lightly on the trapdoor overhead. It opened a crack, and a bright eye looked him over.

"Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?" the boy above asked.

"Spongebob Squarepants," Billy said.

The trapdoor opened completely, and Billy climbed into the treehouse.


It's as acceptable to use that in your book as it is to post it on this forum.
 

velvetlove1980

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If a song is public domain, can you use some of the lyrics in a book? I am writing a novel and I want to use a line or two of a song from the 1700's and I want to do it in the Cherokee language. But I don't want to get in trouble for doing this.
 

fraxum

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Even though well aged, great thread. Music inspires me in my new version of myself as a writer. I had hoped to use lines from different songs as lead ins to chapters at some point. I plan to alter this plan.

A question from the other direction. What if the story described in the song is the bones of my plot? Is this fair use? I have no direct lyric quotes, but I did borrow one characters name from the song.

I would not want to use this story if I could not pay homage to the lyric writer and the artist in some way.

Abandon or forge ahead?
 
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