Goebbels’ Estate Sues Publishers of His Biography

Cordula Schacht, owner of the copyright to Goebbels’ diaries, is suing Random House the publishing company that published a biography of the minister of propaganda in Nazi Germany. The book was released in Germany in 2010. Random House initially agreed to pay 1% of the net retail price for using extensive quotes from Goebbel’s diaries. Later the publishing house said that due to moral objections they will not pay an estate of a Nazi war criminal.

Now as Random House is ready to release an English version of the biography in the USA, Schacht decided to go to court. According to the BBC her lawyers have questioned whether copyright laws can be ignored because of moral objections.

The author of the book, Peter Longerich, has argued that a private person should not be given control of important historical documents.