Lead Without Trying to Lead | Classics with Kathryn Goldman

0:00It's time now for the BIS book broadcast with Liz Scully of Read Think Central. Do you like reading? Do you run a business? Wondering what to read next? Then this is the show for you. Liz is a business strategist and coaches businesses so that they grow while protecting their owner's time, resilience, so they don't burn out. Books can be a real key to changing things. Liz reads a couple of books a day to sift out the dirt and is a self-proclaimed bookter. It show gives you one big idea for you plus your business to chew on to you read the book. Join us now and see what Liz is recommending this week. Hello and welcome to the BIS book broadcast. If you've got a business and you love books and foolishness, you are in exactly the right place. I'm Liz Scully, I'm a business strategist and a total book nerd

1:00and to be honest, a bit of a fool as well. But, tell you who isn't a fool, today's guest. Catherine Goldman is back in the studio with us. Say hello, Catherine. Hello. Catherine? Hello. I see what you did there. Fantastic. Now what you are listening to, lovely listener, is a classics episode. This is where we take a book that very definitely is not a business book. And for no good reason, we discuss it as though it is. It is frankly fabulous. We have lots of episodes in this series. So if you're interested in the strand, do check it out. Now before we get into today's book and it's lovely, let me give you a proper intro to our Catherine Goldman. She is an attorney, or as we know it in Europe, a lawyer. She is a specialist in copyright, trademark, and internet law. She was for quite a while a delightful client. In fact, one of my faves and tell her, she'll get a swell head.

2:02And she is now simply a delight. And as well as working with creatives on their art and how it all fits together and protecting it, she is an artist herself. Now today's tech is Madeline, which is, a 1939 absolute classic. It's by Ludwig Bellman's. And he wrote both the text and the delightful illustrations. And they really are absolutely beautiful. So the book is a story of a small residential school in Paris. We're introduced to the rhythms of their days. They walk in the park. They walk by the same. They all go to bed at the same time. It's lovely. Then we meet the Madeline of the title. She is the smallest girl at the school. She's quite alive by her, I have to say. She is not afraid of mice, of tigers, of walking along the ledge,

3:02near the scary drop into the river. And she is quite happy to scare her teachers. But she is very beloved and very much looked after. But one night she becomes sick and is rushed to the hospital. And she has to have her appendix out. Eventually her school buddies come to visit her. And what do you know? She's at a five-old time in hospital. So when they get home, they would all like their appendix out as well. And that's it. Really? That's your whole story. But it is utterly charming. It really is delightful. And it spawned a whole series. I think there's five other books that followed this. There's Madeline in London. You rescue, you get the picture. Now, the book often appears in the hundred best children's books list. Often I cut one or two in that slot. It's incredibly well known. It won the Coltocot medal, which is normally a sign for having amazing illustration.

4:03In fact, if you ever see that, if you're in a kid's section, you see Coltocot medal winner as a sticker on the cover. Do have a look at the book, it will be beautiful. Now, I must confess, before Catherine recommended this, I'd never heard of this book. I don't know what rock I had been lying under, but I had never heard of it. So obviously you grew up with this book, Catherine. And what did you love about it as a child? So I did grow up with this book. I love this book. I had a wonderful librarian in elementary school, and she just pegged this book for me right away. And what I loved about it was that Madeline was the youngest. And I was always the youngest in school. I was always the smallest and the youngest. I had the least experience. I was the underdog, and so was Madeline. And it was like, she's brave.

5:05She doesn't know that she can't do these things. And she shouldn't do these things. And she does them anyway. And so that's what made this book stick with me my entire life. That makes sense. She is very feisty. The illustrations themselves are really lovely. There's a point in the hospital where when her friends are visiting, she pulls up her shirt to show the scar. And it is beautifully drawn. There's so much life in the drawings. So let's talk about her a little bit more. So she's very brave. She's very good about facing danger. The mouse, the tiger, and later the appendix issue. But apart from the sort of obvious fact that you could visualize yourself as her, she was your identification character. I think there's a lot to be said for artists and for mavericks with all of this stuff. Do you see it when you're client? I do. I do see it in my clients. So my clients are creatives who are also entrepreneurs, right?

6:08They are making a business out of their skill set. And they face a lot of risk. They face a lot of rejection, right? They face a lot of unknown. So they have to have a lot of courage to put themselves out there. To be an artist, a visual artist, or someone who does written work, or design work, or sculpture, or whatever it is, you're really vulnerable. You're really putting yourself out there facing risk and rejection. And so there's that connection that I think we have with Madeline. The only difference is I'm going to point out that I don't think Madeline knows she's facing it when she goes out there. When you're older and you're becoming that entrepreneur, that creative entrepreneur,

7:08you know it's out there, right? So there's a little bit more fear, whereas Madeline is fearless. Yes, that's true. It's partly that she doesn't know better, but also she's full of energy and curiosity. She's leading the pack, but very subtly. She just doesn't... She's not interested in what other people are doing. Well, and she notices things that other people don't notice, which is another thing that, you know, creatives have in common with Madeline. That's what makes them creative. They see something that is intriguing to them, and then they riff on it. And other people would just walk by whatever it is. And so that sets Madeline apart from the 11 other girls in school. That's true, actually. You pointed out to me on the cover here that on the book, when we see Madeline, she's not doing what the others are doing.

8:09Just subtly different. You know, they're standing, she's sitting. She's slightly to the side of it. And I think that life is in all of the illustrations, but it's also the essence of the whole story. It's what makes her so lovable. Yeah, it's... Yes, she speaks her mind, right? She's bold, she's daring, and she doesn't do what the others do. But then at the end, the others want to do what she does, right? And so that is what locks in the whole idea of leadership by being different. You know, leadership by being the example, although, again, it's unintentional. She's just being Madeline. And that is Madeline. And that is what creatives are. They're just being themselves, right? And it's when they are forced into uniformity

9:09that they lose that spark, they lose the energy. And I think that's the difference between the kind of people I work with and those who aren't entrepreneurial, basically. True. True. So after these messages, we'll be back to digging to more. Hi, it's Liz Scully from the Biz Book Broadcast. Would you like my help with your business? Of course you would. Would you like a discount with that? Oh, of course you would. So head at once to Lizscully.com slash endless clients and see the latest offer I have for you to improve your business. My eyes on your business. Great results. And you're back with the Biz Book Broadcast. I'm Liz Scully. I'm speaking to Catherine Goldman. And we are discussing Madeline the book. That is definitely a child's book.

10:09But we're referring to it in her. If it was a business book, what would it teach us? Now, we've talked about the fact that she takes risks and Madeline is out there leading her curiosity. But I want to make it clear that she's not naughty. She is simply doing her own thing. She is not rebelling out of badness. She's just led into a different way. And I think that's what for me, that's what she brings to this story. That's why others want to be like her. She doesn't boss other people around. The girls follow her because she seems to be having more fun than they are. She's super optimistic. Right? She is super positive, enjoying her life. A life which is as they set out in the very first sentence is very regimented. 12 little girls in two straight lines. It's very regimented.

11:10It's very under control. Ms. Clevelle has control. But she manages within this structure to be bold and optimistic and fun-loving. And that is what the other girls really aspire to. And also, of course, from this distance we know what happens to Paris. This was written in 1939, so it wasn't the happiest of times in Europe to say the least. The war had just started. There were major changes coming. And there's this lovely bubble of order and beauty and care. Just the whole thing charmed me deeply. Yeah, and in the context of it being Paris in 1939, and again, we didn't know what was coming because it was on the horizon. In fact, my father's family left Europe in 1939 and came to Baltimore

12:13where I live now. So we saw it. We saw something that the cloud was on the horizon, but we didn't know how it was going to impact Paris. And one of the things that's in the book that showed great foresight is her resilience, right? Her ability to overcome when she has that attack of appendicitis and has to go to the hospital and get the operation. But then she just bounces back and she's so enthused about showing her scar to her classmates. So that resilience speaks not only to Paris, but also to entrepreneurs to business people who are constantly faced with challenges they didn't know were coming because they're out there doing things that nobody else has done. So you can tell I love this book. Yes, I can.

13:13It's lovely. I also think there's something of the entrepreneurial spirit when the other girls cower when they go to the zoo and they see the big scary tiger. But Madeline rushes forwards because she's fascinated by it. It's reeled by the whole thing. And I think that's that kind of artist spirit, that entrepreneurial spirit. And she rushes forward to the tiger and she just goes, right? And she just is like, oh, you, of course the tiger is in a cage at the zoo. So she's safe when she says it. But yeah, she's just got this bravery. And in order to be an entrepreneur, you've got to take risks. You've got to be able to rush up to the tiger and say, who? And if you don't want to, if you aren't able to do that, then you're going to, you can work for somebody who does that. And there's nothing wrong with that. I always want to underline that.

14:14Sometimes for an entrepreneurial world, it's like, oh, we're going to get a job. No, like jobs are fine. Like if you don't want to do marketing and outreach and all of that business development stuff, then a job will allow you to do the thing you want to do most. If you want to be out there, then entrepreneurial way is the way to go. And also it's being a member of a team, right? And working with somebody who has that courage and has the vision and is putting it together and you're an integral part of the team, that's fun too, right? So if you don't have that spirit, you can still go for the ride and help that person achieve what it is they're doing. Absolutely. I think a complete of finishes, like most entrepreneurs, not very good at that side of things, great at starting. Oh, really quite good at the early part of the middle bit, but the ending bit, so complete a finisher, in that team is really helpful.

15:15Now, we've talked about her taking risks. We've talked about leading by example, which I think is that, but I also think the, even the authority figures in the book, the none that looks after them and the doctor, who takes her to the hospital when she's sick, they're very gentle stuff, which considering it's 1939, if we ignore the war, and we just think about the fact that schools were very regimented then. It's still a very loving environment, she's in. That must have been very appealing when you were a kid. Well, yes. So Ms. Clivelle, right? She has this order and this organization and this structure, but Madeline thrives in it. Right? So it's not oppressive. It is not the Gothic orphanage that we are familiar with from other stories.

16:15She thrives in the structure and she has given the freedom by Ms. Clivelle to thrive in that structure. Ms. Clivelle doesn't like it when she's walking on the ledge of the bridge, but she's walking on the ledge of the bridge. Right? So there is kindness and gentleness in the structure. Yes. Yeah, actually that's a really good point because she's really thriving in that world for sure. Now let's sort of zoom out a bit from Madeline in the book to talk about the books themselves as a series. And I'm interested from your point of view in copyright law. How do we... How do you copyright that? Because there's obviously, there's the fact that Ludwig wrote all of these books. But there are very specific parts of it that are very identifiable. Madeline herself, but also the school, the environment, Ms. Clivelle has a bit of a catchphrase that is in all the books, which is something's not right. How do we...

17:15How do we protect that? Well, obviously there's copyright protection for the written word and for all of the illustrations, which are just stunning. There is copyright protection for characters. Identifiable characters like Madeline are protected by copyright. So another author or illustrator can't take her and drop her into another story. So there is protection for the characters. I don't recall whether there's a trademark on the Madeline series. But that would be another way to get protection for the creative work, the series as a whole. The box card children, for instance.

18:15Okay? That's a series. The Twilight series. So a series of books can be protected with a trademark as well. So you can't publish a book that would be... would confuse people about whether or not it was part of the original series. So you have copyright, you have trademark, and then of course, with publishers and whatnot, you have contracts. And those are the three pillars of protection for creator professionals. Hmm. I have a specific question. I'll ask you after these messages.

19:18Now that I've said it, my Mondays are working for me. Find a job you'll love at read.co.uk And you're back with the Biz Book broadcast. I'm still this, Scully. I'm still speaking to Catherine Goldman, and we're still discussing Madeline. Now, my question is this. In the early... I think it was the 1990s, maybe the 2000s, but there was a whole array of the slash fiction, which was specifically taking characters from well-known series, things like Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock, and creating fan fiction around it. It was a very specific type of fan fiction, if you know, you know. Otherwise, we shall gloss over it here. Where does that fit into this copyright world? Because you want fans to be so excited they're writing stuff. Obviously, that's copyrighted. Yeah, so that is an area

20:18that the quick answer is, you can't use other people's characters to write stories about those characters in a different setting or whatever, different facts and commercialize it. You can write all the fan fiction you want as long as you're not selling it. Okay? Now, and I'm not a fan fiction expert, and this stuff evolves, right? So we would need to double-check that. Now, there was, there was a knockoff, or a blend of a doctor's suit style and not Star Wars, the Spock. Star Trek. Yeah, Star Trek. And that was determined to be an infringement. I was going to say, and the Zeus estate is just aggressive decided. They are very aggressive,

21:19very aggressive, and that was determined to be an infringement, that combination, because they took the characters from one and they took the style and the setting from Zeus, and their defense was that it was a parody. Well, tell me about parodies. Well, the court or parody or satire, and the court said, no, no, no. See, parody or satire makes your use of the underlying creative work fair. All right? You can do that, but you have to be satirizing or making a parody of the underlying work. You can't use their characters to satirize something else in the world. You have to be making a satire of that work. And that was the distinction, and that was the downfall of that particular piece

22:20of fan fiction. I guess we could call that. So there, so parody, parody is a legitimate use, but you have to be making a parody of or satirizing the work itself, not something else. That does make sense. I know that there's been a rise in the last sort of couple of decades in, certainly in the UK, I don't know whether it's got as far as the US, where some of the kids stuff that we grew up with, like the Mr. Men books, or we all grew up with the ladybird books, which was, you know, the ladybird book of fire engines, or the ladybird book of nuclear fusion, and they were, they had a very distinct style and size, and beautiful hands-drawn images of a very particular sort of 1950s look. And they have re-issued them, but with scathing commentary on it. So there is the ladybird book of the husband, or the ladybird book of the hangover,

23:21the ladybird book of the bridal drunken night out. And they're obviously coming from, you know, within the house that is doing it, they've taken their stuff, they're reusing their IP. And they're very successful. They're hugely so. Now presumably, that would just be a negotiated contract and the very specific circumstances. Exactly. I mean, so if it's, whoever controls that, those assets, that intellectual property, is going to be able to license rights that would be very strictly controlled by the contract. You may do this. You may not do that. You may only do this for X amount of time. You must use a trademark like this. It must be an eight-inch square book. Whatever it is, there has to be very specific controls over it so that the intellectual property doesn't escape.

24:25And it's true. If you don't enforce your rights, then you can be found to have waived them. There's this thing in the law called latches. It's one of those, yeah, it's one of those words. It means you, it means you've sat on your rights. You didn't enforce them. And so you have lost them. So when something like that happens, when a company owns a group of assets, they're very strictly controlled when they are released to someone else for use. Interesting. So I know years ago, I sat next to a film editor at somebody's birthday and he told me a fascinating thing. We were talking about the new films that were coming out and he mentioned, I'll tell you how long ago was the new Herbie film had come out. You may remember that they used to be really regular and then there was nothing for, I will tell you now, 25 years. And I know it was 25 years because he said, oh, they always reissue films.

25:26After 25 years, they add a new film in the series. I think this is now gone up to 35. So if you want to look at the next version of a series, look at what was really popular 25 years ago. And he told me that that was because the copyright, like you were adding to the series, you extended the entire series copyright. So I'm interested in your version of that, but I then have a follow up question. So let's start. So I'm not sure that that still holds true. And what I'm thinking about is I'm thinking about the Sherlock Holmes series, right? And if you did you see Inola Holmes, right? The two movies were the huge lawsuit over Inola. Inola did not appear in any of his stories. So she is a unique character. And then the question is, when did he fall into the public domain

26:27that made him usable as a character Sherlock? And Watson, I don't think, was in Inola. And the brother, my craft. And the argument that the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle estate made was that the latest book that he wrote to the most recent one extended the copyright on all the earlier ones. And that was litigated for a very long time. And if I'm not mistaken, they were ruled against. And so those early characters, those early scenes were free to use and not the later ones. We're going to have to double check that. If possible. Look on the end here. And also obviously Sherlock Holmes is a lot older piece of copyright. Yes. The Herbie series or the Barbie series or any of those things that are extending something

27:27that has been going for a long time, but only really 50 odd years or so is slightly different. It's yeah, because I think the originals are going to still be protected by copyright. Yes, exactly. So you're just continuing that. I found it fascinating. I really did. And what about people just sort of like fans dressing up as Madeline or going out? That's presumably okay. You want that as a creator, don't you? Well, I don't think you want to suppose or presume what any creator wants done with their intellectual property assets. Okay. And you would think, oh, you know, they want me to do this. This is free publicity for them. Well, they may not. So, um, but all of those costumes and things are generally licensed. Don't make sense. I was like, yeah, don't make sense. Now, unfortunately, we have run out of time. We've just got to the good bit as well. So this has been, as always, a delight. Where can people find out more about you and your work?

28:29You can find out about me at the creativelawcenter.com. Creativelawcenter.com. I have lots of resources available for creative entrepreneurs. And you can sign up for my email list. It's not really newsletter. It's more like missives from me. Um, but I have fun with it and you might find them interesting too. Excellent. We will put those in the show notes and while you're getting things, go to listscully.com slash reading and get my reading list. A while you're there, hop over to the contact section of that listscully.com slash contacts. And let me know what you're reading. I'd love to know. Thank you, Catherine. And thank you. Lovely list. We're listening to listscully of Re thing Central. Follow Liz on Instagram at Re thing Central for what she's reading right now. Books are the answer to most things. So if you've got a business problem, there's a book that'll help. Get your reading guide at listscully.com slash reading.

29:39Re thing Central.