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Few things infuriated dickens more than other people profiting from the sweat of an honest man's brow, when tiie brow was his. He quarrelled with more than one of his publishers when he thought tiiey were taking a disproportionate amount of the proceeds from sales of his works. He antagonised his American hosts by protesting about the absence of international copyright. And he was badly stung when his attempt to prosecute plagiarists of A Christmas Carol resulted in his facing hundreds of pounds in court costs even though the verdict was in his favour.
It is interesting, then, to observe the view from the other side, by noting how those whom Dickens considered pirates justified their activity. Some, like 'Bos', who plagiarised Nickleby, impudently mocked Dickens's protest (the 'Nickleby Proclamation'). Others quietly got on with counting their ill-gotten gains. But one such, the radical publisher Henry Hetherington (1792-1849), brazenly announced that he was actually doing Dickens and his publishers a favour by reprinting material which was copyright to them.
In June 1 837 Chapman and Hall purchased the copyright and printed copy of Sketches by Boz from John Macrone, paying £2250 for rights for...