How copyright law applies to fictional characters

Posted on July 14, 2021 at 12:04 PM by Sadye Scott-Hainchek

Here’s an aspect of character development that we haven’t covered on the newsfeed yet: their eligibility for copyright.

The answer to whether a particular fictional character is covered under copyright law is, of course, that it depends.

Kathryn Goldman, an intellectual property attorney and editor-in-chief at the Creative Law Center, describes when a character is covered by copyright law in a guest post for Jane Friedman’s blog.

(And remember that, while Goldman's illustrative examples are huge household names, licensing and copyright issues absolutely apply to indie authors — just ask Kristine Kathryn Rusch.