Dictionary piracy

Dictionary piracy

From Media Indonesia

Hassan Shadily passed away two years ago. Until his death, he could only complain in silence that the (Indonesian-English and English-Indonesian) dictionaries he coauthored with John M. Echols in 1952 were sold in pirated copies.

All his attempts to find the culprits of this piracy failed. Pirated copies of the dictionaries, which demanded a lot of hard work to compile, have continued to be marketed at a price Rp 40,000 cheaper than original copies.

As his daughter, I feel sad and desperate to see pirated copies of my father's work being sold by sidewalk vendors. He himself was once offered the fakes by hawkers for only Rp 20,000 per copy.

I can only hope that those pirating the books are aware that they virtually "caused" the death of my father. He could not express his sorrow in words owing to his Alzheimer's disease.

AMALIA SHADILY, Jakarta