I don't think there's an answer to that. Let's take Kafka, for instance. He gave explicit instructions for his work to be burned after his death. His executor

I don't think there's an answer to that. Let's take Kafka, for instance. He gave explicit instructions for his work to be burned after his death. His executor Max Brod ignored this request, and published them anyway. The result? Both "The Trial" and "The Castle" managed to see the light. This is a clear case of the public good being richer due to a non-permanent "right to be forgotten". But then again, we also have James Joyce. His executor destroyed some personal letters, but some others survived. Thanks to that, we have some very dirty letters he sent someone. Reading those doesn't really teaches us anything about his works, but seriously casts him in a bad (or at least, unflattering) light[1]. So back to Kafka. There are still unpublished papers that should have been destroyed, but weren't, but at the same time haven't been published yet[2]. So what if Kafka's remaining papers cast him in an equally bad light as Joyce? Is it okay for us to ignore his specific request for those papers to be destroyed? I don't really know. I could imagine some kind of experts voting on that (the same way that we never managed to see Stever Irwin's death video), but it's an idea with many obvious flaws. [1] http://harkavagrant.com/index.php?id=32 http://harkavagrant.com/index.php?id=32 [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kafka#Unpublished_papers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kafka#Unpublished_papers