Authors sometimes find it really tempting to use song lyrics in a novel or story. The words of the song are just so powerful and so right that... well, they need to be there.

If you're considering using song lyrics in your work of fiction, you may want to come up with a back-up plan. Here are some things you should know:

you or your publisher may be able to get rights to use the lyrics--or maybe not
it's probably going to cost you (typically a small fee per copy you make, but that can add up)
your publisher may decide the lyrics aren't worth the time/effort/money required to use them.
What about 'fair use'?

Fair Use principles weren't put in place to cover fiction.

You could claim fair use if you were writing, say, a nonfiction piece looking at U.S. cultural shifts over the last fifty years through the lens of Top-10 lyrics. To write such a work, you'd clearly need to reference some lyrics. But if you tried to get permission and pay for every single song, those barriers would jeopardize your ability to produce the work. Fair use would allow you to quote a few lines from each song to help make your point as you presented your analysis.

Putting lyrics into your fiction is something else altogether.

You'll read a lot of pages online that talk about lyric printing as 'fair use', etc., but that's a stretch of the fair use doctrine and completely unreliable when it comes to novels and other works of fiction.

What's the worst that could happen?

I'm not a lawyer. Personally, I think the worst that would probably happen is that someone would see you used the lyrics and sue to make you pay. You'd have to pay the usage fees, plus maybe some punitive damages and court fees. All that could add up to a great deal more than it would have cost to get the rights in the first place.

I further think rights-holders' attorneys' time would be better spent going after web sites that publish lyrics and musical arrangements in their entirety.

If you have a bestseller on your hands and make millions, though, you're going to be putting yourself into a whole other class of rights violators.

Shouldn't the artist or songwriter be pleased I love their work enough to include it?

Don't take it personally; it's business. Artists, unless they wrote their own songs or bought the rights, don't really have a claim to the lyrics. The songwriter does unless he or she sold them all. But the person you need to worry about most in this equation is typically a music publishing company. That company probably paid money for the rights to control publication of those lyrics you want. They're highly unlikely to get warm fuzzies because you want to use lyrics under their control. Even if they do, they have to pay people (such as the songwriter) for that usage.

Bottom line: Lyrics are intellectual property. They're worth money.

But isn't this like free advertising for them?

In a way... maybe... if your story causes a bunch of people to rush out and buy the sheet music. But that's not likely. At best, it might cause readers to buy the song. That's covered under altogether different rights--performance and recording rights, etc. Someone, somewhere might be pleased. Depending on how things are set up, a little of that money might even trickle to the music publishing company. That prospect, however, is not likely to cause that company to let you use the lyrics for free.

So how much does it cost?

Basically, to use the song, you'll need to enter into a contract with the rights-holder. That company will tell you how much it wants for the usage you've described. A lot of factors go into the cost, including the portion of the song that you're intending to use. If you're only using a line or two, you may be looking at only a few cents per copy you make. Or it could be a lot higher. There generally are different fee schedules for hard-copy vice online use. You won't really be able to gauge the potential cost until you ask.