I think the important thing is that it's a form of deceit. It's not about the value to the public vs the value of the person's wishes: if you don't intend to go through with the wishes or believe there is a good chance that you will not be able to, then you should recuse yourself at the point of the request (or as soon as you realise). Deciding to stay involved and make your own choice is simply duplicitious - it completely defeats the point of having the legal power. It wouldn't surprise me if someone could sue the executor, since they are clearly acting against the best interests of the person.

That's an interesting example of where personal wishes cross over the 'corporate' boundary. The person is subsumed by the job and unless they display huge self-restraint it will be difficult to separate personal notes from their corporate thinking.

Presidential diaries would be another example, or a CEO's Rolodex.

Here's the story: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/05/world/europe/entrusted-to.... It isn't just The Pope's notes, but notes that predate his inauguration as Pope, and it isn't just about retention, but about publication.

Both retention and publication go against the wishes of the deceased, but I would see putting them in the Vatican Archives for a few researchers to peruse as a lesser transgression than putting them in a book for all to see.

I agree with you that there is probably a legal or moral requirement to retain the notes of Pope John Paul II, and that may override his personal wishes (though, again, in an archive, rather than in all good bookshops).

You are also correct that it may be difficult, or even impossible to separate JP2's notes from Karol Wojtyla's notes after 1978, but what about before? Are the notes of Bishop of Ombi or the Archbishop of Krakow also as important? How far back does the corporate entanglement go?

In addition to the moral questions, wouldn't this be a straightforward copyright violation?

My (somewhat oblique) question is why copyright would apply to a dead guy's works. ...It's not like respecting copyright is going to get him to write more.

The standard answer is that it incentivizes living authors to know that their heirs will be able to continue to benefit from their work.

In any case, the question of why it is that way doesn't much matter for this particular question. Regardless of why copyright applies to a dead guy's works, it does.

IANAL

That may depend on whether they are John Paul II's notes (and the Bishop of Ombi's etc.) or Karol Wojtyla's. And whether the published work belongs to The Church or to Dziwisz.

On the other hand if Max Brod had listened to Kafka we wouldn't have The Trial, The Castle, or Amerika along with much of the authors other work.

Sure but if you think about it this way I am sure there were countless works of the same caliber or greater which have never seen the light of day for various reasons, and I can't say we are poorer for it, since we don't even know what we lost. You can't mourn something that you didn't know you had - so a world that never had Kafka could not mourn the lack of his works.

What can I say, clearly God needs money.