Alberto Pinchele
Daniel Defoe
WHAT’S IN A NAME
Pen Names
Source: Speak Up
Language level: Lower intermediate
Speaker: Justin Ratcliffe
Standard: British accent
Many of the most famous writers in history have used pen names. Why?
SIMPLICITY AND STYLE
Eric Blair thought George Orwell was “a good round English name.” Daniel Foe, author of Robson Crusoe, decided Defoe sounded more aristocratic. Vampire novelist, Anne Rice, changed her name early in life: her mother bizarrely named her after her father, Howard O’Brien. The famous Japanese haiku poet tried 15 pen names before settling on Basho, which means banana plant. Some choose simplicity. Georges Remi reversed his initials (French pronunciation) to become Hergé, author of Tintin. Joseph Conrad sounds reassuringly English, compared to Jozef Konrad Korzeniowki. Wilhelm Albert Vlademir Apollinaris de Kostrowitzky is less memorable than Guillaume Apollinaire, Ettore Schmitz became Italo Svevo because he “felt sorry for the one little vowel surrounded by all those fierce consonants;” it also sounds less foreign.
Not only are these pen names clear and memorable, they also look great on book covers. (Like pen names, authors often use their initials – from T.S. Eliot and D.H. Lawrence to J.R.R. Tolkien and J.K. Rowling – to create a memorable brand). Some pen names are a kind of homage. Neftali Bosoalto put together Paul Verlaine and Czech writer Jan Neruda to become Nobel poet Pablo Neruda. Samuel Langhorne Clemens chose Mark Twain because it reminded him of his beloved Mississippi River.
GENRE AND GENDER
Writers may use pseudonyms for different for different genres. Math professor Charles Lutwidge Dodgson invented the playful name Lewis Carroll for Children’s books such as Alice in Wonderland. (Lewis is the French versionof Lutwidge; Caroll come from the Latin for Charles, Carolus.)
Pen names also disguise who you are for example, a woman. Mary Ann Evans did not want readers to assume her novels were romances, so she wrote as George Eliot. Amantine Aurore Dupin became George Sand, while the Brontë sisters (Anne, Charlotte and Emily) initially published as Actor Bell, Currer Bell and Ellis Bell.
CONCEALMENT AND DISGUISE
There are other reasons to hide one’s identity. Isak Dinesen was the pen name used for Out of Africa, the disguised autobiography of Baroness Karen Blixen. Because Irish civil servants were not allowed to publish books, Brian O’Nolan wrote novels as Flann O’Brien and articles as Myles na gCopalleen. Respected critic Anne Desclos wrote erotic best-seller, the Story of 0, as Pauline Réage. Stephen King published four novels under the name Richard Bachman to find out whether people bought his books for his name, rather than his writing. Crime queen Agatha Christie used the pen name Mary Westmacott to write romances, exploring her own psychology n a way the Poirot and Miss Marpie novels could not.
Molliére hid his name (Jean-Baptiste Poquelin) because the theater was shameful. Most touching, when he was just 16, future American politician Benjamin Franklin invented middle-aged widow Silence Dogood to get his satirical letters published in the newspaper printed by his brother.
Would you write books under your own name? Use your initials? Or would you prefer a pen name, to hide your identify or to be more memorable?
PEN NAME | REAL NAME |
Alberto Moravia | Alberto Pinocherle |
Anne Rice | Howard Allen O’Brien |
Anthony Burgess | John Burgess Wilson |
Boz | Charles Dickens |
Daniel Defoe | Daniel Foe |
Eltery Queen | Freeric Dannay and Manfred B. Lee |
Flann O’Brien | Brian O’Nolan |
George Elliot | Mary Ann Evans |
George Orwell | Eric Arthur Blair |
George Sand | Amandine Dupin |
Guillaume Apokinaire | Vilhelm Albert Vladimir Apollinaris de Kostrowitzky |
Hergé | Georges Remi |
Karen Blixen | Isak Dinosen |
Italo Stevo | Ettore Schmitz |
John Le Careré | David John Moore Cornwell |
Joseph Conrad | Józel Teodor |
Lemony Snicket | Daniel Handler |
Lewi Carroll | Charles Lutwidge Dodgson |
Mark Twain | Samuel Langhorne Clemens |
Molière | Jean-Baptiste Poquelin |
Pablo Neruda | Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalto |
Richard Bachman | Stephen King |
Pauline Réage | Anne Desclos |
Saki | Hector Hugo Munro |
Stendhal | Marie-Henri Beyle |
Voltaire | François-Marie Arguet |
