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Posted by Ebonyswanne on 01-04-2008 at 04:41:

What's your REAL name...

OK...

Lately I have been looking at my favourite authors web sites just to see if they have new books coming out etc...

What I have noticed is that a lot of best selling authors will work under several pen names...

Interesting... why not their own? Some may say the answer is obvious... but then maybe its just tradition. Like actors with stage names.

So what are your thoughts on this... should people publish under their real name... or should they take a pen name??? Inquiring minds want to know... Wink2

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Posted by SJ_SwanJun on 01-04-2008 at 12:34:

Personally, I don't want anyone I know personally to read my stuff - then give me shit for it; or false praise.

I prefer a non-biased response to my stuff. So. yeah. I'm all for pseudonyms.

My hero Stephen King salute Felt he had the same problem and that people were only buying his work and offering praise because of who he was .... So he came up with Richard Bachman.

We weren't fooled...

SJ

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Posted by Transmute Jun on 01-04-2008 at 13:33:

A pen name is for people who want to hide who they are, for whatever reason. As long as their reasons are legitimate (say, not hiding their name because they're really a mass murderer), I don't see a problem with it.

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Posted by lborgia88 on 01-04-2008 at 14:23:

One of my favourite authors, Elizabeth Peters, is really Barbara Mertz. She got a PhD in Egyptology many years ago, and has pretty much admitted she took to writing fiction because jobs and $ were hard to find in Egyptology. In one of her series, the main character (an art historian) jokes that she's going to write a smutty historical romance, but publish it under a pseudonym "to protect her scholarly reputation" -I suspect this is also why Barbara Mertz didn't use her real name. There's no better way to catch flack in academia than to publish something that's actually popular and sells well.

I can think of another author who made a big name for herself writing Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter fanfiction, and then got a publishing deal for a fantasy trilogy (not fanfiction), but is publishing the trilogy under the same pen name she used for her fanfiction (with a slight variation in spelling) -no doubt because she has a big following of fans who know her only by her fanfiction pen name.

I suspect there are many reasons for the use of pen names, but I would imagine that the main one is simply privacy -if you get really lucky and become famous, you can still go about your daily life without attracting attention, and if your published work does really badly, or is in some way scandalous, you can also keep that separate from the rest of your life too.

Posted by amyltrer on 01-04-2008 at 16:01:

I'm for pennames too. The last thing I need is having my acquaintance teasing me. It's more secure than revealing your true identity.

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Posted by Ebonyswanne on 01-04-2008 at 22:30:

It just interesting to see different views and reasons...

Who is the fanfic author Iborgia???

I wasn't really talking about our fanfic pen names, but still I like the anonymous life even with the few stories I have done, not that i get loads of attention from them and I'm having fans knocking down my door....etc Lol Lol

But I guess when you think about there are some strange people in the world today!

I looked up my pen name in google and it brought up some of my posted stories... That made me feel exposed let alone using my real name!

__________________
Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up- Pablo Picasso.

Posted by lborgia88 on 01-04-2008 at 23:25:

The fanfic author is Cassandra Claire (now Cassandra Clare). She wrote a Lord of the Rings parody called "The Very Secret Diaries," and three Harry Potter fanfics usually referred to as "The Draco Trilogy." I haven't read her fantasy novel, though.

Posted by Ebonyswanne on 02-04-2008 at 03:23:

She's a very Gothic author, it looks like shes been writing for a long time!
Good on her, I hope she does well with it..

As much as I loved Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, I have never been inspired to do fanfic for it... or search for it to read mmm I wonder why??? Ebony ponders...one of her life's mysteries...

__________________
Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up- Pablo Picasso.

Posted by Ebonyswanne on 02-04-2008 at 04:28:

Some on you tube has a pen name very close to mine!!! Ebonyswan, signed up around the same time I started using the name, but I added 'ne' to it... thats so weird. I wouldn't have thought it would be common at all since I have joined sites without a problem with my pen name...

__________________
Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up- Pablo Picasso.