Impostor

:Impostor (1953) is also the name of a short story by Philip K. Dick and of a 2002 film, starring Gary Sinise, that is based on the short story.

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An impostor (or imposter, a common variant) is a person who pretends to be somebody else.

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Most impostors try to gain financial or social advantages. Pretenders for various thrones used to be common. Numerous men claimed they were Dauphin, heir to the French throne who disappeared during the French Revolution. There were at least two false Dimitris who were serious pretenders for the throne of Russia. The public fascination with impostors extends to modern literature; a well-known recent example is Miles Derry, the janitor who impersonates a U.S. Navy chaplain in the book One of the Guys by Robert Clark Young.

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Very daring impostors may pretend to be someone else who really exists although fast news media has made this rather difficult in these days. Usually they just misrepresent their financial, educational or social status, family background and in some cases, their gender.

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Impostors are usually aware of not being who they say they are; they are not the proverbial lunatics who think they are Napoleon. However there are borderline cases who may have ended up believing their own tall tales.

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People may make false claims about their past or background—that they can sing, for example—without being full-blown impostors; non-existent military service seems common. Only if a significant part of their past is fabricated—like that of George Dupre who claimed to have been an SOE agent in World War II—they approach the admittedly hazy border.

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Many temporary impostors are criminals who maintain the fa?ade for a time of a caper to defraud their victims (like Wilhelm Voigt). Others, like US prankster Joey Skaggs, do it as a prank or to make a point of some kind. The latter usually reveal the truth sooner or later. Some, like John Howard Griffin, have adopted other identity for purposes of research, investigation or experiment.

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Note that although impostors usually misrepresent their background, their intentions may not be criminal as such. They may wish to start anew with a new identity or "go native"; i.e. adopt identity and customs of other people. Sometimes women have masqueraded as men to obtain privileges only men can have or work in male-dominated professions (see James Barry). Some of them have fought as men at least in Napoleonic Wars and American Civil War.

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Sometimes an organization (or even individual) who has been fooled keeps quiet to avoid the embarrassment and therefore allows the impostor try the same thing elsewhere.

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Of course, the most successful impostors are those whose duplicity is never revealed so that we know nothing about them.

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1953: 1953 is a common year starting on Thursday....

Philip K. Dick: Philip Kindred Dick (16 December 1928 ? 2 March 1982), often known by his initials PKD, and sometimes by the pen name Richard Phillips, was an American science fiction writer and novelist who changed the genre profoundly. Though hailed during his lifetime by peers such as Stanis?aw Lem, Dick receive...

2002: 2002(MMII) is a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar. It was designated the:...

Impostor related Images and Photos (experimental)

Tony Curtis on the Set of "The Great Impostor" by Robert Mulligan 1960