Pen name

A pen name or nom de plume is a pseudonym adopted by an author. Nom de plume is a French-language expression.

Related Topics:
Pseudonym - Author - French-language expression

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Some authors take on pen names to conceal their identity: for example the Brontë sisters, who felt they would either not be published at all, or not taken seriously as women authors. Others do so to segregate different types of work: Lewis Carroll took a pen name because as Charles Lutwidge Dodgson he wrote mathematics papers; Agatha Christie wrote romantic novels as Mary Westmacott. Many writers, particularly in genre fiction, are so prolific that they are forced to take pen names in order to sell their books to different publishers: this is the case, for instance, with John Dickson Carr, who, in the 1930s, was publishing two detective stories a year under his own name and another two, through another publisher, under the pen name Carter Dickson. Pseudonyms are not always secret: Stendhal's real name was known: at least one critic disparaged his pen name as an affectation.

Related Topics:
Brontë - Lewis Carroll - Agatha Christie - Genre fiction - John Dickson Carr - 1930s - Stendhal

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