Pseudonyms, aliases, a nom de plume: whatever you call it, they’re a staple for writing. Authors have used them for thousands of years for a number of motivations. Pseudonyms were used to disguise the author’s identity to avoid criticism or even prosecution if the works in question were critical of those in power or flaunted obscenity laws. Nowadays, many authors use pseudonyms (or more) to write in different genres so that, for example, they can separate their romance novels from their crime fiction (Nora Roberts and JD Robb!).
Unfortunately, pseudonyms were also used manipulatively. In 2015, one poem was included in an anthology of the best poems of the year under the name Yi-Fen Chou – only it turned out that the poet’s real name was Michael Derrick Hudson, a white man who took the name of a former classmate in who hopes it will give his poetry a better chance of being published. A few years later, Marvel came under fire for having a white comic book writer using the pen name Akira Yoshida even while writing Japanese-based stories.
For hundreds of years women have written under men’s names or ambiguous initials in order to avoid sexist restrictions on their work from both the publishing industry and readers. (This is a far cry from when male writers with ambiguous aliases try to nudge their way into the tiny niche of domestic thrillers that female writers have carved out.) This was a way for writers to gain access to spaces where they would otherwise The opportunity was denied.
In this quiz you will be asked to assign the author to his pseudonym! They range from classic authors hundreds of years ago to those who are still writing today. How many can you get
