Nameless Names: Pope, Curll, and the Uses of Anonymity
2002; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 33; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/nlh.2002.0021
ISSN1080-661X
Autores Tópico(s)Names, Identity, and Discrimination Research
ResumoTHESE DAYS, TO WRITE ANONYMOUS or pseudonymous books is to aim for an effect. In fact, there are hardly any works of literature which fall into the former category: Joe Klein's "novel of politics," Primary Colors (1996), is an obvious exception, and the absence of an authorial attribution may be the most noteworthy feature of the entire text. Similarly when Doris Lessing produced The Diaries of Jane Somers in 1984, it was the suppression of her famous name which lent point to the enterprise—allegedly her aim was to show how differently books of unknown writers were treated. Many authors, of course, use a nom de plume, but in serious literature they generally stick to one or two: only in the realm of popular genres such as Harlequin novels or mystery fiction are multiple identities common. "Literary" writers who break this rule tend to find themselves caught up in scandal, as when "Anthony Burgess" (John Burgess Wilson) reviewed—not too favorably—his own Inside Mr. Enderby (1963), written by "Joseph Kell," for the Yorkshire Post. He was fired when the truth came out. Today authorship and authority have become inextricably linked, and literature without a responsible agent identified is like an artifact that turns up in the saleroom lacking a decent provenance. Both anonymity and pseudonymity have become suspect behavior.
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