JK Rowling uses male pseudonym after fame and fortune

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JK Rowling uses male pseudonym after fame and fortune

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1vwinsloe
jul 14, 2013, 1:34 pm

What's up with this?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/13/jk-rowling-pseudonym-robert-galbraith_n...

Was it a publicity stunt? Did someone really feel that this was necessary, and, if so, for what reason?

What does everyone think?

2CurrerBell
jul 14, 2013, 2:06 pm

Well, it's not a literary first. Joyce Carol Oates, among many other authors, has written under pseudonyms. (Of course, JK is nowhere as prolific as or anywhere near the literary giant that JCO is.)

I won't be reading it, but I'm not that much of a mystery fan in recent years.

3overlycriticalelisa
jul 14, 2013, 2:10 pm

publicity stunt? i don't know. i have to think it's pretty liberating to not have all that expectation and pressure, and to just be able to write again. i guess it depends on if she's focused more on writing or on selling books, and i don't think we can know that either way.

4cjeskriett
jul 15, 2013, 4:38 am

Assuming she didn't leak the news herself (my understanding is that she didn't), she probably wanted to be judged on literary merit rather than her reputation. She doesn't need publicity or money, she has plenty of both already. Similarly, she published as JK rather than her full forename because she was advised that some people would avoid her book because it was written by a woman (I don't have a source to cite for that but I think I heard her say this in an interview). There are plenty of literary precedents for both.

5vwinsloe
Bewerkt: jul 15, 2013, 11:25 am

A#4, are there? Authors who are already rich and famous writing under a pseudonym? I guess the reason that I think this is so bizarre is that the book is apparently in the mystery genre. It is not as though it were her first attempt at "Literature as Art" or something. Additionally, given that Ruth Rendell (not to mention Agatha Christie and others) have done so well in the mystery genre writing under their own, obviously female, names why would she feel the need to adopt a masculine pseudonym to publish a mystery under?

Ruth Rendell, who achieved fame and fortune as a mystery writer, adopted the pseudonym "Barbara Vine" for her edgier, more literary work. Now that I think that I understand as readers of say, the Inspector Wexford series, would not necessarily enjoy what she wrote as Barbara Vine.

6amysisson
jul 15, 2013, 1:08 pm

I don't know why Rowling chose the masculine, but I think she chose to write under a pseudonym so she could get some objective reviews that didn't spend 3/4 of their words re-hashing the Harry Potter phenomenon.

While she doesn't need the money, her publisher does need to make money.... but on the other hand, it wasn't much of a gamble, knowing they could leak the news at any time and have the book shoot up the bestseller lists.

7vwinsloe
jul 15, 2013, 1:57 pm

>#6, and apparently something like that happened. The book only sold about 1,500 copies before the news leaked.

And I also dispute the proposition that someone "doesn't need the money." It depends on what you spend and how you invest, doesn't it? All one needs to do is to look at the sports figures who have earned multiple millions of dollars and then end up destitute.

Maybe she wanted the earnings from genre fiction without becoming pegged as a genre fiction writer later on in case she later aspired to literary greatness?

8Nickelini
jul 15, 2013, 3:47 pm

A#4, are there? Authors who are already rich and famous writing under a pseudonym?

I can't think of names right now, but I've definitely heard of this. It's done when they want to write very different books from what they are famous for.

9rockinrhombus
jul 15, 2013, 4:26 pm

Stephen King, John Banville, to name a couple.

10SimonW11
jul 15, 2013, 4:34 pm

11Mareofthesea
jul 15, 2013, 5:08 pm

Nora Roberts, Anne Rice...

12vwinsloe
jul 15, 2013, 5:56 pm

Okay, I guess that it is not as strange as I thought it was. The NY Times article (as well as you all) set me straight.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/15/books/a-detective-storys-famous-author-is-unma...

13SimonW11
jul 24, 2013, 1:45 pm

It seems that Ms Rowling's Lawyer told "a friend of his wife". Though I suspect that prior to this he would have claimed the lady as a friend of his.

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