BEGINNERS
A picture, not a mirror
Characters exist to serve the story, not say something about the author, says Adrian Magson
Adrian Magson
There was a bit of consternation at the tail end of last year in Spain when the winner of the Planeta Literary Award turned out not to be a woman (the popular crime writer Carmen Mola), but a trio of men writing under a pseudonym. As one report added rather scathingly, ‘middle-aged men’ at that.
Ouch – or ay! - as they say in downtown Madrid.
Pretending to be someone you are not as a writer is hardly new or shocking. It goes both ways, and maybe some of you out there are already writing under a pseudonym of the opposite persuasion? If it’s any comfort, JK Rowling was revealed as the crime author Robert Galbraith in 2013, and way back in 1859 Mary Ann Evans wrote as George Eliot. Others have concealed their identity by using opposite gender names or simply initials. But I don’t want to start a competition. Neither, dear reader, do I want to start an argument.