PSEUDONYMS AND NICKNAMES

Mother Teresa (Agnes Bojaxhiu) 

A pseudonym (literally “false name”) is a name that differs from an original orthonym (“true name”), and as popularly understood is a new name that a person assumes for a particular purpose. Common examples are the pen names taken by writers, or the stage names adopted by actors. Well-known examples are the author Lewis Carroll (original name Charles Ludwidge Dodgson) and the actress Marilyn Monroe (original name Norma Jean Mortensen). Pseudonyms are also widely found in the world of music, especially among pop and rock performers.

Bob Dylan (originally Robert Zimmerman) and Elton John (Reginald Dwight) are just two of many examples. On a contrasting note, religion has sanctified popes such as Benedict XVI (born Joseph Ratzinger) and holy men and women such as Mother Teresa (Agnes Bojaxhiu), while Italy has nurtured Renaissance artists such as Donatello (Donato de’ Bardi), Giorgione (Giorgio Barbarelli), and Tintoretto (Jacopo Robusti). Elsewhere, the sphere of sport has its rechristened exponents (boxer and prizefighter Bendigo began life as William Thompson), while in politics Russia and the Soviet Union gave the world Vladimir Lenin (Vladimir Ulyanov), Joseph Stalin (Iosif Dzhugashvili), and Leon Trotsky (Lev Bronstein).

Within most categories, distinct groups and subgroups are discernible. In former times, a number of women writers adopted male names to find a readership for their work. Although now familiar as Charlotte Brontë, the English author made her debut in print as Currer Bell, while her sisters, Ann and Emily, first made themselves known to their readers as Acton Bell and Ellis Bell. Crime writers are famous adopters of pseudonyms. Erle Stanley Gardner wrote bestsellers as A.A. Fair, while Harry Patterson took the name Jack Higgins.

Stage names were regularly taken up by music-hall artists and comedians as well as serious actors. Among them are such as Marie Lloyd (Matilda Wood), Harry Fragson (Léon Fragmann), and Little Tich (Harry Relph), while the domain of dance has graced the international stage with gifted ballerinas such as Beryl Grey (Beryl Groom), Marie Rambert (Myriam Ramberg), and Ninette de Valois (Edris Stannus).

Historical figures known by new names include certain Roman emperors, such as Caligula (Gaius Julius Caesar), Caracalla (Marcus Aurelius Severus Antoninus Augustus), and Nero (Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus). The first emperor of all, Caesar Augustus, was born Gaius Octavius. Persons prominent in more recent European history include Grigory Rasputin (Grigory Novykh) and Mata Hari (Margarethe Zelle). The latter adopted her name as a dancer, but became better known as a spy. Secret agents often assumed an alias, among them Rudolf Abel (William Fischer) and George Blake (Georgy Behar), while activists such as Cicero (Elyesa Bazna) and Cynthia (Amy Elizabeth Pack) properly bore a code name.

This sampling of pseudonyms suffices to illustrate the different forms they can assume. Some are recognizable as typical first-and-last name combinations, and this is a regularly adopted type, often with a visible relationship between the old and new names or even with one name remaining unchanged. The connection between the former name and adopted name is not always obvious, however, and it is not immediately apparent, for example, that Lewis Carroll’s new first name was created from his original middle name, or that his assumed last name was devised from his given first name. Conversely, there are many cases where a new if conventional-looking pseudonym may differ completely from the bearer’s birth name.

Ninette de Valois is a case in point. In such instances an explanation or etymology is needed, and this is one of the principal aims of the dictionary. At the other end of the spectrum are names that bear no resemblance to a conventional name at all. Little Tich is such a name, as a creation that is half-nickname (“Little” for his small stature), half-adoption (and truncation) of a surname (Tichborne). Mata Hari is another wellknown example, from a Malay word meaning “sun.”

Minnesota Fats

Nicknames play an important role in the creation of pseudonyms. A person is given a nickname and adopts it, or becomes so widely known by it that it replaces the original name. The distinction between an adopted nickname and an adopted new name can be very fine. The criterion is usually whether the person becomes mainly or solely known by the adopted nickname or not. Thus the U.S. pool player Minnesota Fats is generally known by his nickname rather than his original formal name, Rudolf Walter Wanderone, Jr. The same goes for the many musical performers nicknamed “Big,” such as Big Bopper, who was exclusively billed under this name rather than his birth name, Jiles Perry Richardson, Jr.

Like all pseudonyms, nicknames can be in any language, including the two quoted above for Roman emperors. Caracalla was so dubbed for a type of cloak he designed, from a Latin word of Gaulish origin, while Caligula was given a name meaning “little boots,” a nickname bestowed when the emperor-to-be ran around camp as a child. (Two millennia later his Latin name was adopted in its English version by pop singer Little Boots, born Victoria Hesketh.) Single-word pseudonyms are fairly frequently found. The adopted name may be simply an original first name or surname, or a form of it. The painter Giorgione already mentioned thus came to be known by a name amounting to “Big George,” derived from his given name.

Following in his footsteps are a number of modern cartoonists, who intentionally choose a short name as a signature. They include Jak (Raymond Jackson), Low (David Low), and Marc (Mark Boxer). The photographerWols (Alfred Schulze) came by his name when his surname was misspelled in a telegram.

Madonna  

A quite different stratum of single names comprises the many female pop singers who perform under their first name, as Beyoncé, Björk, Camille, Charlene, Cher, Jewel, JoJo, Louise, Madonna (who may have boosted the mode), Melanie, Millie, Rihanna, Sade, Shakira, Shannon, Sinitta, Soraya, Tiffany, and Yazz. CéU also really belongs here, although the name is not her first name, as do Dana and Lulu, adopting their respective nicknames, and Duffy, whose friendly-sounding surname serves essentially as a nickname.

Cartoonists are not alone in shortening their names for practical purposes. A change in form or spelling of an original name is frequently made on pragmatic grounds. The U.S. aircraft designer Malcolm Lockheed thus respelled his original Scottish surname, Loughead, to ensure its correct pronunciation, while the anglicization or simplification of a non–English name is an equally popular resort. The actress Ethel Merman began life as Ethel Zimmerman, while the star dancer Fred Astaire originally bore the German surname Austerlitz. U.S. actor Walter Matthau came into the world with the Slavic surname Matuschanskayasky, and a drastic pruning was an obvious solution.

Matthau was of Jewish parentage, and many Jewish names were anglicized when their bearers left their European homeland to settle in the United States or elsewhere. Thus Hardy Albrecht became Hardie Albright, Bella Becker became Belle Baker, Herbert Feuermann became Bert Firman, and Alan Kniberg became Alan King. Alterations of this kind were often made in an arbitrary fashion by immigration officials at Ellis Island, where the photographer who became known as Weegee had his original name of Usher changed to Arthur, while the father of actress Anne Bancroft had his name noted as Italiano. The latter resulted from a misunderstanding, as he was being asked for his name, not his nationality.

Some of the more unconventional and colorful names are those adopted as recording names by Jamaican musicians, and especially reggae artists. They include Chicken Chest, Eek a Mouse, Gospel Fish, Honey Boy, Kool Herc, Shabba Ranks, Spragga Benz, and Smiley Culture. Some Jamaican names are prefixed with “Jah,” meaning God, while others have “Prince” as the first element. Such names are an insight into Jamaican popular culture.

In the field of “regular” pseudonyms, certain surnames have gained particular popularity. The present dictionary notes more than 30 instances of Gray, for example. This may be because it is simply an agreeable name: easy to spell, easy to say, easy to write. The converse of this is a name that although relatively unremarkable in itself came to be adopted by more than one person. Such was the alliterative Peter Parley, first assumed by the U.S. bookseller Samuel Goodrich but later taken up by dozens of other writers imitating his style.

Maude Adams

The adoption of another’s pseudonym borders on plagiarism, but the assumption of a person’s real name may be intended as nothing more sinister than a tribute to the individual concerned, especially when a member of the same family. Many adopters of pen names or stage names assumed their mother’s maiden name. Examples range from actress Maude Adams (Maude Kiskadden) to singer Katy Perry (Katheryn Hudson), writer Helen Campbell (Helen Weeks) to novelist Elizabeth Garner (Elma Napier).

In some cases the adopter already bore his or her mother’s maiden name as their middle name, which made the transition even more straightforward. The English painter Hercules Brabazon (Hercules Brabazon Sharpe) is just one instance of several. A similar adoption may originate elsewhere in the family. The engraver and publisher Frank Leslie, born Henry Carter, thus took his father’s middle name as his new surname, while jazz musician Melvin Sokoloff took his brother’s first name as his new surname, so becoming Mel Lewis.

The adoption of a placename is also not uncommon. The Hungarian church leader József Mindszenty (born József Pehm) took his new name from his native village of Mindszent while four centuries earlier the Austrian astronomer known as Rhäticus (originally Georg Joachim von Lauchen) came to be known by the name of his native district of Rhaetia. This type of name is evident among a number of artists, such as the Italians Pontormo ( Jacopo Carucci), named for the village of his birth, and Veronese (Paolo Caliari), famed under the name of his native city of Verona.

There are instances when a single pseudonym does duty for more than one person. Caroline Lewis (intentionally suggesting Lewis Carroll) was the joint name adopted by three English writers. The opposite can also sometimes occur, when a multiple name is borne by a single person. A famous example is (or are) William and Robert Whistlecraft, a double name assumed by the single writer John Hookham Frere.

Multiple names of a more conventional sort are the many names assumed by a single person. A famous example is the English thriller writer John Creasey, who authored more than five hundred books under some twenty pen names, including Gordon Ashe and Kyle Hunt. This was not simply a desire for diversity, for Creasey produced fiction other than thrillers, and reserved different names for distinct genres, including westerns, romantic novels, and children’s stories.

A writer may sometimes assume a persona, not simply a different name, and publish a work in the guise of that persona. Washington Irving thus took on the character of a Dutch author named Diedrich Knickerbocker for his famous 'History of New York', while Jonathan Swift published Gulliver’s Travels as if he actually was Lemuel Gulliver, and described himself in the novel’s full title as “first a Surgeon, and then a Captain of several Ships.” The original edition even had a portrait of the fictional author, aged 58. The French writer Prosper Mérimée went even further in this direction when he published 'Le Théâtre de Clara Gazul' under the female name of Clara Gazul. A foreword to the work gave a brief biography of the lady author and its frontispiece depicted her portrait, posed for by the young writer.

Such trickery also gave the name of more serious impostors, such as the 16th-century Frenchman Arnault du Tilh, who took the name Martin Guerre, that of a soldier who had disappeared and was presumed dead, and in this persona formed a relationship with the latter’s wife, who accepted him as her long-lost husband and bore him two children. In similar fashion, cases are on record of women who have joined the army under male guise and name.

Mary Anne Talbot was one such, joining the English military as John Taylor, while another was Deborah Sampson, who donned male dress and enlisted in the Fourth Massachusetts Regiment as Robert Shurtleff. Such adventures or enterprises of course risked exposure at any time, and it is remarkable that the impostures succeeded as long as they did.

April Ashley (born George Jamieson) 

A related category, though hardly impostors, is that of transexuals who changed their name on assuming their new gender, whether or not it involved a surgical “reassignment.” Male-to-female conversions include April Ashley (born George Jamieson), Debra Bowring (Peter Compton), Roberta Close (Roberto Moreira), Christine Jorgensen (George Jorgensen), and Renee Richards (Richard Rasking). Lady Colin Campbell, writing under her married name, was misdiagnosed male at birth and so was christened George William Ziadie. Female-to-male conversions include Claude Cahun (Lucie Schwob), Marcel Moore (Suzanne Malherbe), and Brandon Teena (Teena Brandon), the latter neatly switching names to denote her new gender.

In a number of cases a new name is gained as a condition of a bequest. The politician John Barrington, for example, was born John Shute, but on inheritng the estate of Francis Barrington, husband of his first cousin, adopted the name of the bequeather, while the philanthropist Angela Burdett-Coutts added the name Coutts to her original name on inheriting her grandfather’s fortune. On similar lines, newspaper editor Geoffrey Dawson, originally Geoffrey Robinson, changed his name by royal license following an inheritance from his aunt Margaret Jane Dawson.

A bequest of this kind may well tie directly in with a marriage, as when the physician Robert Clobery, born Robert Glynn, married his cousin, Lucy Clobery, and took her name on inheriting a property from her father. His is just one example of a man’s adoption of his wife’s name, rather than that of a woman who takes or adds her husband’s name on marriage, as is conventionally more common.
Many name changes, whether resulting from an inheritance or not, are confirmed by the legal process known as a deed poll, a term dating from the days when the document had one edge polled (cut even) rather than being indented, as was more usual.

Garrincha

One pseudonymous sportsman has already been instanced, but there are significant nests of others worth singling out. In the somewhat specialized world of Brazilian football, for example, one finds Didi, Garrincha, Jaïrzinho, Jorginho, Juninho, Kaká, Pelé, Ronaldinho, Ronaldo, Tostão, and Vavá, among others, while the esoteric arena of sumo wrestling includes such warriors as Akebono, Asahifuji, Chiyonofuji, Daijuyama, Fujinoshin, Hananokuni, Hananoumi, Kokutenyu, and Krishima. The football names are largely nicknames, while the sumo pseudonyms are meaningful Japanese fighting names.

Elsewhere in the world of foreign names a distinctive subgroup is formed by the Russian style names assumes by dancers. Russia is traditionally regarded as the home and mainspring of ballet, and at one time it was common for ballet dancers to russify their original name wherever possible. Examples of such names are those of Harcourt Algeranoff, Sonia Arova, Hilda Butsova, Anton Dolin, Vera Fredowa, Margareta Krasnova, and Alicia Markova.

Lydia Sokolova actually adopted the name of an earlier Russian dancer. The fashioning of such names is no longer common.

Finally, a curious nucleus of Italian names is found among members of the 18th-century literary circle known as the Academy of Arcadia, which included such classically pastoral poets as Eulibio Berentiatico, Aglauro Cidonia, Lesbia Cidonia, Comante Eginetico, Glaucilla Eurotea, Tirsi Leucasio, Corilla Olimpica, Fidalma Partenide, and Eterio Stinfalico. A variant was created by Maria Antonia Walpurgis, Princess of Bavaria, Electress of Saxony, who came to be known as ETPA, an acronym of her Arcadian name, Ermelinda Talea Pastorella Arcada, whose last two words gave the title of “Arcadian Shepherdess.”
In areas of activity where the adoption of a pseudonym is common, such as the theater, there are always those who resolutely refuse to adopt a stage name. In such areas, even a real name, especially if unusual, may be wrongly taken as a stage name.

 Here are some examples:

Sandra Bullock 

• U.S. movie actress Sandra Bullock (1966– ) has resolutely refused to change her name, although one journalist feels she should have: “There is something about the name Sandra Bullock that just isn’t Hollywood. It sounds grimly ordinary, plain and tough. It lacks the delicate beauty of a Michelle Pfeiffer, the takeno-prisoners hit of a Jamie Lee Curtis or the languorous sexiness of a Kim Basinger. In an industry where changing your name is as routine as changing your socks these things matter. If a name says something about a person, then Sandra Bullock could be an installation artist, a sprint-hurdler or a gum-chewing bully at school. But a Hollywood starlet? Surely not” [Sasha Miller in Sunday Times Magazine, September 25, 1994].

• As a child, U.K. actress Frances Cuka (1936– ) told her ballerina aunt that she wanted to go on stage under the name “Gloria La Raine.” “What’s wrong with Cuka?” retorted the aunt. “I was Cuka; your aunt Eileen acted under the name Cuka. No one can spell it, no one can pronounce it—but no one will forget it.” Said Frances, who pronounces her name “Chewka”: “I was too scared to change my name, and I am pleased now I was frightened into keeping it” [TV Times, Ferbruary 14–20, 1987].
• U.S. movie actor Bradford Dillman (1930– ) commented: “Bradford Dillman sounded like a distinguished, phoney, theatrical name, so I kept it”.

• U.S. actress Bridget Fonda (1964–  ), daughter of Peter Fonda (1942–  ) and grand-daughter of Henry Fonda (1905–1982), has often been tempted to change her name since childhood, when her father divorced her mother. She acknowledges that bearing this particular name has problems: “I did consider changing my name but it does no good to run away and I am part of the Fonda family” [The Times, August 1, 1988].

• U.K. radio and TV presenter Gloria Hunniford (1940– ) has said: “A lot of people think it’s a stage name but it isn’t. When my husband told his family he was marrying me, they said: ‘No wonder—she wants to change her name!’”.

• “Of course it’s my real name,” said U.S. TV star Cloris Leachman (1926– ), when interviewers expressed doubts about it. “Would anyone in his right mind change it to Cloris Leachman?”.

• When a Hollywod executive wanted to change the name of Jack Lemmon (1925–2001) to “Lennon,” the movie actor replied: “I told him it had taken most of my life to get used to the traumatic effects of beng called Jack U. Lemmon, and that I was used to it now and I wasn’t going to change it”.

• U.K. TV comedian and presenter Bob Monkhouse (1928–2003) said of his name: “Americans never get it right, they always call me Mongoose. If I’d had my wits about me I would have changed it at the start. People like Ted Ray and Lulu had it right”.

Sydne Rome 

• U.S. movie actress Sydne Rome (1951–  ) once inquired at an airport whether she should stop off in Nice. The clerk, on learing her name, reaplied: “Madam, I think you would do well to transfer to Qantas” [Telegraph Sunday Magazine, June 3, 1979].

• Popular singer Frank Sinatra (1915–1998), at the age of 22, was a singing waiter in New Jersey under the name Frank Trent. He kept this name until it was pointed out to him that his real name was much more musical. From then on he firmly refused to adopt a new name, saying: “You like the voice, you take the name” [1. Times Literary Suplement, March 1, 1996; 2. The Times, December 6, 2002].

• U.S. actress and singer Barbra (originally Barbara) Streisand (1942–  )  and actor Dustin Hoffman  (1937–  ) were just two of the 1960s generation of Hollywood stars who refused to change their names.

• South African actress Janet Suzman (1939–), when she first went on stage, adamantly refused to accede to suggestions that she change her name because it was too “foreign.” Instead, she sent a telegram to the theater director: “Imperative remain Suzman” [TV Times, April 9, 1976].

• Anglo–U.S. playwright Timberlake Wertenbaker (1945–  ) found that critics reacted with suspicion to her name, seeing it as some sort of anagram. Yet it is her real name, her first name being a former family surname [Sunday Times, April 6, 1986].



By Adrian Room in the book 'Dictionary of Pseudonyms' - 13,000 Assumed Names and Their Origins, McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers U.S.A, 2010, introduction. Adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.

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