Taylor Ramsey read here about the passing of Ron Goulart and sent me this question…
I was surprised to hear of Mr. Goulart's passing, though Wiki still has not heard of it apparently. I have some of his non-fiction works on my shelf. It raises a question both specific and in broader terms, why did he write under so many different names or why would any modern writer?
I know of cases where someone felt that one form of writing or another was "slumming" or the style was so different from what they were known for they would chose a different name, but this seems less obvious. He was so prolific that there really couldn't be much he didn't dabble in and the broadness and strength of his work would have surely benefited from prospective editors (or at least the ones you might want to work for) knowing the full breadth of his work.
Well, I never discussed this with Ron but I know a lot of writers who write under different names and there are a lot of different reasons for using a pseudonym on a book. You might have a contract to do a certain number of books for a certain publisher and you don't want them to know you're cheating on the contract and squeezing in a book for someone else.
Or they might know and not care as long as you don't disrupt their marketing plans. Let's say they're promoting you as a mystery author who brings out two gripping murder dramas a year. You have a sudden urge to write a treacly romance novel and they don't want to disrupt the image they're painting of you as a dedicated writer of whodunnits. So they ask that you not put your real name on the romance novel..or maybe you make that decision for that reason.
Or maybe someone's worried you have too much product hitting the market at the same time. Or maybe you knocked out a quick book for a quick buck and this one's not up to the standards you want associated with your name. Or maybe this one is porn.
But the most frequent reason is this: You couldn't pass up the deal.
You got an offer to write a certain book of a certain length for a certain fee and you think, "Hmm…that's decent money and it would be nice to add that money to my bank account." And maybe it's a book for a series that has a house name…for instance, the Tom Swift books were written by a lot of different people all under the name of "Victor Appleton." The Nancy Drew books were all by "Carolyn Keene." The Doc Savage and Avenger novels were all written by "Kenneth Robeson."
If you're a professional writer with any visible ability, you will almost certainly be offered ghost-writing jobs or jobs where your name will not appear…or if it does, it will be in real tiny type or you'll be credited for "research" or something and another name will be featured prominently on the cover. You may decide that that guaranteed money is better than waiting until you can sell a novel you're working on that might be more "you." You may decide to save your real name for books that are more "you."
And often, ghosting jobs are because someone putting together the book deal wants to involve someone with a bigger name and list them as the author. Their name might sell more books than yours. I've turned down a number of such offers and not necessarily because of the anonymity. I don't think I really considered that because, at the time those offers were offered, I just plain didn't have the time to take on those assignments. If I had, I might have taken one or two of 'em if I was low on other options.
On top of all that, it can be somewhat liberating to write something that you know won't have your name on it. You get paid and you'll never have to read a review that says "[YOUR NAME HERE] is a lousy writer." I have no idea if that was ever Ron Goulart's motive but I know one writer who was quite shy and he wrote at least a dozen novels with his name appearing on zero of them.
I'll close off this answer with a quick story. A few decades ago, I read the autobiography of a Fairly Big TV Star. In it, he said that these were his words and he had refused the publisher's suggestion of a ghost-writer. I was a bit suspicious because it was pretty well-written and this gentleman, when I'd seen him interviewed, had never seemed that erudite to me. Then one day, I met the agent who'd handled that book.
I told him, "I find it hard to believe your client didn't have a ghost-writer." The agent grinned, obviously proud of himself and said, "My client didn't know he had a ghost-writer."
He went on to explain that he'd arranged with the publisher to secretly hire one and he told the F.B.T.S., "You just dictate your book into a tape recorder. This guy I've hired will transcribe your words, clean up the punctuation and such, then chapter by chapter, we'll send the manuscript to you for your approval." The ghost-writer completely wrote the book based on the tapes and when the chapters went to the Fairly Big TV Star, he read them and said, "Yeah, that's what I dictated all right."
The "ghost-writer" was paid well for his work (and his anonymity) and that money enabled him to spend plenty of time on a book that he did want to have his name on…and when that one came out, it did.
