A few years ago, I took a screenwriting course, wrote a short script and went to a gathering of film industry types to network and learn more about the biz. When I stood up to introduce myself in a restaurant of about fifty people, I began with, to paraphrase slightly: “Hi, my name is Sharleen X, but I’ve been writing under Sharleen Y—also, I sometimes use Sharleen Z—so you see I have what I like to call severe byline issues, ha, ha…” Later, a young actress came up to me and shared that she, too, had a problem with her legal name and was debating two new versions of it and soon the actress and I were surrounded by several others similarly afflicted. My public confession of difficulties around deciding what to call myself had struck a chord—and not for the first time.
You’d be amazed how many writers starting out—or, as in my case, writers who’ve published a fair amount of work in one field but are starting all over again in another—are all in a dither about their names. The novel takes you years of work to squeeze out and then you devote a whole lot of new mental energy wondering Who Wrote This? Perhaps way back when, this decision could be put off until the lucky day an agent or editor helped you decide on your pen name, but now, when people are building identities online, you have to choose the name you want to be known by as soon as you buy your domain name.
I’ve used a couple of different bylines over the years. Long story short, the domain for the name I was born with was already taken, and that person also happens to be a writer, so this gave me a good excuse to use an older version of my family name—a name I actually happen to like better. But it’s not my legal name, and is not the name most people know me by. At least my various bylines/domains over the years have all started with the same letter—J.
Which is why in my Twitter handle and newest email addresses, I’m simply Sharleen J.
(BTW, this post was inspired by a post by Jane Friedman on her own blog.)
If anyone has thoughts/solutions/misery to share on this topic, please comment!
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
OK, that explains it – I’ve seen you spell
your name differently and I wondered why.
Jonsson is great, and it sounds like it’s got some great family history. I
think you should do the legal name-change and stick with it.
Seriously – I do think the “brand” thing (especially in these days of search
engines, where spelling matters) it is really important to stick with your
one name. You are lucky to have Jonsson – unusual but completely
pronounceable, i.e. very memorable. I think you should take full advantage
of it.