Famous authors and their lesser-known real names

In honor of Get a Different Name Day, we gathered up the pen names of several famous authors. 

Some changed their names in order to actually get published; others, to protect their families or their own privacy; and still others, because they simply preferred the new ones.

At any rate, it's always fun to peek beyond the glamour of celebrities, so enjoy these real identities!

• Alice Sheldon (James Tiptree Jr.)

• Alissa Zinovievna Rosenbaum (Ayn Rand) 

• Amantine Aurore Dupin (George Sand)

• Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (Lewis Carroll)

• Chloe Ardelia Wofford (Toni Morrison) 

• Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Brontë) 

• David John Moore Cornwell (John le Carré)

• Eric Arthur Blair (George Orwell)

• Erika Leonard (E.L. James)

• François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire) 

• Gloria Jean Watkins (bell hooks)

• Hector Hugh Munro (Saki) 

• Howard Allen Frances O’Brien (Anne Rice)

• James Alfred Wight (James Herriot)

• John B. Wilson (Anthony Burgess)

• Jozef Korzeniowkski (Joseph Conrad)

• Karen Blixen (Isak Dinesen)

• Marguerite Annie Johnson (Maya Angelou)

• Mary Ann Evans (George Eliot)

• Peggy Marsh (Margaret Mitchell)

• Ricardo Eliécer Neftalí Reyes Basoalto (Pablo Neruda)

• Samuel Langhorne Clemens (Mark Twain)

• Theodor Diesel (Dr. Seuss)

• William Sydney Porter (O. Henry)

Sources: Literary Trivia by Richard Lederer and Michael Gilleland; Literary Hub; and Encyclopedia Britannica

Related posts 

• Reaction to the Reclaim Her Name book campaign is somewhat mixed 

• Why these ten authors chose to use a nom de plume