Pseudonyms

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Between 1660 and 1750 about 50% of published prose fiction did not list an author on the title page, 20% appeared with a pseudonym or tag line. Novels published between 1750 and 1790 reached over 80% using pseudonyms. These women may have liked staying in the background due to modesty, notoriety, or a fear of criticism. To avoid severe gender bias and social prejudices many famous authors of the time adopted pseudonyms. The Bonte sisters, Charlotte, Emily and Anne, wrote under Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. Lucille Aurore Dupin, one of the most famous writers in Europe, used the pen name George Sand. Louisa May Alcott used the pseudonym A. M. Barnard to write darker, sensational thrillers. Women were not able to break through these barriers until the late 19th and early 20th centuries.(In 2024 surveys reported that women made up about 68% of the publishing workforce) In earlier times women were supposed to stay in the background, taking care of the children and the home and were not to have any ideas of their own. If women got too radical their husbands could say they were out of control, be diagnosed with female hysteria and taken off to an asylum. And this was not for just a month or two, but some spent the rest of their lives there.