By Nipun Malhotra
Any bestseller list in the world these days has a crime novel, titled ‘The Cuckoo’s Calling’ by debut novelist Robert Galbraith in it. A novel I myself enjoyed reading this past weekend. Except, it’s not a debut novel and it’s written by J.K. Rowling, Robert Galbraith her pen name/alter ego.
With the Harry Potter series, a series loved by children and adults alike, Rowling had become a household name. Thus, even when she wrote her first ‘adult novel’, the “The Casual Vacancy” it flew off bookshelves despite reviewers calling it not so much ‘fun’.
It is believed that J.K. Rowling wanted to know if she could pen a book that measured the appeal of writing, a liberating experience in her words that allowed one to “publish without hype and expectation and pure pleasure to get feedback under a different name”
The book received a lot of critical acclaim. However, you don’t get sales and revenue based on critical acclaim. One night of the news being leaked, and it jumped from rank 4,709 to rank 3 on Amazon’s bestsellers listing.
Choosing to be anonymous might have been a liberating experience for Rowling, but it can be a very useful tool too.
Take for example, a 1937 article published in the Modern Review of Calcutta profiling Nehru and being very critical of him, even comparing him to Caeser. It was an anonymous article signed by “Chanakya”, only much later did one learn that the Chanakya was Nehru.
Nehru, today is everyone’ favorite punching bag when it comes his socialist ideas and five year plans. While, the author of this article is himself no fan of Nehru’s economic policies, there is a lot to admire about his faith in democracy and democratic ideals.
This article was written when Congress President, Nehru was ending his second tenure as President and there was speculation about giving him a third term, the anonymous author argued (about Nehru) “He calls himself a democrat and a socialist and no doubt he does so in all earnestness, but every psychologist knows that the mind is, ultimately, slave to the heart . . . A little twist and Nehru might turn dictator, sweeping aside the paraphernalia of a slow-moving democracy” He went on to warn against absolute power to be given to one man, adding “In this revolutionary epoch, Caesarism is always at the door. Is it not possible that Jawahar might fancy himself as a Caesar?”
In 1996, American bookstands were filled with a fictional book titled “Primary Colors” on Bill Clinton’s Presidential Run in the 1992 elections. This book was published without an author name, just filling that space with ‘anonymous’. It was believed that “Anonymity makes truthfulness much easier”. Many, including Clinton’s speechwriter identified famous columnist Joe Klein as the author. Klein denied authorship multiple times, admitting to writing it only after The Washington Post published results of a handwriting analysis which they conducted on an early manuscript of this book. Was keeping it initially anonymous a marketing strategy? That, only Mr Klein can answer. What we do know is that over a million copies were sold, it was adopted into a movie and Joe Klein even penned a sequel to the book.
Today we live in the marvelous Internet age. An age where you can really be a nobody and broadcast your thoughts – twitter, facebook and the blogosphere have empowered the common man. Writers have been born from casual bloggers, casual singers have become famous overnight out of videos put on Youtube and twitter has even been the cause of revolutions! Today, the elite notion of needing to be a ‘name’ to convey your views to the public has gone. Anyone can express her views, and how much they are read or not are decided by the social media market. The greatest part of this revolution being that today the viewer reads and watches what she wants to read and watch, not what the mainstream media wants to present to her.
Like in anything else, there are pitfalls in social media too. Take, for example how the cricketer Ravindra Jadeja was described on the online encyclopedia Wikipedia recently (Wikipedia is a free online non profit encyclopedia in which entries are editable by anyone) “a philanthropist, a Nobel prize winner, a double Laureus sportsman of the year and the nearest human to being God”. This was light – hearted humor, but Wikipedia has been used to attack persons on their individual pages too. It is very easy to create a second (fake) identity online too. One can see loads of trolls on all ends of the political spectrum on twitter, with hidden identities allowing them to write anything on twitter! There are countless stories of people having dated online with someone using a wrong identity, sharing a picture of someone else credited to them or even lying about their gender!
But the positives of social media definitely outweigh the negatives. If not anything else, it has atleast democratized information and allowed everyone to express an opinion. Even, if they aren’t a famous “name”!
So what’s in a name, I ask? Much less, than perhaps even a decade ago. But try asking J.K. Rowling’s publishers, especially after her book jumped from rank 4,709 to rank 3 after her name was revealed!
He is an entrepreneur, runs his own foundation and is a public policy wonk. He is an alumnus of St. Stephen’s College and Delhi School of Economics.He spends his free time reading history,economics and writing about politics. He is always open to a discussion about ideas that can make this country better and can be contacted on nipunmalh@gmail.com and @nipunmalhotra on twitter.
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