Community Conversation => Transgender talk => Topic started by: AbeLane on March 13, 2015, 02:36:22 PM Return to Full Version
Title: Transitioning as an Authors
Post by: AbeLane on March 13, 2015, 02:36:22 PM
Post by: AbeLane on March 13, 2015, 02:36:22 PM
I apologize if this isn't the right place for this question.
I am a published writer (nothing too spectacular just a few online literary magazines) and for a while I stopped submitting because I felt like it would be counter-productive to publish under a name (my birth name) that in a few years I won't be using at all. Now that I've settled on a name (still not legally my name) I plan to start using it as a pen name in my submissions to magazines until I can get it changed legally.
But I started wondering the other day if it would be completely stupid for me to contact the editors of magazines with my old published poems and ask them to change the name? I feel like if I don't I won't be able to claim those poems any more once I change my name or put them into a book (if I ever make it to that stage) and I'd really rather not lose them since I'm attached to one or two of them in particular. And since the magazines are on-line, I thought maybe since it's an easy edit it wouldn't be a completely crazy thing to ask?
So I'm wondering if there is anyone here who has either been through this themselves of heard or someone who has? And what you/they did?
On a similar note, has anyone ever run into a problem using a pen name that didn't match with their "perceived" gender? As of now I am pre-T and while sometimes I can pass, my voice really gives me away. I worry about backlash if someone claims I'm using a male name just to try to get published more or something? Though hopefully within the next year it will be my legal name and I'll be farther along in my transition so I won't have to worry about that for much longer.
I am a published writer (nothing too spectacular just a few online literary magazines) and for a while I stopped submitting because I felt like it would be counter-productive to publish under a name (my birth name) that in a few years I won't be using at all. Now that I've settled on a name (still not legally my name) I plan to start using it as a pen name in my submissions to magazines until I can get it changed legally.
But I started wondering the other day if it would be completely stupid for me to contact the editors of magazines with my old published poems and ask them to change the name? I feel like if I don't I won't be able to claim those poems any more once I change my name or put them into a book (if I ever make it to that stage) and I'd really rather not lose them since I'm attached to one or two of them in particular. And since the magazines are on-line, I thought maybe since it's an easy edit it wouldn't be a completely crazy thing to ask?
So I'm wondering if there is anyone here who has either been through this themselves of heard or someone who has? And what you/they did?
On a similar note, has anyone ever run into a problem using a pen name that didn't match with their "perceived" gender? As of now I am pre-T and while sometimes I can pass, my voice really gives me away. I worry about backlash if someone claims I'm using a male name just to try to get published more or something? Though hopefully within the next year it will be my legal name and I'll be farther along in my transition so I won't have to worry about that for much longer.
Title: Re: Transitioning as an Authors
Post by: pollypagan on March 13, 2015, 03:28:16 PM
Post by: pollypagan on March 13, 2015, 03:28:16 PM
I am a totally failed author, rejection after rejection, knockback upon knockback; just what is the point of going on: just what is the point of even trying? Life has sent me a message, a clear unambiguous message that I have no future in writing. I am just a delusional loser who should know when to quit. Anyway not one for self pity I wondered if my writing style may have changed approximately half way through the book when I embarked upon hrt. It may be interesting to see if anyone notices a smudged demarcation mid book when I self publish in a few weeks time.....if I even bother. What's the point. Woe is me. Time to end it all..............Oooh chocolate! Changed my mind.
(Not exactly what you asked but hey). xx
(Not exactly what you asked but hey). xx
Title: Re: Transitioning as an Authors
Post by: FTMax on March 13, 2015, 04:06:54 PM
Post by: FTMax on March 13, 2015, 04:06:54 PM
I've been featured on some popular online sites. I wrote to one of the editors of one in particular and he said he'd be happy to update all of my work to reflect the correct name. It is not difficult for them to do at all. I wouldn't worry about it :)
Title: Re: Transitioning as an Authors
Post by: Ms Grace on March 13, 2015, 04:19:01 PM
Post by: Ms Grace on March 13, 2015, 04:19:01 PM
Even authors who wrote under pseudonyms are still able to claim that work as their own (eg King, Rowling, etc) so I wouldn't worry too much. I'm in a similar boat - as an illustrator and cartoonist, and as someone who has changed their name and also written under pseudonyms on numerous occasions, I have a LOT of work not under my current name in old publications. Not much I can do about the name attached to that stuff but I can still claim it as mine. If it bothers you though, by all means, ask the publishers to change your old stuff. Whether they will or not is another matter.
Title: Re: Transitioning as an Authors
Post by: Natkat on March 14, 2015, 04:11:05 PM
Post by: Natkat on March 14, 2015, 04:11:05 PM
One of my friends have published a comic and in the sequal he changed his name. I don't think he could change it since the publisher was rather small but i never heard him complain about it. the only trouble was when looking it up in the libary and the first names where diffrent but the second was not, I pointed out both names but it could maybe be a problem if I only had asked for the serie by the first name and not the last. I dont think people wonder too much of the names change it could as well had been siblings writing it (beside the fact he wrote a biography of his own life as being a transgender person)
Another friend of mine which I have illustate for goes under 2 names, his original name and his pseudonyms and I have not heard complain from him either. For myself I never published anything in my female so that is no problem, but I do wonder when to use pseudonyms and when to you my name. I guess alot of writters think about these things.
Another friend of mine which I have illustate for goes under 2 names, his original name and his pseudonyms and I have not heard complain from him either. For myself I never published anything in my female so that is no problem, but I do wonder when to use pseudonyms and when to you my name. I guess alot of writters think about these things.