JK Rowling’s Stolen Valor
TSO sends a link from Fox News that tells the story of a new novelist, Robert Galbraith, who writes “The Cuckoo’s Calling” a story about a former servicemember who becomes a private investigator. The publisher writes about the author;
The publisher described Galbraith as an ex-military man, married with two sons, who wrote the novel based on experiences from his military life. Revealingly, it also stated that Galbraith was a pseudonym.
But, the pseudonym was cover for JK Rowling who wrote the Harry Potter series;
“I hoped to keep this secret a little longer because being Robert Galbraith has been such a liberating experience,” she said in a statement released by her publicist on Sunday. “It has been wonderful to publish without hype or expectation, and pure pleasure to get feedback from publishers and readers under a different name.”
Like TSO writes, this would probably be a prosecutable offense under the new Stolen Valor Act – pretending to be a veteran for a tangible benefit.
Category: Stolen Valor Act
Agreed. She is falsely claiming military service for personal gain.
text book case for the wording of the new SV law. book sales are well documented, tangible benefits are clear
Jonn: not sure it will be prosecutable if all the fake bio about “Galbraith” claimed was that “Galbraith” was “ex-military”. As I read it, violating 18 USC 704 seems to require claiming receipt of a specific US military decoration or badge, not merely a general claim of service. The fake bio for “Galbraith” seems to claim some form of not-fully-identified foreign military service (seems to be British, but I’m not certain) and doesn’t appear to claim receipt of any specific US decorations or badges.
I agree what Rowlings did here is shady, but I don’t think it violates the new SVA. I could be wrong.
She sold more books after she revealed she actually wrote it, not the fake veteran.
SV? please…. Do they even have that law in the UK?
“The publisher described Galbraith as an ex-military man…” Who desribed? Right. The publisher. What’s the claim? Ex-military man. What’s that? Dunno. No issue here, even allowing it is a US issue.
I disagree that this was SV. In this case she was attempting to use her non-J.K. Rowling persona to attract less attention, not more. If the publisher advertised “New, gritty crime novel by acclaimed author J.K. Rowling”, she would have sold more books from the release date. She sought anonymity by using a fairly non-specific description to get a fair shake from book reviewers because she felt she did not get one when the first non-Potter book came out.
#7 Agree. This is a non-issue, and not SV. Rather like gay actors claiming to be straight in order to land more roles.
Oh, come on, you guys. People write and do other creative work under pseudonyms all the time. No stolen valor about it.
She wanted the novel accepted for itself, on its own level, not because she’s Jo Rowling writing something besides another Harry Potter story. Can’t say as I blame her, either. And besides all that, she used a man’s name instead of a woman’s, which made it less likely she’d be snickered at by critics in writing from a man’s point of view. It worked. She snookered the critics. Fine with me, because most of them are putzes, anyway. What’s problem?
If she wanted the book to stand on it’s own merits rather than her name, why did she make the author a military man? She could have made him a PI or a police officer, or a judge, or a lawyer, or a Sunday School teacher. But she chose someone with a military career behind him for a reason. To give her pseudo-author more credibility than he might have had otherwise. So the book isn’t really standing on it’s own merits, is it?
I never read any of the Harry Potter books and I do not believe I will be reading this one.
Ex-PH2: I have no problem with an author’s use of a pseudonym. However, I have a bit of a problem with the use of a fake biography for that pseudonym that includes false claims of military and police/security service if the work is of that genre. Those false claims lend a credibility to the author that isn’t real – the work is purportedly “based on experiences from his military life”. The false claim of post-military work in the security industry does the same.
IMO, that’s rather like a celibate priest or nun writing a sex manual under a pseudonym and claiming falsely to have based it on experiences from a time in their life when they worked as a gigolo or hooker. Very few people would be likely to buy a sex manual written by a nun or a priest – but quite a few might if they thought the person writing it was a former gigolo or hooker. It’s simply a matter of the author’s credibility regarding the subject.
Absent those false claims, I’d have no problem with what Rowlings did here. I do have somewhat of a problem due to the false background.
That’s something I do agree with, Hondo. I read the sample pages. It’s well-written, has a good flow to it, is basically a good novel. But the pseudonym was enough to throw people off-track. There was no need to drum up a pseudo-history along with it.
As far as people writing under pen names is concerned, there are at least two men who write romances for women under several different female pen names. And let’s not forget George Sand and George Eliot were not their real names, but they could not have been published if they had not adopted men’s names for their stories.
From the About the Author section of the publisher website:
After several years with the Royal Military Police, Robert Galbraith was attached to the SIB (Special Investigative Branch), the plain-clothes branch of the RMP. He left the military in 2003 and has been working since then in the civilian security industry. The idea for grew directly out of his own experiences and those of his military friends who returned to the civilian world. ‘Robert Galbraith’ is a pseudonym. – See more at: http://www.hachettebookgroup.com/authors/robert-galbraith/#about
Looks like a fair amount of detail to me. If she was so interested in getting honest criticism then why lie about her experience with the character? Why not simply publish the book under a male name and skip the claim of military experience?
It’s pretty clear she didn’t want criticism of her portrayal of military veterans. She also didn’t want criticism of her portrayal of investigators. Which is funny, because she wrote a book about an ex-military private investigator.
Well, the book can stand on its own without the kerfuffle. Now she’ll get criticized for that. It shows a lack of self-confidence and considering her success with Harry Potter, that’s a surprise to me.
A phony bio that lists accomplishments never achieved is just as low as using their own name and claiming the shit.
What would you think is Paul K Wickre wrote an exciting novel about Gerbils, Trannys, Jaquars and Hacking?,,, If he did it under the name Phillip Sepp Dale and in the Author’s bio claimed he was a member of SEAL Team four?
I’m not arguing the point any longer.
What she did was stupid, but now it’s in the glare of publicity, so she’ll have a LOT of ‘splaining to do.
I have no issues with a pen name — people do that all the time — but her decision to fake experience, just to make the book acceptable, shows a lack of confidence in what she does for a living, and that IS an issue to me. She showed very bad judgement about it and I’ll bet the Walter Mitty people in the UK are piling it on her, too.
George Plimpton used to write books based on his ‘Walting’ experiences, doing things like playing football with the Detroit Tigers. That on was titled “Paper Tiger”. But in this case, did she even interviewed ex-military people? Who knows.
Old Dog, if Psulieboy the pulltoy actually managed to crank out one coherent sentence, never mind an entire novel, I’d be surprised. However, the subject matter does seem right up his incoherent, self-righteous alley. Maybe I could write it for him and use his name as a pen name????
A pseudonym can legitimately be used for a fairly wide variety of reasons. When someone uses a made up personality or life details, it is called a delusion. Or acting.
Lighten up,Francis. “Ex military” is too vague. Maybe it was The Kiss Army. Who knows. But, she has given 160 million pounds of her money away to charity. She can’t be all bad.
The bio said Royal Army. Nothing to misintret there. Clians of sevring in MI?
who the fuck is Harry Potter?
Oh my fucking god people lighten the fuck up. There is nothing here. She is a really good author and just wanted to write a book without her name being attached to it. Now that the cat is out of the bag then oh well. JK Rowling isn’t a bad person and trust me she doesn’t need the money and didn’t commit fraud. She is a Billionaire it isn’t like she was saying hey I served in the British Military to sell a book. Anything she writes from now on is just for fun…goddamn…
Sorry folks, I’m in the “No BFD” on this one. She used a pseudonym to publish a book. She only said “ex-military” as opposed to coming up with a long and detailed background about the author’s time in the SAS. For all we know, she interviewed people in the service and used that as part of the background.
What a non issue. I assume she was always intending to reveal her authorship eventually, so essentially, all she did was engineer a temporary identity to see how the book would be received critically, even though it would mean massively reduced sales. Also, the stolen valor act is an American law, and therefore irrelevant when discussing a British author.
When you indicate knowledge to prove legitimacy in subject matter, and you’re faking it, you’re working a con. She isn’t stupid, and she knows exactly what she’s doing.
@21 – Harry Potter is Obama’s selection to replace Janet Napolitano as secretary of DHS.
You really oughtta watch the news, man.
I would think I would have preferred:
“Written under the pseudonym Roberth Galbraith, the stories and concept were conceived from experiences during the author’s previous career.
That’s vague enough that some folks might take it to mean a career related to the book’s protagonist, but in actuality could mean something as simple as in a previous career I read some sh1t about this topic and decided to create a complete fiction from it….
Tempest in a teapot probably, and the current new SV is extremely specific in what is illegal versus what’s just a lie…
Stolen Valor Act of 2013 – Amends the federal criminal code to rewrite provisions relating to fraudulent claims about military service to subject to a fine, imprisonment for not more than one year, or both an individual who, with intent to obtain money, property, or other tangible benefit, fraudulently holds himself or herself out to be a recipient of:
a Congressional Medal of Honor,
a distinguished-service cross,
a Navy cross,
an Air Force cross,
a silver star,
a Purple Heart,
a Combat Infantryman’s Badge,
a Combat Action Badge,
a Combat Medical Badge,
a Combat Action Ribbon,
a Combat Action Medal, or
any replacement or duplicate medal for such medal as authorized by law.
Someone who just lies about serving in the infantry, Rangers, Seals, Airborne without the appropriate claims to awards can not be prosecuted under the new statute….
I’m in the no big deal crowd on this one. Another thing to keep in mind is that we’re viewing this through American glasses. Being as she’s a British author, in Britain, I doubt there are many in England who give a rat’s patootie that she pulled the wool over their eyes in this fashion. We are way more sensitive to this kind of thing then the Brits are.
She hurt her initial potential sales by being someone else, regardless of the imaginary claims, and she’s smart enough to know she could have made more money just by being herself, so I don’t see any gain through phony valor here. None.
[…] sends us a link to the BBC which, as a follow-up to our post about JK Rowlings’ stolen valor tells that she sued her lawyer for leaking the fact that she wrote the book and not some […]
I heard about this on NPR’s “Fresh Air” and how I perceived it is that Rowling has pigeonholed herself as a children’s/young adult author with the Harry Potter series. She had previously released an adult novel under her real name and sales suffered. Because of mixed reviews, it was unclear as to whether it was because of her name, or if it was actually a bad book.
Long story short, she decided to write this one under the pseudonym and sales did well, but when the cat got out of the bag, sales exploded. Clever marketing ploy or grounded experiment? I don’t know.
I’m still a little sensitive to the military pseudography, but that’s just me.