Author Unknown

[Mike Weaver]

 From a book club blurb


>Author Unknown: on the trail of Anonymous by Don Foster.

>Coupled with traditional scholarship skills, today’s extraordinary 
>developments in computerisation have given the discipline of literary 
>sleuthing a greater prominence than ever before. In the riveting Author 
>Unknown, English professor and ‘literary detective’ Don Foster explores 
>this particularly tantalising area of detection and explains how his 
>revolutionary methodology has solved some of the most intriguing literary 
>and criminal mysteries of modern times.
>Foster’s realisation that an individual’s use of language is as 
>distinctive as his or her DNA allowed him to develop his ability to 
>identify the writer of almost any questionable document. He initially 
>found fame when his discovery of a hitherto unattributed Shakespeare poem 
>appeared on the front page of the New York Times and, shortly afterwards, 
>he identified Joe Klein as the unnamed author of Primary Colours. In 
>Author Unknown he reveals his techniques in detail, inviting the reader to 
>sit alongside him as he sifts through anonymous documents and sets his 
>astonishing skills to work on cases such as those of the Unabomber, Thomas 
>Pynchon and Monica Lewinsky.

What a team, beats Horace Bachelor and the Zebra Kid by a mile.


Given the recurring complaints about pseudo/ano-nymous postings perhaps the 
p-list should hire Mr Foster as alias breaker in residence.

On the point of aliases there is a whale of a difference between 
pseudonymous posters (Charles Hollander posting consistently as Dudious 
Max) and anonymous posters whose realtime identities are unknown 
(slothrop666, big one u.s.w.). This difference is regularly ignored in 
arguments about this realm.

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