Fraudulent

This news reminded me that one unsuccessful Victorian writer, "Osborn W. Trenery Heighway" (a.k.a. Gordon Trenery) was convicted on similar grounds for writing a fake Christian autobiography and peddling it as the real thing.  The publisher was unamused; in fact, Heighway/Trenery's Royal Literary Fund case file contains a letter from said publisher, noting that his wayward author had failed to pay up.  Another one of Heighway/Trenery's productions, Leila Ada, the Jewish Convert, still occasionally rates a mention from both evangelical Protestants and  Messianic Jews.  (Here is Trenery publishing under his own name--or, in any event, what purports to be his own name; in 1908, somebody wondered if Heighway was any relation to his own family.  A friend from graduate school, Larry Zygmunt, first pointed out Heighway's malfeasance to me while I was writing this article, in which Leila Ada--and this anecdote--puts in an appearance.)

Comments

[TM]

Wow. Just wow.

Here's what I don't understand: Why would someone peddle their wares as an autobiography when it so obviously isn't?

Did no literature instructor in their lives ever teach them about the meaning of "genre" to the writing craft? [If my students are any indication, the answer may indeed be a NO.]

I agree that artists should be able to use pseudonyms, but these situations go far beyond that.

Fiction is not non-fiction. Full stop. End of story. Fin.

[david]

Well, non-fiction sells better than fiction.

Of course, there is a tradition of this kind of hoax. I'm thinking of the rather fun story of Naked Came the Stranger.

[Larry Doyle]

Wildly off topic, but would that be Larry Zygmunt from St. Viator High School? (we had a little "Hello Larry" thing we'd do in the hall) My mother taught him chemistry and such- she'd love to hear from him again.