College and Research Libraries


Yerburgh, State University of New York at 
Albany . 

Pseudonyms and Nicknames Dictionary. 
First edition. Edited by Jennifer Moss-
man. Detroit: Gale, 1980. 627p. $48. LC 
80-13274. ISBN 0-8103-0549-6. 
The Pseudonyms and Nicknames Dictio-

nary (PND) will not replace any works a li-
brary already has on pseudonyms and nick-
names but it will supplement them. Its 
scope is revealed in a subtitle worthy of a 
nineteenth-century novel, " A Guiae to 
Pseudonyms, Pen Names, Nicknames, 
Epithets, Stage Names, Cognomens , Alias-
es , and Sobriquets of Twentieth-Century 
Persons, including the Subjects' Real 
Names, Basic Biographical Information, and 
Citations for the Sources from Which the 
Entries Were Compiled. " It is thus limited 
to "figures who have achieved some degree 
of prominence or recognition" who were 
alive during some part of the twentieth cen-
tury , with emphasis on North Americans 
and Western Europeans. It includes more 
than 17,000 real names and almost 22,000 
assumed ones, with authors accounting for 
only 40 percent of the names . 

The PND was compiled by consulting 
more than eighty biographical dictionaries 
and through contacts with specialists in 
fields such as auto racing and rodeos . A use-
ful feature is an indication by the real name 
of the source or sources used to obtain the 
information . In addition to providing a 
source of verification , this serves as a start-
ing point for further investigation. When no 
source is listed, the information was 
obtained through independent editorial re-
search. 

Since most libraries hold a number of 
pseudonym and nickname dictionaries 
already , it is important to know how the 
PND compares with them. I selected 
Harold Sharp's Handbook of Pseudonyms 
and Personal Nicknames (Scarecrow, 1972) 
and Supplement (1975), Frank Atkinson ' s 
Dictionary of Pseudonyms and Pen Names 
(Linett Books , 1975), Samuel Halkett and 
John Laing's Dictionary of Anonymous and 
Pseudonymous English Literature (Oliver 
and Boyd, v.8, 1956, and v.9, 1962), and 
Laurence Urdang's Twentieth Century 
American Nicknames (Wilson, 1979) for 

Recent Publications I 11 

comparison. Taking a page of the PND with 
forty-seven names, I found twenty-eight not 
listed in Sharp. Of the twenty English or 
American authors on the page, nineteen 
were not listed in Halkett and nine were 
not in Atkinson. Six of the eleven twen-
tieth-century personal nicknames were not 
in U rdang. Covering the same alphabetical 
range, Sharp had six twentieth-century 
names not in PND , Halkett seven, Atkinson 
three , and Urdang five . PND is thus not 
comprehensive but it does add significantly 
to any pseudonym and nickname collection. 
From recent ads it appears that the PND 
will be supplemented in usual Gale fashion 
by New Pseudonyms and Nicknames, thus 
increasing its usefulness especially for cur-
rent figures. 

Given its restriction to twentieth-century 
figures, one suprising area in which I found 
some lacks was what might be described as 
popular culture. PND had no listings for 
Miss Vicky (Mrs. Herbert "Tiny Tim" Buck-
ingham Khaury), Cheech (Richard Marin) , 
or Evel Knievel (Robert Craig Knievel) . 
PND is , however, strong in sports . Another 
problem is that an asterisk is used to indi-
cate a pseudonym, but that is not explained 
anywhere . It would also be useful, in the 
case of authors , to distinguish between pen 
names and nicknames.-Carol M . Tobin , 
Princeton University, Princeton , New 
jersey. 

Brown, Clara D . , and Smith, Lynn S. Se-
rials: Past, Present and Future. 2d rev. 
ed. Birmingham , Ala. : EBSCO Indus-
tries, Inc., 1980. 390p. $20. LC 80-
81267. ISBN 0-913956-05-8. 
Despite the somewhat misleading title, 

Serials: Past, Present and Future is in-
tended as a handbook for new serials librar-
ians and a reference tool for experienced 
ones and deals primarily with the specifics 
of serials management. It is an enlarged and 
revised edition of Clara Brown's Serials: Ac-
quisition and Maintenance , published in 
paper in 1972 . The first edition contains 
solid information on such matters as who to 
order serials from , how to know when to 
claim, and what to do with duplicate issues 
and reflects the author's long experience in 
the field and her familiarity with all types of 
serials problems. This new edition builds on