Jim,
Re your message below:
> From what I remember, there was never any
> reconciliation, and I read
> profiles at the time that claimed John D.
was
> irritated because many critics
> had a higher regard for Ross's work than for
his
> own. As far as I know,
> Ross's feistiness with John D. was tied entirely
to
> the name issue. He was
> forced to stop using John R. and go to Ross, and
he
> didn't like it.
Here's how it went, if I remember correctly. Millar's first
Archer novel, THE MOVING TARGET, was originally published
under the pseudonym "John Macdonald" and appeared at almost
the same time as JDM's first novel, which, coincidentally,
was one of JDM's few genuine private eye novels.
Someone in JDM's family bought the Archer book thinking it
was JDM's. I don't know whether or not there was an actual
lawsuit, because I'm not sure names can be copyrighted. There
WAS contact between the two authors via third parties about
the name confusion and an agreement was reached. How heated
the contact was, I don't know. In any case the reuslt was
this.
Millar and MacDonald agreed that the second Archer book would
be published as by "John Ross Macdonald," that this pseudonym
would continue for a few books, after which the "John" would
be dropped, and the Archer series would run from that point
on as by "Ross Macdonald."
I have no idea what Millar though of JDM's work. In an
interview years later (after Millar's death I think), JDM
said something along the lines of "Neither one of us ever
embarassed the other. Neither or us ever embarassed the
name."
JIM DOHERTY
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