"It is useful to reflect on this question," wrote "George Knowall": "What precisely is a given person's name" A society in Dublin recently called upon its members to use `the Irish version of their names.' Surely a name is a name and cannot have versions"" This suggestion is provocative because its author was the writer born Brian O'Nolan, who was best known as novelist Flann O'Brien or journalist and playwright Myles na gCopaleen (or Myles na Gopaleen). He was also the television scriptwriter Brian Nolan and the civil servant Brian O'Nolan or Brian O Nuallain. Some of the other pen names he used include An Broc, Peter the Painter, Brother Barnabas, John James Doe, Winnie Wedge, The O'Blather, and George Knowall. This profusion of different names is a sign of his multifariousness and compartmentalization. As Flann O'Brien he is one of the major modernist novelists of the...