By David Astle
Publication Date: 2026-03-27 18:30:00
Opinion
David AstleCrossword puzzle maker and presenter at ABC Radio Melbourne
The world of ghostwriting is a house without a nameplate. You knock, you enter, you leave – but the mailbox has someone else’s last name on it. The arrangement is older than ink stains. In the salons of Paris, the smoky clubs of London, the swank boardrooms of New York, the invisible hand always hovered just outside the picture.
If authorship is nine-tenths sweat and one-tenth inspiration, then ghostwriting is ten-tenths discretion. The byline shines; the writer disappears. An obvious paradox…
Wait. Let’s cut the scam. The first two paragraphs in italics are not yours…
