Authors may write and publish under different names—by adopting pseud­onyms or changing their names. When you are aware that an author has published under different names, consider whether it is useful for your reader to know that works published under different forms are by the same person, clearer to use a well-known form of an author’s name for easy rec­ognition, or appropriate to avoid the former version of an author’s name. Various solutions exist for presenting such works.

If you are writing about or working directly with an author whose name changed and you know that they do not use their former name in refer­ences to their work—for example, for trans authors—list their works under the name they use, regardless of the name that appears in the source. Do not supply information about the name change or cross-reference entries, and avoid using the former name in your prose.

For more details, as well as examples, see sections 5.12–15 of the ninth edition of the MLA Handbook.