General Discussion : If you were to write your magnum opus would rather...?

So I'm the only one who went for the money so far. Let me just say that book of mine will never be read again after five years because it will be banned forever for its blinding bright awesomeness.

I am curious who the 3 people are that wanted to change the world, though.

I know that, but I think mostly they lied to themselves.  It makes me sad when people self-delude so hard.  Pro-tip:  you'll eventually go blind doing that, and grow hair on your palms.

I don't know, I kind of like Utah's world vision. sounds fun. we've gotten way too comfortable. maybe throwing a few of the dead into the mix would keep us on our toes.

You didn't join the military for the money?  Weirdo.

or, you could fund the writing of that book which would then change the world. see, you can have both. I know, that's missing the point.

I would build Castle Grayskull.

Both.

I would use the money to build Castle Grayskull, or if I got the chance under almost any circumstance. Right out on the north end of town where they have all those nice horse farms you can see from the high way, complete with heroic sized He-Man and Skeletor locked in sword combat statue.

As an aside Avery everytime you switch pictures you look like a different person I know in real life. First few times I thought you must be someone I know messing with me.

I would not pick the money over changing the world. I prefer the idea of changing things for the better. Probably less work, too, in the end.

"Are you kidding me?"

(see Ridiculous Things You Have... [etc.] thread)

"giving of themselves in some unselfish way."

That is actually a fantastic answer.  I'm impressed.

Bit of a loaded question don't you think. If its a book that is so monumentally powerful that it actually helps to "Shape the World" why is the trade off a measily $50 million? Maddonas Florida mansion cost her $29 Mil and decent sized Super Yacht cost a good $20 Mil leaving you to scrape by on a poultry $10 Mil !

Oh and i voted for shape the world. :0)

i voted for change the world, and only read for five years. that five years *is* income from the piece, and the question perameters do not stipulate that i never wrote another book that would sell like slaughterhouse five.

I think you guys are looking at things in very over simplified manor. The richest 1% are NOT some secret block of folks who agree on things, neither are politicians, the heads of major MNCs, or any other group with more then 2 or 3 people. And  2 or 3 people who agree are rare.

You know how we can't ever agree on anything on the boards? Some of us want to do A and some want to do the exact opposite Z, and bunch are in between? Imagine if you gave each one of us a billion dollars. We'd be rich and not get a thing done that wasn't personal. Sure we might start a business, or a charity, or whatever. But that $50 Million you gave  for gun control? Some other guy just gave $50 million for the protection of the 2nd Amendment (for those outside America the 2nd Amendment is the part of the United States Constitution that legally ensures Americans have the right to own guns). 

There are tons of people doing everything that you guys have listed. To really change things you have to do something we never even think about it is so rare. You have to get people to agree on something.

The problem with Changing the World is that each single person has a different idea about it. And they're basically all wrong.

Hitler wanted to change the world, Charles Manson wanted to change the world. They even thought they were being unselfish, in a way.

There's something awesome about 'The World': it changes itself in a manner that escapes humans' will. Some call it God, I call it Chaos. It's what Orwell, Huxley, Dick and many others taught us. Every time we try to change the world, the world changes us. In tragic ways, and the sad thing is that we never learn from that. Of course we want to feel powerful against Chaos, we strive to survive, but look what we got for wanting our lives more comfortable and longer: pollution, garbage everywhere, wars and poverty - don't let me start on that.

I'm not saying that humanity should stop trying to have a nice life. I'm saying, let's do it in a smart way. It takes a long time, if we survive as a species.

I still go for the money. Because of deserving it. With inspiring works.

I wish I could think like that. But I cannot repay my family for all they've done for me with a changed world, because they're gonna be dead by that day, if it'll ever come. And I'd rather give my dear ones a decent old age by writing a good book than by working in a shitty call center, calling people who don't want to be called all day.

Here's my example: Catcher in the Rye. People love catcher in the Rye, they're all like "you should read it," and so they do. But catcher in the rye is a book about how it's alright to be a self involved, smug, superior jackass. And so I think that Salinger could probably take credit for an uptick in the self involved smug jackass population.

But, liturature exists as a tool to help us think about real life problems. So you aren't going to get a direct influence from it. You don't see a bill to legalize LSD called "The Electric Kool Aid Act," and if that's the sort of effect you want then, lol you are in the wrong field, it is unlikely that a book will have that sort of influence. If you want direct influence on your society then I reccomend that you start trying out for Reality TV.

But, while changing the ways that people think about things is a smaller sort of change, it is infinitely more pervasive. It's a long process, but changing the way people think about things is the first step.

Why can't we list Holy Books? What makes the Bible not count? It's a fucking book, written by men, that influenced the way people think. It's like the Roussou's Social Contract or Aristotle's Ethics, or do they not count either?

Any book Ayn Rand ever wrote served to pave the way for the popularization of von Hayek and other neoliberal deregulators. They have a very real effect on the country you live in. She wrote the Tax Code, she wrote the arguments we have about the tax code, it just took a while for her changes to take effect.

No book written in most of our lifetimes has had the time yet to make such a change.

Note that I asked about "works of fiction," not books such as Origin of the Species. Religious books don't count because I was asking about books such as novels or short story collections (although many people may consider religious texts works of fiction).

Rand and Salinger may or may not have made fifty million off the books that you mentioned, but they definitely made a lot of money. A book cannot change the world without selling tons of copies. Since a book can't change the world without making a lot of money, I feel this question is invalid. It would be better if it asked which of these things is more important to a person. Why must we choose one of the things but not the other? And I would be unable to answer the question unless I specifically knew what "changing the world" were referring to. There are many ways to change the world that would not appeal to me.

Until I write something that has a good reason for changing the world, I want the money. I'll ignore the whole "no one reads the book after five years" thing since it's ridiculous that a book that makes fifty million dollars will not be read after five years.

I like stories which don't make any sense, but an unrealistic hypothetical question in an internet forum just rubs me the wrong way. *jk*

Joseph, I think we all want money, we all want the Stephen King dream of being vastly successful and knowing that we have created a legacy.  King's legacy will last even if the snobs don't respect him as a literary writer, he will definitely be remembered long after his death because of his immense imagination and body of work and he lives quite comfortably.  Although I do think King is an anomaly, most writers get successful with a few books and then disappear for years at a time. Even the great writers. I think the deeper question is:  would you rather be a writer who writes one book in his lifetime that is successful long after your death and remembered (you live in moderate successful but still have to maintain a regular job)?  Or write a shitload of books that make you a rich man but they are formuliac pieces of crap that no one cares about when you are six feet under.  Yes, James Patterson I am looking at you.