Thread: You CAN Write a Good Book Just For the Money

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gir...ns_of_the_book



Not the best book ever, but it did pretty well.

Of course you can write a book just for the money, but let me tell you something I learned from experience. You'll hate yourself in the morning.

The book I'm starting on sustainable development in rural communities in Central America will earn a nice piece of change. But I didn't sign the contract just to get the money. Sustainable organic agriculture as part of a diversified farm system planned from marketing down to soil preparation and back up through production, value added processing, to marketing using the value chain approach to assure that the farm family has a profit, the environment is not damaged, and the culture of the local society is not upset is a concept that I see as a way out of poverty for many people in developing countries.

Tell me you'll pay me the same amount describing how globalisation and gm seeds will save the world and I'll hang up on you.

I'm not ashamed to take the money for writing a book or a report or anything else so long as what I'm writing is something I believe in.

One time I wrote just for the money. I gave the money to Goodwill and took a hot shower with plenty of soap and still felt dirty.

Some of the best-selling books in the world were written for the money. Nothing wrong with it, anymore than doing anything else for the money. If you can make something and sell it, good on you

Exactly my point.

And I doubt this guy hated himself, garza.

From a practical standpoint that's all well and good. I do know how the world works. But I continue to be under the influence of my grandfather, my mother's father, who died almost 60 years ago. He was Ulster Irish, an atheist humanist with a moral code made of cast iron and rules for ethical behaviour carved in stone. He was a successful businessman and a power in Mississippi politics a hundred years ago, respected and trusted but never liked, according to my father. His views on race and religion were not popular, but he was known as a man who could be depended on to do exactly what he said he would do.

I knew him only as a very old man, but a very stern, unbending old man who hated the English and loved everyone else. He lectured me on how a person can compromise on specific issues without compromising his principles. He did not live to see me start writing, but I believe he would be proud of the way I have lived my life. He never approved of doing anything just for the money. I won't use the word here that he used, but you know what I mean.

On the other hand, who am I to judge? That was another of his principles, that he would never judge what another man did. He would have no dealings with a man he didn't trust, but he never condemned the man either.

What I say and do is said and done with the unblinking eyes of my grandfather looking over my shoulder. I didn't invent my beliefs. I inherited them.

off topic

Originally Posted by garza

The book I'm starting on sustainable development in rural communities in Central America will earn a nice piece of change. But I didn't sign the contract just to get the money. Sustainable organic agriculture as part of a diversified farm system planned from marketing down to soil preparation and back up through production, value added processing, to marketing using the value chain approach to assure that the farm family has a profit, the environment is not damaged, and the culture of the local society is not upset is a concept that I see as a way out of poverty for many people in developing countries.

Hi, Garza. This writing project seems interesting. I'm curious about who are the landowners in your sustainable development plan.

Just what are the "moral issues" here? Why can somebody make jewelry or play music in a club for money--or sell real estate, practice law or medicine, etc--but writing has to have some unspecified qualification of stern moral order or else it's dirty?

You can do creative things 'just for the money' but that sure does miss half the reason for doing it at all.

I'm a trained commercial artist so, yes, I've done art just for cash and the only fun part of that was in pocketing the cash. But at any opportunity to have a really great time creating and make money with it too...THAT'S the full deal in my opinion. I think you end up with a better product when you're passionate/happy/inspired than when you're just trying to make it happen so you can get paid.

When I worked at the airbrush shop I did both, it depended on the job.

At the 'just do it for the money' extreme I did a portrait of this lady's two dogs. Don't laugh, she was paying WELL for this. I took the photographs and did what I thought she wanted...combined them to get the best pose for the doggies that I could. She was irate! She wanted something that, in my opinion, was inferior to what I'd done. So what did I do? I painted right over my work with what she wanted because it belonged to HER not to me...her money said so. I hated pretty much every moment of the job but when she came back and saw the 'fixed' version she thawed right out and paid up, carting it off happily. I did not put my name on that one...I simply pocketed my commission and was thankful.

At the other end of the spectrum at the same shop someone wanted a simple license plate that had a heart on it and said 'Heartbreaker'. Also it should be primarily red...other than that they said, "Have the artist do whatever they want." That was one beautiful plate and it was a pleasure to paint. I was happy, the customer was happy, and...I was paid! Best possible experience...now if they could all be that way.

Creativity and practicality have to have a good healthy marriage when it comes to making money with creative work. You can write as inspired as you want, have a great time writing...but you also have to edit and that takes an entirely different eye and skillset. You have to revise and maybe that has some of the same passion and maybe it doesn't. You have to sell it in some way if you want the money and that's yet another practical hat to wear.

Sometimes you just do what you have to do and when you can also do what you love to do, rejoice!

I've always regarded "art for art's sake" as a naive concept. Getting paid for something is only prostitution of a person contradicts personal ethic to do it. Many of my close family had a very closely defined work ethic and I tired of hearing comments like, "if you must wok then you should get a proper job". I was quite pleased to be able to thumb my nose at that by producing remuneration for commissions in both painting and photography.

I also enjoyed the few years that I spent working as an investigative journalist. Much of that time was spent exposing the practices of unscrupulous landlords and I had a passion for what I was doing. As well as getting paid well at the time I had sympathy for the situation the tenants were in and a real desire to see some kind of justice.

I do work with homeless people that I don't get paid for. I have also been paid for photographic work and articles relating to homelessness. Do I feel bad when a magazine or newspaper pays me for these? Not at all. I have to live like anyone else and if I can further a cause and pay the bills at the same time I don't have a problem with that.

Lin - The principle has nothing to do with writing or any other occupation. It applies to everything in life. My son is in construction, has never wanted to do anything else, and he makes quite a bit more than just a decent living at it. I don't know how to cast a concrete roof, but I taught David the value of casting a concrete roof if that's what you love to do.

For all his liberal thinking, my grandfather had no patience with anyone who complained about what they had to do to make a living. 'Go do something else,' was his answer, and of course that's not always a helpful answer.

As for art, that's something I know nothing about. I'm no artist, so I'm not sure how granfa's ideas would work in that realm. I would think it would be the same. I suspect the old man would have told the lady with the dogs to do something rude with her money.

winkash - You touch a nerve, there. Belize was once a crown colony, which meant it was the personal property of the king or queen. Government land continues to be called crown land.

When you go into the rural areas of the Toledo District, you find the Maya concept of communal land ownership under the stewardship of the Alcalde. In Stann Creek District and in part of the Toledo District there is a similar idea, brought from Africa, among the Garinagu. Yet a third communal land system operates in the Mennonite communities.

Then with private ownership there is a distinction between leasehold and freehold. Leased land must be put to use or forfeited. It can also be forfeited for political reasons.

There are lawyers who make a good living just dealing with the Lands Department.

And I'd better sto there before we get cited for 'off topic' discussion. One day soon I'll put some of my thoughts up in non-fiction and we can talk further.

Originally Posted by garza

Of course you can write a book just for the money, but let me tell you something I learned from experience. You'll hate yourself in the morning.

No, I won't. I'll be too busy laughing all the way to the bank.

I also selll writing to alleviate the plight of the homeless.

Me.

I have a house at this point, and want to continue living indoors rather than outdoors. Why thiis would be morally or esthetically questionable is beyond me.

Originally Posted by Baron

Getting paid for something is only prostitution of a person contradicts personal ethic to do it.

Exactly, this is where I draw the line at the 'customer is always right'. I've turned down one job in the past because the design was clearly obscene and was willing to walk away from the income on another one because the slogan that the customer wanted to add was so bad. In both cases the reaction was a sputtering, "But...but...I'm offering to PAY you so you HAVE to do it!" Horse hockey, I don't need your money, get out of my face.

Thankfully, this doesn't happen all that often.

Every one has been arguing against what I say and then Baron comes along and says 'Getting paid for something is only prostitution if a person contradicts personal ethic to do it' and just what do you think I've been saying all the time?

I will repeat. I make no apologies for getting paid for what I do. I write. I love to write, and so long as there is nothing morally questionable about what I am paid to write I like getting paid for it. So I like writing and I like getting paid and I put the two together and I can make a living doing something I love to do and would be doing anyway, paid or not. Is that such a difficult concept to understand?

If someone comes to me and says 'using your knowledge of economic and social development in the countries of the ACP write an article about how globalisation and the policies of the World Trade Organisation, International Monetary Fund, and World Bank will lead to the elimination of rural poverty' I would certainly refuse because they would be asking me to violate the ethical standards I have lived by from childhood. Such an article would be a lie. To write such an article and take money for it would be prostitution.

If someone comes to me and says 'using your knowledge of economic and social development in the countries of the ACP write an article about how training rural families to make efficient use of organic production techniques can lead to healthier children and reduced negative impact on the environment' I would (and in fact have) gladly accept the commission and accept the cheque when the job was done. That would be best of all. I use the skills of my craft to motivate people to support the right kind of rural development and I'm paid to do it.

How about if somebody says, Hey, write a book about something and we'll give you some money?

I just get really sick of people going around making moral judgement about what other people write