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/lit/ - Literature

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11056454 No.11056454 [Reply] [Original]

You have two choices.

1) a long and highly prosperous career churning out shit, lowest common denominator fiction that has no lasting cultural value.

2) you write two or three beautiful, albeit poorly selling novels in your lifetime that come to be regarded as classics only after your death. You earn very little from them in life and have to continue working a day job until your retirement.

Which do you choose?

>> No.11056459

>>11056454
Which ever lets me have a family.

>> No.11056465

>>11056459
This, but with option 2, since my posthumous honor will be reflected in my offspring, increasing the chance of the passing of my genes, which is our ultimate goal.

>> No.11056473

>>11056454
Ideally, you'd pick both. Do the first and then transition into the second. Are there any examples of authors who wrote Hunger Games-tier fiction that went on to write quality literature?

>> No.11056476

>>11056454
2 but unironically, alongside a bountiful family

>> No.11056496

>>11056454
I pick two but burn my works before dying

>> No.11056559

>>11056496
based

>> No.11056571

2, easily.

Artistic perfection and canonical contribution are all that matter.

>> No.11056587

>>11056465
>unironically believing this
DUDE MY GENETIC CODE LMAO

>> No.11056604

>>11056454
Easily #2. I'm still at uni, but I've got enough marketable skills (that I enjoy as well) to keep me afloat while I write my masterpieces.

>> No.11056670

>>11056587
No one can convince me that I don't want to have sex. But the purpose of sex is to reproduce. Therefore, I know that I want to reproduce, and this is common to all organisms. The consideration of other objective meanings of life are the product of an artificial, distraction-filled society that eases survival and even reproduction.

My mind only knows what lies near the heart.

>> No.11056689

2!

Is what I would have picked before I had a job

I might go with 1 now

>> No.11057192

>>11056473
Chekhov?

>> No.11057343

Two or three highly-regarded novels is fucking amazing, even among highly-regarded authors. That makes you more prolific than than Harper Lee, J.D. Salinger, Arundhati Roy, etc.

I really don't see how 1 could ever top that. Sure I'd probably be well-off, but I'd probably find my soul crushed after finishing just my first airport trash novel. And then to do that for the rest of my life.. nope, I don't think I could do it.

>> No.11057350

>>11056454
I choose option 2 because my day job will be taking over the family business and raking in cash doing some shitty busy work

>> No.11058343

>>11056473

Bumping for answers to this question. I know Faulkner only found mainstream success after writing Sanctuary, but he started his career with two difficult works. Anyone else?

>> No.11058355

>>11056454
2 and succeed in other job so i can be rich and weite what i want

>> No.11058372

>>11056454
2 is the best option.

>> No.11058378

>>11056454
People who ponder this question unironically will never have the ability to do #2.

>> No.11058571

>>11056454
The latter
I don't care about the money, only the art

>> No.11059099

2
Basically every writer had to work a day job. Living off your writing became possible only in the late 18th century, when there was enough literate middle-class people. In my tiny country with a small readership basically every writer has a job.

>> No.11059109

>>11056473
Melville.

>> No.11059111

>>11059109
And Twain.

>> No.11059113

>>11058378
this

>> No.11059152

>>11059099
>Basically every writer had to work a day job.
Correcting myself: they had to work a day job or were already well-off financially (nobles).

>> No.11059438

>>11056473
Melville started off by writing quite popular adventure novels