May 30: New Way to Make Money

This post is going to sound totally frivolous and self-centered.

I don't care.

I have found a new way to make money.

You see, every once in a while, just for fun, I Google my name to see what comes up.  Usually, it's nothing exciting or surprising.  For example, I have discovered, doing this, that there is a man in Germany who has a Facebook account with my name.  I have also found that I died in the nineteenth century.  At least that's when the guy underneath the tombstone bearing my name died.  And, surprisingly, I have also discovered that I have no hotness factor on ratemyprofessors.com.  This fact really depresses me.

Well, today, when I Googled my name, I found some bookseller in, I believe, Texas trying to sell an autographed copy of my book of poems (The Mysteries of the Rosary, $10 on Amazon) for a little over $200.  That's a 2000% mark up.  My book, bearing my signature, is being hawked on the Internet for two grand!  Now, I don't know if the bookseller will obtain his asking price, but it does make me wonder how far I can push this.

I've heard that Cormac McCarthy never autographs his books.  I've also heard that he's got a whole bookshelf filled with autographed first editions of The Road in his home.  Sort of like a collectible college fund for his kid.  Every time his son needs to pay for a semester or two of classes, all he has to do is sell one of these copies of The Road.  McCarthy is a pretty smart cookie.  (He also, notoriously, doesn't give a crap about money.  That's one of the luxuries of being wealthy and/or famous.)

Here's my plan.  I've codenamed it Operation Cormac:

Step One:  I'm going to start an Internet rumor that I'm one of the most brilliant and reclusive poets living.  I've been trying to do this for several years, so this step will take a lot of elbow grease.  I'm thinking a Wikipedia page and some well-placed blog posts about my unnatural hygiene habits.  (Hey, it worked for J. D. Salinger!)

Step Two:  After step one is firmly under way, I start another Internet rumor that I've disappeared under mysterious circumstances, possibly the victim of some anti-poetry terrorist organization named the Prose Warriors.

Step Three:  I slowly start selling autographed copies of my book (The Mysteries of the Rosary, $10 on Amazon) at astronomical prices on eBay.  When I top $100,000 in book sales, I start peddling my old journals and papers from high school for even steeper amounts.

Step Four:  After becoming a multimillionaire, I start publishing new collections of poetry under the pseudonym Marty St. Martin until The New Yorker runs an investigative essay on what it calls the "Cult of Saint Marty," revealing my true identity.

Step Five:  I become a poetic legend, winning every literary prize that exists on the planet.

Saint Marty thinks Operation Cormac is foolproof.

Do I hear $2000?  $3000?  How about 25 cents?