Your choice

Nothing I write will ever change the world, except an 'X' on a voting form...MAYBE! Respectable second rank? Given the combination of hard work and outrageous luck required to get published at all, I think I'd be satisfied with third rate.

Notice I don't mention talent. Maybe that's why the first option isn't one for me.

Just like an election! :-)

I would personally goes for the second, as it is a tad bit more realistic than the first for me.

From my perspective, I'd rather write something I don't think I ever read before and that I am personally 100% satisfied with all by myself. If recognition happens, let's say in the form of a cherry, or income, or a nice comment, this makes satisfaction to 103% or 107%. It's only an additive thing to me, but this is the luxury of being a hobbyist. I know a handful of writers who do make a living off their work but keep a secret enclave of their "real stuff" which is their most unique. This is another great age old question around the activity of art and commerce, the difference between the New York and London gallery scenes and folk art, for example, or how (in proposition 1 above) seminal writers and even rock acts shock and repulse the culture, which then (in proposition 2 above) assumes the style in a broader and less wince-inducing way for general consumption. I think all of you jokers above are eligable for either option. Writers are way too hard on themselves, but this is a good thing, it keeps the focus.

Speak to a few people...that's all I ever wish for. Not through writing but through music. My only ambition is to leave an echo :) rahh In wine, poetry or virtue, as you wish, but enivrez-vous! The art is to be absolutely yourself -Charles Baudelaire. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmhEMPN7y1I

Interesting choice. I'm not sure most writers are motivated by the desire to change the world, I think it's fair to say most of us just want to share our stories/ideas with other people, and hope they enjoy them or at least that they provoke debate. I'm certainly not motivated by the desire to earn a little money from writing either, and I'm never happy with what I write and rarely let people I know read it. So I couldn't go for option 2 either. Hmm... Kropotkin eh? I'm a Malatesta man, myself. Good to see the flag being flown ;)

www.lorrainemace.com I wouldn't go for either category, but write because the damn voices in my head won't shut up. I make money from my non-fiction, less from fiction, but even if I didn't make a penny, I'd still write.

I'd go for the money every time. It's the same with employment...what's would you rather have; job satisfaction or money? I spent the first 7 years after graduation in a very satisfying but averagely paid industry. It's okay when you're young and idealistic but I have become more cynical. I loved being at the cutting edge of biomedical publishing and it paid me well enough but not enough to be able to afford to have a family. That's why I am back at Uni for post grad studies and retraining (in medical law eventually I hope) and have my own freelance work meanwhile. I often think about writers who died impoverished and often lonely deaths and then became recognised as a genius post mortem. I don't think the knowledge of their post-death contribution to the world would have been much of a comfort to them as they lay dying in squalor. jude "Cacoethes scribendi" http://www.judesworld.net

Exactly. Stop being hypocrites and be honest with yourselves. Every single person who writes on abc is a self-obsessed egotist, like me.

like me you mean! In wine, poetry or virtue, as you wish, but enivrez-vous! The art is to be absolutely yourself -Charles Baudelaire. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmhEMPN7y1I

Although an oversimplification, I agree with TheShyAssassin above. Any creative work is an egoflex by definition. The paradox interesting to me is the more successful and interesting work seems to tearup or teardown the ego to get at commonalities, build a bridge, etc.

Are we assuming that the world gets changed for the better after our writing has been read? My latest killing is: http://www.bookscape.co.uk/short_stories/human_sacrifice.php

www.lorrainemace.com I think the most any of us can aspire to is to BE read. Fame, fortune or changing the world (for the better or otherwise) is not something many writers achieve.

I think changing the world for the worse is relatively easy. Writing derogatory comments about a prophet and spreading them around a city, or libels, slurs and rumours of one kind or another on this topic or that, predictably works readers into a frenzy. The impression that I get is that changing the world for the better, (through writing,) is the hard bit. (And on the subject of non-egotistical artistic expression, I've noticed stylised Christian paintings which do not show the name of the artist anywhere. That strikes me as an act of devotion and worship rather than one of an egotistical kind.) My latest killing is: http://www.bookscape.co.uk/short_stories/human_sacrifice.php

changing the world wholesale is an abstract notion and I can't imagine any writer specifically sets out to do this. Long lasting and great tasting literary writing ends up revealing things that makes us the same. This often happens as an accident for the writer, as we all know. Any list of Greatest Books Ever Written do this, and using only a handful of forms. About anonomyous artists of Christian paintings, this is typical of (especailly) early Christianity, where the robes and hoods of the clergy take away the ego so no big personallity takes over the elemental message for their own purpose. In this era of media personality cult, Christianity has been mutated and hijacked by the big personalities of slime evangelicals in the same way the scum jihadists and their wing nut big personalities have hijacked Islam, but this is a whole other bag of snakes.

I for one wouldn't live in a Barbara Cartland world. Enzo.. www.thedevilbetweenus.com

Its my dream to write a book that will discover some previously un-known aspect of our universe, that would change our understanding and place within it. So i suppose you're first scenario applies to me kp. I can but dream..D: