...a self-critique--not just signifyin'.
1. You shall have no other Gods before CNN or FOX or MSNBC or NBC or NPR or even C-SPAN.
2. You shall make of yourself a graven image of unending authority, ubiquitous and always well-groomed.
3. You shall not take the name of your television/radio host in vain.
4. Remember the publication date of your new book, to keep its pre-sale buzz going.
5. Honor your publisher and your publicist that your book’s sales numbers may be in the hundreds of thousands.
6. You shall not murder, unless you can get off and raise book sales to boot.
7. You shall not libel anyone, at least not anyone with substantial enough resources to really make you pay for it.
8. You shall not plagiarize without subsequently procuring a lucrative book deal explaining how and why it happened that first time.
9. You shall not bear false witness against your editor, chalking grammatical mistakes up to their irresponsibility only makes you look less professional.
10. You shall not covet your colleague's fame; you shall not covet your colleague’s six-figure book advance, nor his positive press reviews, nor her skyrocketing book sales, nor his Hollywood agent, nor her HBO-backed website, nor anything that is your colleague’s.
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