Most people who follow this blog know about my inclination towards research procrastination.
I’ve recently published an essay called “The All is an Egg” in which I tried to develop a blueprint that would unify all the fields of human knowledge and skills.
The fundamental principle behind all this is relatively simple and is derived of the concept of the Philosopher’s Egg that medieval alchemists used when looking for wisdom and eternal life.
I just demystified their hermetically philosophies and reinterpreted their pseudo-scientifically nonsense through the lens of the system theory, added some recent insights about the reality, and framed it in a cyclical historical perspective.
As usually, I had accumulated more research material than was really opportune to create a commercially viable essay, so I cut it down till only the rudimentary frame of the underlying argumentation remained.
I edited, rewrote and made sacrifices till I ended up with a lean manuscript of 200 pages of which the printed version could be sold for 20 USD in the bookshops.
Days went by and with every day grew my dissatisfaction with the work. Till I unpublished and added some parts that I cut away till the page-count swelled to 426 pages (mind you: it’s still a far cry from the 965 pages of the first draft). I also didn’t want to compromise on the print quality so the printing costs doubled.
Now I’m a happy writer with a book that has to sell for 40 USD in order to offer a marginal profit. It’s probably a commercial disaster. On Amazon I even had to price the printed version at 99 usd to generate some income. For one reason or another, color printing on Amazon costs triple than on other self publishing presses.
Good I don’t have to do this to earn a living.
I leave a link here for the curious among you who want to check up on my latest contribution to the literary oubliettes.
Shaharee Vyaas 