Page 16 - MidWeek - Sep 7, 2022

16 MIDWEEK SEPTEMBER 7, 2022
Due to recent econom- ic conditions, I need to auction off a copy of a book I wrote in 1985. It’s in mint condition and be- lieved to be the only one in existence — so the bidding will start at $2.5 million.
PATERNITY WARD D. L. Stewart
Yes, Ridiculous Investors Are People, Too
The book originally ap- peared as Fathers Are Peo- ple Too, which still is avail- able on eBay for $2.40. But the publisher also came out with a German edition titled Vater sind auch nur Men- schen. (Full disclosure: I can’t warrant the faithfulness of the translation. The only sentence I remember from my semester of high school German is, “Herr Stewart, du
But if $2.5 million for a book seems a bit pricey, it’s definitely a bargain com- pared to the $12.6 million someone paid last week for a Mickey Mantle baseball card.
able to say
they’ re the
bist ein dummer Arsch.”) I have no idea why the publisher decided to print
ly room? Wear your $60,000 Levi’s to a Browns’ game? Is “Hey, baby, wanna come to my place and see my Swedish postage stamp” a good pickup line?
a German version, and the company has since gone out of business. Which is what it deserves for making decisions like that.
In fact, the whole col- lectibles business mysti- fies me. Comic books that
being
only ones who have it? What makes the Mona Lisa price- less when there probably are thousands of painters today who could make knockoffs that would fool the most dis- cerning art experts?
In other words, people are willing to pay a ridiculous amount of money in hopes that someone else will pay an even more ridiculous amount of money sometime in the fu- ture. The man who sold the Mickey Mantle baseball card, for instance, paid $50,000 for it in 1991, which made it a pretty good investment.
I also have no idea why anyone would pay $12.6 mil- lion for a baseball card. Un- like a book, a baseball card can serve no useful function, such as being stuck under the leg of a table to level it.
avoided being thrown out by the owners’ mothers are snapped up for $40,000. A pair of Levi’s fetched $60,000. A Swedish post-
The author hopes that someday, some collector will fork over millions for
the rare German edition of a book he wrote 37 years ago.
age stamp went for $2.3 million. Paintings go for multimillions, topping out at $450.3 million for da Vinci’s
And what do you do with those things? Hide your mul- timillion-dollar painting in a vault where it will be safe and no one can see it? Hang it over the fireplace in the fami-
So maybe I’ll just hang onto my book for another 37 years and see if I can get $12.6 million.
Salvator Mundi.
Is it for the ego boost of
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What makes the “Mona Lisa” priceless when there probably are thousands of painters today who could make knockoffs that would fool the most discerning art experts?
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