“Let’s all chip in and make Dando Shaft a millionaire.”
I was 16 when Don Calhoun’s novel “Dando Shaft” was published, although I don’t think I heard of it until a few years later.
It was a halfway unique premise — a mediocre advertising executive setting up a campaign to make himself a wealthy man.
The idea was that people would send Shaft $1, and as long as at least a million people responded, he would become a millionaire.
What would they get from it? He would do all the things they wished they could do — sleep late, tell his boss off, spend evenings in ritzy restaurants and bars, chase women.
I don’t recall how the book turned out. I believe Shaft was only partly successful, but the idea stuck with me.
Some years later, I had a friend — let’s call him Joe Blow — who lost his job and was having trouble getting another one. I offered to take some initiative and start a campaign.
“Let’s all chip in and make Joe Blow a millionaire.”
I think I could have pulled it off, but Joe wasn’t really the type. To be a Dando Shaft, you have to be outgoing to the point of being a showoff.
Joe is a little too shy for the top hat, white gloves and cane.
To pull this off, you’ve got to have a subject who revels in the spotlight.
A Donald Trump type, someone with very little shame and a strong self-image.
A narcissist or even a sociopath.
Fact is, it really wasn’t that great a book.
It was, however, a great idea.