Rich 13 March 1988

Trevor Leggett was head of the Japanese Department of the BBC.

This is one of his broadcasts to Japan

Zubari for 13 March 1988    

Hello listeners!

Is it an advantage to be rich? Everyone seems to think so. Still, there may be some exceptions.

At the end of the last century, a Russian prince named Dadian was very rich indeed. He was the owner of a whole province, near the Black Sea.

He was a very keen chess player, and he went in for a number of tournaments. He did not win the tournaments, but sometimes he had brilliant quick wins over great masters. A few of them are in chess books, as examples of chess genius.

But, of course, his duties as Prince prevented him from playing chess very often. One commentator wrote: “His name would have been heard much more, if he had not been born a rich prince.”

But it has recently been discovered that in fact, the prince bribed some of the famous masters to let him win brilliantly. They secretly rehearsed the game beforehand.

So now we can say: “His name would not have been heard at all, if he had not been born a rich prince.”

So, to be very rich was some advantage to Dadian. But I discovered from a great Indian scholar that the very rich Indian rajahs of India were mostly very miserable men.

“But why?” I asked. “They could have everything they wanted.”

“Not everything,” he replied. “They did not have family affection. They knew their children were waiting impatiently for them to die, so that the children could have everything.”

© Trevor Leggett