Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Businessman who made a fortune in publishing and finance, then became an author and philanthropist, writing about leopards and the Nile.
On the island
Eight records
Der Rosenkavalier: Prelude to Act I
Vienna Philharmonic, conducted by Herbert von Karajan
My first choice is this wonderful prelude to Strauss's Rosen Cavalier, where the Marchalin is enjoying a night of love with her young lover, and it tells its own story.
Well, I was in England and learning this new country, and the first piece of music that was very English that really influenced me was Kathleen Ferrier singing Blow the Wind Southerly.
During this time in England, I became fascinated with American music. And I later learnt that really American music almost charted the waves of financial prosperity or failure in the States.
Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out
This record, which is when Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out, has always been a warning to me. So I said you've been up and you've been down, you know, and up is better, but you've got to remember that there is a down.
Gordon Lightfoot, he really is the Canadian troubadour. ... So this is Lightfoot's song of the CPR.
Josephine Baker was a black musical artist from Harlem who made a great hit in Paris. And she has a wonderful song called I Have Two Loves. And for me it's particularly permanent because although I'm British and have a British passport, I'm also Canadian.
Louis Armstrong & His Hot Five
I've always been fascinated with American music, and I cannot talk about American music without including Louis Armstrong. And so I'd like to take with me his wonderful recording of West End Blues because it certainly has his most creative trumpet solo.
Der Rosenkavalier: Act III TrioFavourite
The last trio launched by Marshland, where she literally pushes her young lover, Count Octavian, to his new love, Sophy.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:25Can you remember the moment when you took that decision [to chuck business]?
I didn't really intend to do it. I was just on safari in Tanganyika, or Tanzania as it is known now, chasing leopards, and I was with my wife, and we were in the middle of nowhere, and I was just having a fantastic time, and didn't have to field all the phone calls and see all the people that I had to see, or meet the press, and answer all kinds of ridiculous questions. And I was just free. Free. I mean, free in much the same way I was when I was a little boy in Ceylon. I just said to myself, what on earth am I doing? Just beating my head against the brick wall. I mean, why don't I do this all the time?
Presenter asks
5:32How would you describe that small boy you were then [in Ceylon]?
Very free, very happy, absolutely didn't have any responsibilities. My father was a tea planter. We lived on the top of an an enormous hill or mountain, semi-mountain really. I was there with my two sisters and my brother, younger brother Michael, was born ten years later. And we were just up there on the tea estate and we'd get up in the morning and have breakfast and just go out into the jungle. I'd walk with my father. It was a fantastic existence. Marvelous existence.
Presenter asks
8:50Do you remember the moment of parting [from your father]?
The keepsakes
The luxury
Blue Nude by Justin Deraniagala
I bought this Blue Nude in Ceylon, and I thought I recognised the Aniasnin face, and it's since been confirmed that it is. So I think I'd take this probably ridiculous luxury.
Oh, absolutely. It was terrible. It was terrible. We gave each other a huge hug, etcetera. And he gave me his watch, which I still have, and he was in tears. And I remember him turning away at the car. He just staggered into the house. He wasn't drunk or anything like that. It was a very sad moment. I've been back, obviously, to the planters' bungalow where we lived, and I've seen exactly the same place, and the whole horrible scene came flooding back to me.
Presenter asks
10:41How difficult was it [to adapt to boarding school in England]?
Quite difficult. It was 1947. I sort of arrived, this wild young boy with a shock of black hair, probably with a Bombay Welsh accent, which you can probably still detect every now and again. And I had to learn quotes to be an Englishman. It was very cold. We had to leave the windows of the dormitory open. We were not allowed to wear vests underneath our shirt. There was no central heating. It was pretty miserable. It was the rugger term. I love rugger. I love rugger then, I love rugger now. But it was tough when you're suddenly shoved into the scrum and you don't know what you're doing.
Presenter asks
13:58How and where did you live here [with your mother in London]? How did you cope?
My mother was an incredible woman, and you you couldn't ever knock her down. She had just this tremendous spirit. ... She got a job in Nottinghill Gate looking after a house ... And she ran this boarding house in return for one room in the basement which she lived in with my sister. ... And I had this tiny little attic room, and that's how we lived. And she used to be. She scrubbed the floors ... and looked after the people who were in the boarding house. She used to tell us, you know, that we're we're in Chelsea, and this is where all the Bohemians are ... We are the real Bohemians. We are the people who, you know, who are down here living this way now, you know, because we are the real aristocratic Bohemians. I mean, she just gave us so much ... Confidence. I mean, and I've kept that all my life.
Presenter asks
29:35How difficult has it been for you to make your way into this conservative society of ours, a man self-evidently with no background in the British establishment?
It was difficult to not necessarily be accepted, because I don't ever want to be quotes accepted. I'd just like to have an influence, I'd like to be listened to, and it's not just a matter of give me the money and stand over there.
“The thought of giving it up was difficult because you you knew you were giving up all this adulation, as you say, and and you the power and the money and the control of money. It's it's an addiction. I mean, if you're successful in business and you are doing what you really want to do, it's a drug. It's a drug, and it's just hard to turn it off.”
“I loved him as much when I was there as when I wasn't there. And that's an important thing, because remember, I left when I was thirteen and never saw him again. So I really lived without th that father image, that guiding influence. And let's face it, your father is the most important influence in your life. And he certainly was in mine, even though he wasn't there. Everything I always did, I did for him.”
“I hated being poor. You know, as they say, you know, I've been rich and I've been poor, and rich is better. And, you know, I I really didn't like it.”
“I certainly don't want to die with the words Financia emblazoned on my gravestone.”