I am on the train from Malmesbury to Paddington.
I could have been on an earlier train, but I booked this one and did not want to pay the extra. I travel first class with a Senior Railcard, so the fare is marginally less ludicrous than it might otherwise be.
I am here with a cup of tea and half an egg sandwich (bought at my local Tesco yesterday for just £1.25: I love an end-of-day bargain) and my notebook. It’s rather a handsome notebook. I got it as a freebie in a goodie bag at a conference in York.
I have been in Malmesbury interviewing Sir James Dyson. The super-rich are different from us. They have more money.
Dyson, artist turned designer and engineer, looking 60, turning 78 in May, is an extraordinary achiever. He started out with nothing. Now, according to the Sunday Times rich list, his family wealth is around £23 billion.
A billion, by the way, is a thousand million. When we were young, a billion in the UK was a million million, but in 1974 we fell into line with the Americans on this one and accepted that a billion is 1 followed by nine noughts rather than twelve. Either way, it’s a lot of dosh.
I was interviewing Sir James for my Rosebud podcast. I have interviewed a few billionaires in my time. Inevitably, I ask the self-made ones for the secrets of their success. ‘Energy’ is often the answer they give; ‘using my own and harnessing the energy of others’; and ‘Persistence’.
Sir James agreed. ‘Persistence, yes,’ he said. ‘I’m a long-distance runner. You’ve got to keep going. And you’ve got to be ready to fail. You learn from your failures. Keep failing if you want to DYSON succeed.’
It took 5,127 prototypes over five frustrating years (plus borrowing to the hilt) before Dyson launched his G-Force vacuum cleaner in 1983.
I asked Sir James for advice I could share with my grandchildren, three of whom are about to launch themselves onto the world of work. He said simply, ‘If you want something done, do it yourself. Don’t expect others to do it for you. And don’t believe the experts.’
My first billionaire interview was with the Aga Khan, Prince Karim Al-Husseini Aga Khan, who died in Portugal on 4th February, aged 88. He was the leader of Ismaili Muslims around the world and, so he told me, a direct descendant of Mohammed the Prophet, through Mohammed’s daughter, Fatima.
He was 31 when I met him and worth ten billion. He was still worth ten billion when he died, which, given inflation, suggests his fortune diminished somewhat over the years. Well, he spent a bit on horses and yachts, private jets, islands in the sun, and wives who came and went – the usual nonsense – but he did good works, too.
I was 20 when I interviewed him for my university magazine. He was based in Paris then. This was Paris in May 1968 – when many thought
France was on the brink of civil war. Les événements de mai ’68 encouraged protests around the world – and graffiti. ‘Be realistic: demand the impossible’ was my favourite.
I had read in Paris Match that the Aga Khan never gave interviews, so I found his address in Who’s Who and wrote to him – and he agreed to give his first-ever interview to me.
When I arrived in Paris, there were armed police on every corner. North of the Seine it was relatively calm, but south of the river it was a city in the middle of a revolution: burnt-out cars, pulled-up paving stones, streets closed off. Around the Sorbonne, there were barricades and tanks and armoured vehicles everywhere you turned.
The Aga Khan lived on the Île de la Cité. When I reached his house, I couldn’t see a doorbell or a knocker. The front door was wooden, covered with heavy metal studs. As I climbed the steps, it swung slowly open. A servant in a white jacket stood within. ‘Monsieur Brandreth? Son Altesse vous attend.’ The house was entirely lit by candlelight – a blaze of candlelight.
The candlelight is what I remember best. And I remember being struck by how self-deprecating the Aga Khan was: he talked several times about his ‘lack of self-assurance’. And I remember, too, when I suggested that in the West religion was on the decline, he said emphatically that the reverse was true in the Muslim world.
A word of thanks to all the readers who have kindly sent me their secrets of how best to get to sleep when you find you can’t.
From deep-breathing techniques to magnesium tablets, I am ready to give them all a go, and to date the one I have found most effective is the remedy suggested by my friend Bishop Richard Harries, Lord Harries of Pentregarth and of Thought for the Day. He simply lies back, closes his eyes and says Psalm 4.8: ‘I will lay me down in peace and take my rest: for it is thou, Lord only, that makest me dwell in safety.’
Sleep tight.
Gyles Brandreth: Can’t Stop Talking is on tour from April 2025
