Winter 2027 – Barbara Buzinkayová – blessed be the billionaires

This fictionalised story is based on an interview Barbara Buzinkayová had with author Luc Upson on Oct. 2.

A typical afternoon in the busiest park of Amsterdam: Vondelpark. Hundreds of cyclists rush by as if something enormous were chasing them — the mounting stress of being crushed by someone faster behind you, perhaps. Sadie holds a book in her lap. It has a bright green cover with a twisting snake: Blessed Be the Billionaires by Luc Upson. She picked it up at the American Book Center, hoping to read something fresh from an author she’d never heard of before. She picked it up because the back cover promised her a dystopian world too relevant to ignore, one that would hit home in a way that’s gripping and tantalising.

In the book, a handful of high net worth people own everything, while commoners live only on subscriptions. There are three main characters: a girl with a big dream who risks everything to do the impossible and buy a house; a billionaire man with a horrifying secret paid to destroy the upcoming revolution no matter what; and an Indian activist who enforces a nine-million-dollar limit on personal wealth.

Sadie is glad she picked up the book. It dreams big, just like Sadie does.

She read somewhere that writers have a responsibility to offer the world something beautiful and, at the same time, something that spreads an important message and helps improve the world. They need to combine aesthetics with ideology, at least according to whoever said that.

Sadie doubts there needs to be so much pressure placed on writers, but Luc Upson definitely lives up to her expectations. He intertwines playful jokes and artistic language with communicating an explicit and purposeful message. Phrases like “shower, shit and hit the clit” coexist in the same place as “her words were crisp, like leaves at the height of summer” and “if dollars were seconds: / $1 million = 11.6 days / $1 billion = 31.7 years / $1 trillion = 31,688 years.”

She rubs the pebble hidden in the pocket of her dress — a gift from her mother and a reassurance.

Sadie is one of the luckiest people in the world; perhaps that pebble is enchanted — who knows. The universe listens to her. And that’s why a stranger suddenly sits on the same bench. “I see you’re reading my book,” he says with a kind smile.

Sadie stares in disbelief at first. But when the universe provides, she’s not one to refuse.

She asks the first question that comes to her mind, as if afraid the man would just dissipate in front of her: “How can you achieve the right balance between artistry and politics?”

Luc responds in an accent she cannot place, “I read a book by — his name escapes me — the former minister of the economy in Greece, back when everything was happening in 2008. Yanis Varoufakis! He knew what he was talking about, but his political ideas were only thinly veiled in a story. One person would ask, ‘So, John, what do you think about inequality?’ Then there would be a page and a half of John’s speeches about it. I think that’s a very clunky, ugly way to convey your message, and people see through it. People have a very short attention span. I don’t think they get through the first couple of chapters.”

—

Garrett sips a coffee as he waits for another one of his important conferences. RAI Amsterdam bustles with people in suits indistinguishable from his own. He should think about what he is going to say in his business meeting; instead, his mind travels back to the book he read last night. Fuck the Billionaires or something like that.

The writer — what was his name again? Garrett googles him. Luc Upson, a New Zealander living in Amsterdam, who hosts a writing group that meets biweekly in a room across Amsterdam Centraal. Fuck the Billionaires — wait, sorry — Blessed Be the Billionaires is his debut novel.

The author said in an interview: “Capitalism isn’t a law of nature. We came up with it. We can absolutely tweak it.” Just like he portrayed it in his story.

Garrett takes another sip. The book didn’t convince him. The rich wouldn’t give up their often hard-earned wealth so easily. He would know; he was one of them.

And the issue feels oversimplified. How can you fit such a complex topic into fewer than 300 pages? The months in the story pass by like an international train, with only quick recapitulations of the new laws enforced and the revolution progressing. It seems surreal and fails to give a feeling of realism, which, as Garrett thinks, was probably supposed to be the author’s intention. The idea of changing the world’s entire economic system is a big one and should be discussed in depth; yet, this book leaves it in shallow water.

Garrett leaves his coffee half-full and stands up. Ignoring the lone dark object crouching in the corner of the room — one that is always with him, a horrifying secret — a man by the cafeteria door catches his attention. Someone with a strong build, long grey beard, and a tattooed arm, in his late forties, perhaps. Where did Garrett see him before?

It’s the author!

Without realising what he is doing, Garrett walks towards the man. This is ridiculous; he would arrive late for his meeting.

But it seems his body has other plans.

“Good morning,” he says, and Luc turns his attention to him. Garrett introduces himself and continues, “I read your book. May I ask you a couple of questions?”

Luc waves a hand. “Go ahead.”

“Are you aware that you are oversimplifying a complex issue?”

Luc sighs, as if people asked him this question daily. “Yes, but no one wants to read a thesis on economic theory. I’m not an economist, so I’m absolutely not qualified to write that book. At its basis, there’s a very simple message: the people who have the most should pay part of what they have towards supporting the rest of the world and shouldn’t take disproportionately much, which is detrimental to the rest of the world and the culture at large. I think a two-year-old can understand that. So, it’s absolutely simplified and dumbed down.”

“Hmm.” Garrett doesn’t know what to say, so he decides to ask another question, one that is gnawing at him: “Your book seems very critical of social media, or … what do you call it in the story again? The ‘antisocial media,’” he makes sarcastic quotation marks with his hands, “but I guess it can’t be all that bad if you use it yourself as a writer?”

“It’s ironic that it’s impossible to sell books without social media and Amazon. I’ve successfully boycotted Amazon for forty-nine years, and then, when you bring out a book, there’s just no way around it. This proves my point: they’ve monopolised this creative force of books and bookselling. You can’t get around it. You could try, I guess, but you wouldn’t sell anything because everything goes through Amazon. It’s terrible, and I agree, but it’s a means to an end — which I’m aware isn’t a great justification.”

Luc looked at his watch. “Responsibilities call me. Mind if I …”

“Just one more question, please.”

Luc nods.

“In your book, you claim that personal wealth shouldn’t exceed nine million euros. Why nine, specifically?” asks Garrett.

“I thought about it for a long time, and I started with four million. But there was such a massive transfer of wealth during Corona — I was writing during COVID — and the rich got so much richer that four million seemed obsolete. I had to bump it up, but I didn’t want it to be too high. Nine was where I landed.

“Funnily enough, two years ago, an academic — Ingrid Robeyns, a professor at Utrecht University — came out with a book called Limitarianism. It’s a terrible title but a great book. She put the figure at about the same: nine million. Nine million is enough to take care of your kids, a medical disaster, everything. Nothing can happen in your life for which that wouldn’t be enough money to live on. It was purely coincidental, but now I have an academic who says the same thing.”

—

Her friends stood in front of the university, waving banners and shouting slogans. Nishanthi wishes she could join their demonstration for longer, but she has an appointment.

The moment she enters CREA Café, she sees him seated on a sofa by a window. She sits across and adjusts her sari.

Nishanthi decided to interview Luc Upson for a magazine she works at immediately after hearing about the concept of his book. Her husband recommended it, actually. It made her think of Foucault’s definition of critique: “The movement by which the subject gives himself the right to question truth on its effects on power and question power on its discourse of truth.” Blessed Be the Billionaires demonstrates how the “truth” of capitalism being inevitable justifies those in power, and how the rich promote and reinforce this “truth” that benefits them. The characters, or at least two of them, rebel against this enforced inevitable “truth,” or in Foucault’s words, are “not being governed quite so much.” They do end up in prison, though …

After the initial introductions and pleasantries have been exchanged, Nishanthi congratulates Luc on publishing his very first novel and asks: “Why do you think fiction can be useful to spread a political message?”

Luc responds, “Fiction is the only thing that’s useful for spreading a political message. The problem with non-fiction is that it’s dry facts. Facts are great, but they’re extremely hard to remember. I’m reading The Haves and Have-Yachts now. I’ll remember those facts and statistics for a while, as long as I’m telling them to other people at dinner parties or at a pub. As soon as I stop doing that, I’ll forget them, and most people are like that.

“There are scenes in fiction that I still remember from reading twenty or thirty years ago: the beginning of Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, the beginning of A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, or some other works which are not by Charles Dickens,” Luc laughs, and it makes Nishanthi smile as well.

Then he continues, “Even when you think back to non-fiction books, conferences, or keynote speakers, it’s generally the anecdotes and stories that you remember. There’s something about stories that makes them stick with you. You’re in the shoes of the person making those decisions, which makes it much more personal. It’s easy to talk about a cap on personal wealth, but when you’re in those shoes and have to make those sacrifices…That’s what fiction does. When you’re in the personal story, you resonate more with what it’s really about.”

“Do you think it’s important to spread a hopeful message in political writing?” Nishanthi asks.

“I think it’s really important. I’ve tried to keep it hopeful. The general idea of the book was to throw up a weird flag: ‘Hey, this is happening.’ I feel capitalism has been embraced as a law of nature, but it’s not. We can do something about it, but if people don’t feel empowered, nothing will ever come of it. So, I think it’s important to make it hopeful.

“I’ve read a few books — one was called I Hate the Internet — and there’s just no positive message. At the end of the book you’re like, ‘All right, let me just kill myself.’ In marketing too, you want a call to action. If there’s nothing except ‘everything’s fucked,’ that’s not going to be helpful.”

Nishanthi responds, “Books are ‘unable to act directly on the world, but only via the intercession of those who read them.’ That’s Felski in Uses of Literature. Readers need to feel inspired, entertained, and empowered to act.”

Luc smiles and nods.

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