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James Merrill was born rich, as he said, “whether I liked it or not”. His father Charles, who co-founded brokerage firm Merrill Lynch, had given him a trust fund. It bought James time. Free from the need to earn, he conducted seances with the spirit world and wrote poetry. In a new biography, Langdon Hammer describes how Merrill’s transcripts of 40 years of seances morphed into the great 560-page poem, “The Changing Light at Sandover”.
詹姆斯•梅利尔(James Merrill)生来富有，正如他所说的“不管我喜欢与否”。他的父亲查尔斯(Charles)与人联合创建了券商美林(Merrill Lynch)，他给了詹姆斯一只信托基金。这给詹姆斯赢得了时间。由于不需要赚钱，他开始与亡灵世界对话、写诗。在一部新的传记中，兰登•汉莫(Langdon Hammer)描写了梅利尔的40年通灵会笔记如何变成一部伟大的560页诗集：《桑多弗变换着的光》（The Changing Light at Sandover)。
Merrill, who died in 1995, is an early example of what you might call a HNWI artist (after the wealth managers’ acronym for “high net worth individual”). HNWI art is going to become much more common. That will help the next generation answer a pressing question: what to do with the growing tribe of HNWI heirs?
梅利尔于1995年去世，他是一个人们可能称之为“高净值人士”（财富经理的专业用语）艺术家的早期例子。高净值人士艺术将变得更为普遍。那将有助于下一代人回答一个紧迫的问题：该拿人数日益增多的高净值人群的继承人怎么办？
Because art rarely pays, each society has to find a way to fund artists. In the Middle Ages, kings acted as patrons. Until the financial crisis, American universities routinely gave poets teaching jobs. And now we have HNWI heirs.
由于艺术很少足以维持生计，因此每个社会都必须设法资助艺术家。在中世纪，国王充当赞助者。在此次金融危机之前，美国大学经常给诗人一份教师工作。如今我们有了富二代。
Most HNWIs missed the crisis. Since 2008, their numbers have grown at a compound annual rate of 10 per cent, according to Capgemini’s World Wealth Report. In 2013, there were 13.7 million HNWIs worldwide with investable assets of at least $1m.
多数高净值人士没有受到金融危机的影响。根据凯捷集团(Capgemini)的全球财富报告(World Wealth Report)，自2008年以来，他们的人数以每年10%的复合率增长。2013年，全球共有1370万位高净值人士，其可投资资产至少有100万美元。
Of course, 90 per cent of HNWIs are just scraping by — mere “millionaires next door”, with assets of only $1m-$5m, says Capgemini. Still, if the average HNWI has two children, then even factoring out humbler HNWIs, that still leaves several million heirs who won’t need to work for money. These people will need to answer the James Merrill question: what to do with all that education, ambition and time? We will need to keep them occupied.
当然，凯捷表示，90%的高净值人士只是勉强符合标准，只不过是“邻家的百万富翁”，其资产仅有100万至500万美元。然而，如果高净值人士平均有两个子女，那么即便剔除较为寒酸的高净值人士，仍会有数百万富二代不需要为了谋生而工作。这些人需要找到“詹姆斯•梅利尔问题”的答案：所有那些教育、雄心和时间该投入什么地方？我们需要让他们有事可做。
Previous generations didn’t have this problem. Historically, most HNWIs were aristocrats who considered activity vulgar and, anyway, had a penchant for drinking their wealth. Frequent revolutions helped winnow their tribe: a Russian prince might end up driving a Parisian taxi. Hefty inheritance taxes winnowed further.
之前几代人没有这个问题。历史上，多数高净值人士是贵族，他们将任何经济活动斥为粗俗，再说他们本来就倾向于花天酒地。多次革命帮助这个人群进行了筛选：一位俄罗斯王子到最后可能在驾驶一辆巴黎出租车。巨额遗产税对这个人群进行了进一步的筛选。
But, for now, life is kinder to HNWIs. Their children therefore need to decide what to do. One billionaire’s son told me he saw no point in following his father into moneymaking. In fact, few HNWI heirs are itching to wake up early and do boring entry-level jobs. “Inherited wealth is a mixed blessing,” billionaire philanthropist Sigrid Rausing told The Irish Times. “Unconsciously, it can feel like all types of professions are not for you.”
然而，就目前而言，生活对于高净值人士比较友好。因此他们的子女需要决定做什么。一位亿万富翁的儿子告诉我，他认为继承父业、忙于赚钱毫无意义。实际上，几乎没有富二代愿意很早起床，做枯燥的入门级工作。“继承财富是一件好坏参半的事情，”亿万富翁慈善家西格丽德•罗辛(Sigrid Rausing)告诉《爱尔兰时报》(Irish Times)，“下意识里，你可能会感觉所有的职业都不适合你。”
Some HNWI heirs will devote their lives to philanthropy. However, this is usually a waste of time. It’s smarter to donate to an existing charity (as Warren Buffett gives to the Gates Foundation) rather than setting up your own organisation that will need a learning curve and probably duplicate work that others do better.
一些高净值人士的继承人会毕生投入慈善事业。然而，这通常是浪费时间。更为明智的做法是把钱捐给现有的慈善组织（就像沃伦•巴菲特(Warren Buffett)向盖茨基金会(Gates Foundation)捐赠一样），而不是创办自己的慈善组织，后者需要学习曲线以及很可能是重复性的、其他人做得更好的工作。
Some HNWI heirs will buy political offices. Others will waste their lives like old-style aristos. But most want high-status work that leaves scope for long holidays. Art is the obvious solution.
一些富二代会用钱买公职。还有一些人会像昔日的贵族那样虚度光阴。但多数人想要高地位的工作，有大把时间度假。艺术是显而易见的出路。
Some HNWI heirs will become artistic patrons. Rhapsody, the literary magazine for United Airlines’ first-class and business passengers, is a mechanism for converting HNWI wealth into fees for serious writers.
一些富二代将变成艺术赞助人。面向美国联合航空(United Airlines)头等舱以及商务舱乘客的文学杂志《Rhapsody》，提供了一个机制，帮助将高净值人群财富转化为给严肃作家的报酬。
Other HNWI heirs will make bad art. A friend once asked the daughter of a famous European family the ultimate middle-class question: “What do you do?” She replied: “I make combustible art.” “Err, what?” asked my friend. “I make sculptures,” she explained, “then I burn them.” “I’d like to see some one day,” he said politely. “You can’t,” she replied patiently. “I burn them.”
还有一些高净值人士的继承人会创作糟糕的艺术。一个朋友曾向一个出身欧洲名门的女子提出终极的中产阶级问题：“你做什么的？”她回答：“我创作可燃艺术。”“呃，什么？”我的朋友问。“我创作雕塑”，她解释道，“然后烧了它们。”“我希望有一天看到您的一些作品，”他礼貌地说。“你不会看到，”她耐心地回答，“我会烧了它们。”
But some HNWI art will be good. HNWI artists have time to hone their talent, and won’t dissipate it in hack work like us plebs. When I joined the FT as a graduate trainee in 1994, I was told that somebody called Alain de Botton had been offered the same job the year before. But De Botton — whose banker father left him a trust fund reportedly worth £200m — had decided to write books instead. He insists he never touched his dad’s money. Still, it presumably made artistic life feel secure.
但一些高净值人士的艺术将是优秀之作。高净值人士艺术家有时间磨练才华，而且不像我们这些常人这样把天分耗在打工上。1994年，当我作为毕业实习生加入英国《金融时报》时，我被告知，前一年，一个名为阿兰•德波顿(Alain de Botton)的人曾经获得这份工作。但德波顿决定出书，他的银行家父亲留给他一只信托基金，据报道价值2亿英镑。他坚持说，他从未碰过父亲的钱。话虽如此，这样的财力后盾想必让他的艺术生涯有保障。
Similarly, American writer Andrew Solomon (whose ultra-HNWI father Howard was a pharmaceutical mogul) could afford to spend 11 years writing his book Far From the Tree. Other contemporary HNWI artists include Brazilian film-maker Walter Salles, from an old banking family, and posh English novelist Edward St Aubyn. His books recount an unhappy childhood on a big estate. That will become a classic theme of HNWI art. This may seem a limitation. But when the educated middle classes dominated artistic production, they, too, left out most of life. George Orwell lamented the scarcity of “proletarian novels”. De Botton notes that even middle-class working life rarely features in literature. Most literary characters, he complains, “fall in love and have sex and . . . never go to the office”. Being a HNWI with time to rectify these matters, De Botton visited many offices to research his book on work. HNWI art has its drawbacks. But it will keep a lot of potentially dangerous people off the streets.
类似的，美国作家安德鲁•所罗门(Andrew Solomon)或许有条件花费11年撰写他的著作《那些与众不同的孩子》(Far From the Tree)，他的父亲霍华德(Howard)是一位超高净值人士、一位医药业大亨。还有一些高净值人士当代艺术家，包括巴西电影制片人沃尔特•萨勒斯（Walter Salles，来自古老的银行业家族）以及优雅的英国小说家爱德华•圣•奥宾(Edward St Aubyn)。他的小说讲述的是巨大庄园里的不快乐童年。这将成为高净值人士艺术的经典主题。这似乎存在局限性。但当受过教育的中产阶级主宰艺术创作时，他们也遗漏了人生的大部分主题。乔治•奥威尔(George Orwell)曾哀叹“无产阶级小说”的缺乏。德波顿指出，就连中产阶级的工作生活也很少出现在文学作品中。他抱怨道，多数文学人物“相爱，然后做爱……从来不去办公室”。身为一个有时间矫正这些问题的高净值人士，德波顿拜访了很多办公室，为他有关工作的著作进行研究。高净值人士艺术有其缺陷，但它会让很多潜在危险的人远离街头。
