It is hardly possible to open a newspaper these days without coming across a listing of the riches people in the UK, in the world, in the solar system . . . not to mention the endless profiling of internet millionaires and the obscenely wealthy of all stripes - from Posh and Becks to Richard Branson and Bill Gates.
In the footsteps of David Attenborough, Richard Conniff sets out to try to understand the peculiar behaviours of this strange species through the lens of the naturalist, setting them in the context of the behaviour of other animals, from mice to flies to baboons.
Conniff sees the very rich as human, except more so; genetically identical to ordinary people, they nonetheless display exaggerated and extreme behaviours, a result of exposure to excessive resources. The very rich display all the hallmarks of a dominant animal: even at their most leisurely they show an extraordinary evolutionary urge to achieve and sustain status, prime habitat, reproductive success and wasteful display.
Conniff uses evolutionary psychology to help explain why Aristotle Onassis had the stools of his private bar covered with whale scrotums; why serial monogamy is seen as the key to business success by Donald Trump and Jean Paul Getty; and what the selective display of certain moths and butterflies, disguising themselves as everything from twigs to bird droppings, can reveal about the incognito rich, with their elaborate codes of references that only those deemed worthy can understand.
Both serious and entertaining, 'The Natural History Of The Rich' is a field guide like no other.
