Source: Arabian Nights 1914, a novel by Eric Koch (published by Mosaic Press in 2003)
My noble lord, you asked me to tell you what it is to be a “modern monarch”. What, in short, makes Wilhelm modern, you ask. My reply is, he must grasp the spirit of the times.
He must understand the importance of cultivating the magical image of a great leader and to use it for this purpose and for whatever other purposes he chooses; he must understand the need to discard obsolete old practices, to be aware of the requirements of the industrial age, of extraordinary new technologies – Zeppelins, for example – of the crucial importance of lower and higher education, of communications, of scientific research and scholarship, of the uplifting function of the arts.
A modern monarch must always think of the future, but he must respect the past and understand that certain old traditions must be maintained, by no means all. He must be popular. He must identify with the people, not merely represent them.
He must, so to speak, be the people’s incarnation.
Eric Koch’s new book, New Beginnings, was launched on September 20. The book is available from 
This would be an excellent preamble to my upcoming lecture on Public Sector Leadership in Canada. Would the author be kind enough to grant a permission to refer to it with an explicit acknowledgment of the source?
The author would be honoured. His novel is available at Amazon at a most reasonable price.