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Not so long ago, there was a Queen of Talkshowland, who was richer than even Midas. She was generous and quirky, and people generally liked her.

One day, she made a promise to a revolutionary leader of far away South Africa to build a school for the children of his country.

She built it, the children went to school, and everyone lived idyllic lives, bathed in learning and dappled sun fun.

It’s a lovely cotton candy of a story, but the facts of the case make it complicated and somewhat bizarre.

The ever-fame-embraced Oprah Winfrey conducted the opening ceremony for the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in South Africa last Tuesday.

The school is designed to provide excellent education to disadvantaged girls from all 13 provinces of South Africa. Yay.

Sprawled over 22 acres of greenery, the school complex includes 28 buildings, large rooms draped in 200-thread-count sheets, yoga studios, spas and personalized butlers.

OK, I made up the butler part, but it would really fit in with the beauty salons and amphitheaters .

Starting a school for disadvantaged girls in Africa is an amazing and beneficial act of charity on Oprah’s part, but did it have to be so ... Oprah-licious?

When she met with Nelson Mandela in 2000, she pledged $10 million for the school, and the project was declared to be built in conjunction with the South African government, which later backed out .

The government declared the institution to be too extravagant and elitist – and it might have a point.

Out of the 3,500 applications received, only 152 girls were accepted, 73 of which the talk-show diva personally hand picked .

With $40 million better spent, there could have been room for more schools, more girls and more education.

Maybe some of the love would have spread over to the young boys in South Africa who are, I’m sure, pretty disadvantaged as well.

Of course, the schools should be of a high caliber and nothing should be spared in the expense of books, faculty, classroom supplies and functional and aesthetically pleasing dormitories.

These ladies will experience perfection in the form of silver-spoon education from grades 7 to 12 – and then what? What do these recently graduated 18-year-old women do in a country that is severely disadvantaged?

To become the future leaders of their nation, they will have to go through some sort of higher education, employment and direct exposure to the outside world.

But since the very reason that these girls were admitted to this academy was that their families make less than $787 a month, where will they find the resources to move on with the same momentum and quality that existed in the academy?

In a way, I understand that this is a way for Oprah to reach out and, in a sense, repair her own past.

Born in the obscure town of Kosciusko, Mississippi, Oprah was abused, molested, and turned away even from a juvenile detention center before she was 13.

She obviously identifies with these young girls and wants her school to be a life-altering, inspiring experience – which it will be for the 152 of them.

But how do you revert from an almost euphoric lap of luxury to a crumbling home?

In Kazuo Ishiguro’s book “Never Let Me Go,” he explores the raw shock experienced by students in a similar situation. They have to go through joining the rest of humanity after being sheltered in an exclusive boarding school in order to fulfill a special purpose in society.

The parallel falters in that the students in the book are bred to give organs for the betterment of society, but these women will be bred to give their minds and souls to better their nation.

And while education is designed to provide young people with not only knowledge but a purpose as well, this elitist and exclusive form of education might incite other unanticipated effects, such as estrangement from society and the failure to reenter the real South Africa.

Of course, I am not against all construction of schools in South Africa, nor do I believe that this treatment is “too good” for the girls.

It’s just over the top. The price tag is ridiculous, and at the risk of sounding too much like Peter Parker’s grandfather: With great power comes great responsibility.

Write to rjoshi@media.ucla.edu if you’re a little African boy seeking an education. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.