SIMON SEBAG MONTEFIORE

The best-selling British author of history and fiction is most proud of his new book

Covering the history of the world in one book is a big ask, how did you approach it?

It’s a new exciting way of writing world history: it tells the story of humanity from the Stone Age to the drone age in one narrative through families. It is populated also by doctors, poets, scientists and courtesans, rock stars and charlatans. It ends on the day of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. It is full of catastrophe, cities fall, pandemics strike, wars devastate and also with joy and laughter, love, ingenuity and creativity. A celebration and an indictment.

What was the reason for undertaking such a task?

I wanted to create a book that would be utterly accessible to everyone yet founded in scholarship. My aim was to combine the span, the movements, the great themes of world history with the intimacy, grit, the juice of biography. This may be the most diverse world history written so far. It also works well as female history: women are given their rightful place in this history. It has been daunting and the greatest joy in my professional life.

Is there a book that made you love writing?

I love the history books of Simon Schama. I grew up adoring the novels of Balzac, Zola, Isaac Babel, Grossman, Proust, Joseph Roth, Orwell, Hemingway, Maupassant, Dumas, Dickens and Le Carre.

What’s the best book you’ve read? I’ve read many classics. But have found few masterpieces among contemporaries. But The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt is one.

A book that had a pivotal impact on your life?

I think Isaac Babel’s Red Cavalry and Odessa Stories fascinated me in the Soviet Union and led me to write about Stalin and Catherine the Great.

The book you couldn’t finish? All Henry James.

A book you wish you had read but haven’t got to?

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry.

The book you are most proud to have written?

The World: A Family History.

What book do you re-read? Maupassant’s stories.

What books are on your bedside table?

The Michael Connelly thriller Desert Star. The Mauritius Command by Patrick O’brian. I’m reading all these brilliant historical naval novels.

What are you writing next?

I am now writing Jerusalem City of Stories; it will be illustrated in a very beautiful book for adults and children. The World by Simon Sebag Montefiore, Hachette, $70