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" I am a passionate nonfinisher. Life is too short, and there are too many great books to read, so if I lose interest or respect, I switch. But when, of course, when you really fall in love with a book, all the others are ignored. "

Simon Sebag Montefiore
Love
Respect
Great
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" I can never resist Ruritanian intrigue: I was once charged with the task of offering the Estonian throne to Prince Edward. Feeling like a Dumas Musketeer on a mission, I did so, but he turned it down. "
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" Saddam Hussein admired, studied, and copied Stalin, the paragon of modern dictators. "
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" I'm not disciplined at all. I barely function. But I get a lot done. I take days off all the time, but when I work, I work very fast and very efficiently. But I'm always having days when I'm feeling a little anxious, and I take a day off. I work in a funny way. "
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" I'd like to write a biography of Ivan the Terrible. "
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" To make a Frankenstein monster of a complex character like Stalin would have been too simplistic. I wanted to show who he was and, if you like, how he happened. "
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" President Trump is, some ways, the personification of a new Bolshevism of the Right, where the ends justify the means and acceptable tactics include lies and smears and the exploitation of what Lenin called 'useful idiots.' "
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" The Russian Revolution mobilized a popular passion across the world based on Marxism-Leninism, fueled by messianic zeal. It was, perhaps, after the three Abrahamic religions, the greatest millenarian rapture of human history. "
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" She grounded me. I have become very disciplined now. I would never have written the books without her. Definitely the cleverest thing I ever did was to marry Santa. Maybe it's the only clever thing I did. "
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" Colonel Qaddafi's tyranny was absolutist, monarchical, and personal. The problem with such dictatorships is that as long as the tyrant lives, he reigns and terrorizes. "
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" I much prefer writing fiction. History books, for me, are very hard work, very serious. "
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" I love the heat and the excitement of Israel, and I will always love Jerusalem. "
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" After the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russian influence collapsed, and Moscow came to bitterly resent the Western interventions that destroyed Mr. Hussein and Colonel Qaddafi. "
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" I'm the sort of person who, if I arrive in a city under siege, in the middle of nowhere, I'll always find my way to the leader of the rebels. I just don't know how. "
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Leader
City
Find
" I'm an enormous fan of American literature, and especially the great novels of Larry McMurtry, 'Lonesome Dove,' Cormac McCarthy, Elmore Leonard. "
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American
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" No one can take away the experience of Yeltsin's freedoms, but Russian democracy will never follow Western models: other authoritarian 'controlled democracies' - Turkey, Taiwan, Mexico - ultimately developed into democracies. But it took decades. "
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" Mugabe's resignation fascinates because the fall of tyrants is always a family story, decline of the father, writ large. What a strange creature he is. "
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" Most history books are about power. "
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Most
About
Books
" I don't like sports. I'm not interested in sports. I hate sports. "
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Like
Not Interested
Sports
" Moses Montefiore loved Jerusalem, lived for Jerusalem, and even made it our family motto. A Zionist before the word was invented, he believed in the sacred idea of Jewish return as a religious Jew's duty, and in Jewish statehood. "
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Lived
Family
Loved
" I'm the last person who would end up doing something that needs meticulous compilation of facts. It's totally against my character. I live by impulse. I'm totally ill-suited to writing history books. "
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" Bolshevism was a mind-set, an idiosyncratic culture with an intolerant paranoid wordview obsessed with abstruse Marxist ideology. "
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" Historical fiction is simply fiction set in the past, and should be judged as such. "
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" When I was young, I always wanted to go to Russia. "
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" As a youth, I was much more of a Zionist. But Israel was very different then. Israel's changed, and so have I. "
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" Under Stalin, artists weren't dissidents; all they hoped was to survive and write. "
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" Believe it or not, some Western analysts in the 1930s insisted that Stalin was a 'moderate,' controlled by extremists like the secret police chief Nikolai Yezhov. "
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" In 1918, a police chief of Jerusalem was a Montefiore. "
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Chief
Police
Jerusalem
" I don't feel that Jewish people have a class. "
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Feel
" A book's title is vital. "
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Title
Vital
Book
" The tsar of War and Peace, especially in the BBC version, is a complete popinjay and a useless character. The real tsar, Alexander I, had an amazing career. "
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