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Diary

Simon Sebag Montefiore

Wednesday, 28th November 2007

Simon Sebag Montefiore's week

I’m home again after book tours to Scandinavia, Germany, America. In Berlin, my favourite interviewer was a Jewish wit, Michael Wuliger of the Jüdische Allgemeine, the Jewish newspaper, who’s writing a how-to book of Nine Commandments to instruct well-intentioned, decent Germans how to deal with an understandably sensitive area in social etiquette -- their embarrassment when talking to Jews. ‘Yes, you may say the word “Jew”,’ he recommends. ‘The word itself is not derogatory.’ Then: ‘Contrary to widespread rumours, not all Jews are rich . . . Neither are all Jews intelligent. Most of us are just as dumb as you goyim!’ Eighth Commandment: ‘Yes, Jews have been persecuted for 2,000 years. That, however, does not mean that injustices of all kinds are our favourite topic of conversation. So please, when talking about matters of concern to you like baby seals, Tibet, or battered spouses, don’t open the conversation by saying “you of all people should understand . . .”’ Ninth Commandment: ‘If you suffer from deep-seated feelings of guilt because your great-uncle Gottfried was in the Waffen-SS, don’t expect someone Jewish to be fascinated... You’re better off with an experienced (preferably non-Jewish) psychiatrist.’

A book’s title is vital. At a Swedish dinner, I sat next to the novelist Maria Svelands, whose novel attacks male domestic arrogance and ineptitude. Its title?

‘Bitter C###’ she replied. I thought I’d misheard so I asked, ‘Bitter . . . Country?’

‘No, Bitter C###!’ she insisted.

‘Bitter Culture?’ I tried again.

‘No,’ she declared, ‘BITTER C###! That’s what men turn us into.’ Amazed at such vehemence in Europe’s most feminist country, I did suggest that title mightn’t work in Britain. She’s writing a sequel — but I didn’t dare ask what she’s calling it.

My son Sasha, four, insisted on taking my book Young Stalin -- dedicated to him -- to school ‘show-and-tell’. ‘Stalin ruled Russia. Stalin chopped off a lot of heads,’ he said. ‘Daddy wrote this book but Stalin is NOT his friend!’ Yet in Russia last week, 47 per cent of Russians approved of Stalin. President Putin’s new guide for teachers hails him as a Russian Bismarck, the 20th century’s most successful Russian leader. Not long until ‘Stalin the Great’.

Young Stalin by Simon Sebag Montefiore has been shortlisted for the Biography of the Year prize in the Costa Book Awards.

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