Simon Sebag Montefiore, the historian behind Jerusalem, talks about The Cauldron, his new history of the Middle East from 1900 to now.
Simon Sebag Montefiore, the historian behind Jerusalem, talks about his new history of the Middle East at the Royal Geographical Society in South Kensington on Thursday 11 February 2027.
Montefiore was born in London and read history at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, where he also took his PhD.
His books, among them Jerusalem, The Romanovs and The World, have been published in 52 languages and have won prizes. He has presented five history series for the BBC, and several of his books are being developed for film or television.
The Cauldron runs from 1900 to the present, from the Ottoman sultanate to the Trump presidency and from Morocco to Iran. It asks how one prince created Saudi Arabia and how an elderly cleric overthrew the Shah to rule Iran.
The book also covers the killing of a million Armenians during the First World War and the failure of the Arab Spring.
He returns to How To Academy to talk about the book in conversation.