A Quote by Simon Sebag Montefiore

Writing about Jerusalem was very stressful; every word counts.

Simon Sebag Montefiore

Quote Topics

About Counts Every Jerusalem Stressful Very Word Writing

Quote Author

Simon Sebag Montefiore
British - Historian
Born: June 27, 1965

In the beginning was the Word. It doesn't say in the beginning was God. In the beginning was the Word because in the very beginning of every moment of time and space your word counts. Your whole destiny is written in the Word.

Harbhajan Singh Yogi

Writing fiction is very different to writing non-fiction. I love writing novels, but on history books, like my biographies of Stalin or Catherine the Great or Jerusalem, I spend endless hours doing vast amounts of research. But it ends up being based on the same principle as all writing about people: and that is curiosity!

Simon Sebag Montefiore

I really do think about the fact that every day counts. I believe that every individual counts, and so I believe that every day counts and I try not to waste it.

Madeleine Albright

From a cognitive standpoint, I'm very aware that you have no room for error in a picture book. Every word counts.

Kate DiCamillo

Writing for myself and writing for another artist are two very different experiences. When I handle both the story and the art, I have full control. I can endlessly tweak every word and every line.

Gene Luen Yang

My greatest personal mistake is ever to allow a word or moment that “doesn’t count,” i.e., that I do not refer to my own basic principles. Every word, every action, every moment counts. (This is the pattern on which everybody makes mistakes [or] becomes irrational — not relating their one action or one conviction to another.

Ayn Rand

Every time we give our word, it counts. For the most part, people give their word entirely too often. Our word is a precious commodity and should be treated as such.

Peter McWilliams

At any given moment, it's not about where we are supposed to be. It's about what work, which relationship, what decision I take. Every moment counts. Every decision counts. And if we look at our decisions in life as such, we stop battling and start winning.

Yehuda Berg

The secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components. Every word that serves no function, every long word that could be a short word, every adverb that carries the same meaning that’s already in the verb, every passive construction that leaves the reader unsure of who is doing what—these are the thousand and one adulterants that weaken the strength of a sentence. And they usually occur in proportion to the education and rank.

William Zinsser

Art to me is not precious enough that I feel territorial about what the word gets applied to. Conversations about what counts as art and what doesn't doesn't captivate my attention very much.

Maggie Nelson

Writing about Jerusalem can be such a minefield.

Simon Sebag Montefiore

I try to write every day. I don't beat myself up about word counts, or how many hours are ticking by on the clock before I'm allowed to go and do something else. I just try to keep a hand in and work every single day, even if there are other demands or I'm on a book tour or have the flu or something, because then I keep my unconscious engaged with the book. Then I'm always a little bit writing, no matter what else I'm doing.

Jonathan Lethem

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

Jerusalem is old, Jerusalem is new, Jerusalem can hold Moslem, Christian, Jew.