The Silk Roads: A New History of the World

“I start my book by talking about maps: everyone puts themselves right in the middle. If you’re a child growing up today in Shanghai, it doesn’t have London at the centre of the world as it does if you live here in the UK…I think reconfiguring how we think about geography, how we think about history, and how we think about international relations is hugely important in a world that we keep on being told is globalised, where we can travel and exchange information quickly. I’m trying to work out how to broaden that appeal. I’m not a hectoring academic who insists that people have got it wrong or should follow my lead. It just seems to me entirely natural that there are parts of the world that we should look at, that we don’t…

It is important for historians to get the big picture but when you get close, the detail has to be there. So, if you want to know how staircases changed in Venice in the 1600s, or about the prices of wool in Amsterdam, or what was being written in Isfahan or Tabriz 700-800 years ago, the footnotes are all there in my book and you can drill down. A bit like a work of art, it looks equally detailed close up as it does from afar.

Sometimes big picture books can lose that detail. There are a lot of half-truths, lots of things that are broadly right, but actually need to be qualified. The trick, of course, is to write a book that is readable. I try and flag up where there are disputes or where things are complex or where there are scholarly debates, and leave it in the footnotes for people to follow up. As you know, it’s a highbrow book but it shouldn’t be too hard. Mary Beard called it, “perfect poolside reading.” I need to buy her drinks next time I see her, to say thank you for that.”

Peter Frankopan on History