From the very beginning, history wasn't content simply to be nostalgic fairytales; it wanted to make you think.

I actually think that history has fed off the restlessness of cyber space, of kind of the frantic, segmented nature of the way we lead our lives. People want to be connected.

As a schoolboy, poetry seemed defined by preciousness. It was all very rarefied.

The history of the Jews has been written overwhelmingly by scholars of texts - understandably given the formative nature of the Bible and the Talmud. Seeing Jewish history through artifacts, architecture and images is still a young but spectacularly flourishing discipline that's changing the whole story.

I am strongly of the opinion that chronology is very important. The great arc of time is what children are wired for.

Jewish history turns out not to be an either/or story - as in, either pure Judaism detached from its surroundings or else assimilation - but rather, for the vast majority, the adventure of living in between.