Stalin's Englishman: the lives of Guy Burgess

摘要

In the fading evening light of 5 October 1963, five mourners met to intern the ashes of Guy Francis de Moncy Burgess in the graveyard of St John the Evangelist in the sleepy village of West Meon, Hampshire. In life, Burgess had been a larger than life figure; a charming socialite to many, he was a skillful manipulator able to access the higher levels of the Foreign Office thanks to his 'Establishment' links, betraying British secrets to his KGB handlers before his defection in 1951, yet his final years were marred by loneliness, alcoholism and a yearning to return home. But, following his death in August 1963, aged just 52, Burgess like the rest of the 'Cambridge Spies' - Philby, Maclean, Blunt and Cairncross - reached a mythical-like status, fascinating journalists, novelists, historians and the public since his disappearance and later re-emergence in Moscow.