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Harry Gold : A Novel

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In the early 1950s, an episode as divisive as any that followed in the turbulent 60s and 70s took place. The younger generation is largely unaware of it, and it's not taught in schools, probably out of some fear that, unlike the freeing of the slaves or the American Revolution, there's no way to cover it without acknowledging its ambiguous morality.

About five years after the atomic bombing of Japan that closed out World War II, the full force of America's collective dread of Communism finally found a local place to land. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were charged with delivering the secret of the bomb's design to the Soviet Union. They were tried in federal court and executed in 1953 amid worldwide furor that ranged from New York to the Vatican to the mobbed streets of Pairs.

What history there is of this shattering event consists largely of a severely limited body of demonstrable fact, an ocean of debate and speculation, and the public record of the trial itself. A great deal has been written about why the Rosenbergs did what they did but, surprisingly, there is virtually nothing known about what drove one man, Harry Gold, to not only act as a courier between U.S. spies and their Soviet controllers, but to become the government's chief witness against those very same spies.

By all accounts, Gold was a meek, enormously generous man whose only truly notable characteristic seemed to be his desire to please others. He was not politically savvy, he evinced no strong convictions, and why he would agree to become immersed in something as nefarious as handing a superweapon over to the Russians was a mystery.

In Harry Gold, noted biographer Millicent Dillon makes a bold, speculative stab at ferreting out what might have driven this very ordinary man to his extraordinary deeds. Exploiting the fictional license of the novel, Dillon is able to strip away the traditional biographer's obligation to separate documented fact from interpolated conjecture and instead present us with a cohesive, eminently plausible psychological portrait of a man who, to net it out somewhat unfairly, was so anxious not to give offense that he let himself be influenced by anyone with a stronger personality than his own, which was essentially everybody.

Harry Gold gets off to a somewhat slow start that might not immediately grab readers who don't already come to this book curious about the subject, but soon picks up emotional steam as events implode in on Gold until he can no longer stop them, assuming he'd even want to. Although her research was meticulous, Dillon deliberately avoids overburdening us with too many details that have been well-documented elsewhere, and instead concentrates on Gold himself. By the time he voluntarily confesses all to the FBI, the author doesn't need to hit us over the head explaining why: she's done such a good job of bringing us inside this man's head, it would almost be a shock if he didn't eventually break down and spill everything.

Aside from the occasional sentence that spins its metaphor for a few more words than necessary, Harry Gold is written with a sure hand and is a terrifically revealing, highly readable examination of a little-known but critical figure in our history.

The characters of fiction are usually larger than life, but Millicent Dillons fictionalization of Harry Golds life as a courier for the Russians before and during the cold war revels in this ordinary mans ability to disappear, perhaps even as the main character in his own life. This makes a difficult subject for a novel, but Dillon's take on him is very readable. That a man with no large ideological beliefs would put himself at risk in this way is curious indeed. By Dillons estimation, his secret life may be all that gave this mans life color.

Harry Gold transferred information about the Manhattan Project, had contact with the Rosenbergs and later testified against them. The book gained interest for me when Dillon began to alternate chapters from British/German scientist Claud Fuchs point of view. Fuchs was revolted by Gold--and Gold idealized Fuchs. Though references are not required in fiction, the dust cover says that Dillon did her research. She didnt list any sources--I would have been very interested in seeing them.

In the early 1950s, an episode as divisive as any that followed in the turbulent 60s and 70s took place. The younger generation is largely unaware of it, and it's not taught in schools, probably out of some fear that, unlike the freeing of the slaves or the American Revolution, there's no way to cover it without acknowledging its ambiguous morality.

About five years after the atomic bombing of Japan that closed out World War II, the full force of America's collective dread of Communism finally found a local place to land. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were charged with delivering the secret of the bomb's design to the Soviet Union. They were tried in federal court and executed in 1953 amid worldwide furor that ranged from New York to the Vatican to the mobbed streets of Pairs.

What history there is of this shattering event consists largely of a severely limited body of demonstrable fact, an ocean of debate and speculation, and the public record of the trial itself. A great deal has been written about why the Rosenbergs did what they did but, surprisingly, there is virtually nothing known about what drove one man, Harry Gold, to not only act as a courier between U.S. spies and their Soviet controllers, but to become the government's chief witness against those very same spies.

By all accounts, Gold was a meek, enormously generous man whose only truly notable characteristic seemed to be his desire to please others. He was not politically savvy, he evinced no strong convictions, and why he would agree to become immersed in something as nefarious as handing a superweapon over to the Russians was a mystery.

In Harry Gold, noted biographer Millicent Dillon makes a bold, speculative stab at ferreting out what might have driven this very ordinary man to his extraordinary deeds. Exploiting the fictional license of the novel, Dillon is able to strip away the traditional biographer's obligation to separate documented fact from interpolated conjecture and instead present us with a cohesive, eminently plausible psychological portrait of a man who, to net it out somewhat unfairly, was so anxious not to give offense that he let himself be influenced by anyone with a stronger personality than his own, which was essentially everybody.

Harry Gold gets off to a somewhat slow start that might not immediately grab readers who don't already come to this book curious about the subject, but soon picks up emotional steam as events implode in on Gold until he can no longer stop them, assuming he'd even want to. Although her research was meticulous, Dillon deliberately avoids overburdening us with too many details that have been well-documented elsewhere, and instead concentrates on Gold himself. By the time he voluntarily confesses all to the FBI, the author doesn't need to hit us over the head explaining why: she's done such a good job of bringing us inside this man's head, it would almost be a shock if he didn't eventually break down and spill everything.

Aside from the occasional sentence that spins its metaphor for a few more words than necessary, Harry Gold is written with a sure hand and is a terrifically revealing, highly readable examination of a little-known but critical figure in our history.

Millicent Dillon's novel about the "accidental spy", Harry Gold, is an amazing blending of well researched historical fact and a novelist's portrait of a socially inept, physically unprepossessing atomic scientist who stumbles into one of the highest profile spy stories of the century. Dillon illustrates with remarkable insight how an awkward and undistinguished man can find a "telephone booth" to transform him, if not into Superman, yet into an important go-between in providing atomic secrets to the Soviets. This novel is especially timely while we ponder current (June 2000) security problems at Los Alamos.

The writing hooked me immediately and kept me completely involved throughout.

Millicent Dillon's most recent book, "Harry Gold: A Novel", is so brilliant and complex that it resists reduction just as any serious poem resists reduction. And indeed the choice of the novel form is dictated, I presume, because essay, historic account, explanation could not produce the personages, the times, the circumstances in all their labyrinthine ramifications, nor the paradox in the role of the protagonist, Harry Gold, himself, an alleged spy for the USSR and a witness for the prosecution in the Rosenberg case. To cite an example: Gold, for all his apparent mindless simplicity, follows over a period of time the same course as Klaus Fuchs, with all his political and personal sophistication, both of them dedicated to what they initially perceive as a moral position, each of them influenced by a particular but totally different history. Another example: what Gold regards as his "puniness" against what he sees as Fuch's heroic stature is counterposed to Fuch's contempt of Gold. Yet the attitude of both Gold and Fuchs to each other seems to disappear in their final meeting in Los Alamos of which Dillon resists interpretation. These are but illustrations of the many and perhaps less paraphraseable encounters the book so cogently presents. Dillon's familiarity with the period as well as her own background in physics inform the book. And despite the difference in genre and subject matter, the novel is invested with the same energy and originality that dictated her recent biography of Paul Bowles entitled "You Are Not I".

I read everything I can find about Soviet espionage, especiallyduring the Stalin era. Biographical fiction of this sort is stillfairly rare and very welcome. This is not a fast-paced, action-packedtechnothriller. Far from it. But not to worry. What it does (and does quite well) is explore the peculiar psychological and other reasons why ordinary people such as Harry Gold got caught in Stalin's web. The mood she creates; little people embroiled in great events that they don't really understand and can't control. In hindsight one wonders how anyone Russian, American, or otherwise could possibly have spied for Stalin after the purges of the 1930s and after the pact with Hitler in 1939. Gold helps shed a bit of light on this subject. In summary, I liked it! A whole lot! END

I knew Harry Gold I was a student of his at the John F. Kennedy Hospital in Philadelphia in the late sixties.The Harry Gold I knew was a kind person and a wonderful teacher .Unfortuately he was not a strong person but weak and always wanted you to like him which we all did. The Novel really tries to let you know how a man could get involved in such a tragic historical event. I wish he would have written his own book to let you into his heart.

I knew Harry Gold I was a student of his at the John F. Kennedy Hospital in Philadelphia in the late sixties.The Harry Gold I knew was a kind person and a wonderful teacher .Unfortuately he was not a strong person but weak and always wanted you to like him which we all did. The Novel really tries to let you know how a man could get involved in such a tragic historical event. I wish he would have written his own book to let you into his heart.