A Very Dangerous Woman: The Lives, Loves and Lies of Russia's Most Seductive Spy by Deborah McDonald, Jeremy Dronfield Page B
Authors: Deborah McDonald, Jeremy Dronfield
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Berberova was a Russian novelist who had the priceless advantage of having known Moura during her early years in exile, from around 1921 to 1933. Other than that, Moura’s life was almost as mysterious to Berberova as it was to any other person. As a highly spirited writer of fiction, she wasn’t deterred, and where her source material failed, she didn’t hesitate to invent – not only decorative details but vital facts.
Since then, more material has come to light. Aside from the large archives of letters to Gorky, Wells and Lockhart, more recently the file kept on her by MI5 from 1920 to 1951 has been released. Added to facts uncovered by Andrew Boyle and tied to new research into the historical background of the ‘Lockhart Plot’, it has become possible to piece together the whole story of her life, and uncover some surprising and quite startling facts.
What Moura did in her life, what she was reputed to have done, and what she claimed to have done are difficult to tell apart. Sometimes it’s impossible to tell them apart. It is tempting to take a cynical view of Moura’s untruths – that she aggrandised herself or simply couldn’t distinguish fact from fiction. But what she was really doing was creating an artistic truth for herself. She did it all her life, but it was only in the course of her intimacy with Maxim Gorky, when she delved deeply into the mind of a literary creator, that she herself began to understand what she was doing. Trying to sum up what Gorky did in the process of converting life experience into fiction, she commented that ‘Artistic truth is more convincing than the empiric brand, the truth of a dry fact.’ 4
There was her life and motive encapsulated. She wasn’t a magpie – she didn’t steal experiences because of their attractive gleam, or embellish her own in order to seem more interesting. Where Gorky created literary art out of people’s lives, Moura tried to create an artistically ‘true’ life for herself out of them, even as she was living it.
And her stealing and invention weren’t wholesale – just a little touch here and there. Her life, quite by chance, had a dramatic structure normally found only in novels; she was aware of the fact, and ensured that in her letters and her utterances at the time, and in her recollections afterwards, the right words were said and the right attitudes struck at the dramatically appropriate junctures. Whether it was a courageous farewell in the gloom of a night-time rail station, a vow to love unto death or a noble valediction on a mountain crag, she played her part to the full. That it was embellished and charged deliberately with drama did not make any of it less real, either for her or for the people who acted in the play of her life.
The contributions that have gone into the making of this life story are too numerous to list in full. If it hadn’t been for the late Andrew Boyle’s work in gathering the tales of her friends while they were still living, this book would not have been possible. Neither could it have been done without the memoir written by Moura’s daughter Tania, An Estonian Childhood .
Others who have helped this book on its way, and who have earned our thanks, include:
Archivists who have provided copies of documents and letters relating to Moura Budberg’s life: Arcadia Falcone of the Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas; David K. Frasier of the Lilly Library, University of Indiana; Carol Leadenham, Sean McIntyre and Nicholas Siekierski of the Hoover Institution archives, University of Stanford; Dennis J. Sears, Rare Books and Manuscripts Library, University of Illinois; and the staff of the House of Lords archives, Westminster.
Enno Must, Director of Jäneda Mõis, and Georgi Särekanno, Head of Jäneda Museum, kindly gave Deborah an hour of their time to show her round the manor in which Moura lived in Estonia and which now contains a museum devoted to her and the Benckendorff family.
Biographers
Since then, more material has come to light. Aside from the large archives of letters to Gorky, Wells and Lockhart, more recently the file kept on her by MI5 from 1920 to 1951 has been released. Added to facts uncovered by Andrew Boyle and tied to new research into the historical background of the ‘Lockhart Plot’, it has become possible to piece together the whole story of her life, and uncover some surprising and quite startling facts.
What Moura did in her life, what she was reputed to have done, and what she claimed to have done are difficult to tell apart. Sometimes it’s impossible to tell them apart. It is tempting to take a cynical view of Moura’s untruths – that she aggrandised herself or simply couldn’t distinguish fact from fiction. But what she was really doing was creating an artistic truth for herself. She did it all her life, but it was only in the course of her intimacy with Maxim Gorky, when she delved deeply into the mind of a literary creator, that she herself began to understand what she was doing. Trying to sum up what Gorky did in the process of converting life experience into fiction, she commented that ‘Artistic truth is more convincing than the empiric brand, the truth of a dry fact.’ 4
There was her life and motive encapsulated. She wasn’t a magpie – she didn’t steal experiences because of their attractive gleam, or embellish her own in order to seem more interesting. Where Gorky created literary art out of people’s lives, Moura tried to create an artistically ‘true’ life for herself out of them, even as she was living it.
And her stealing and invention weren’t wholesale – just a little touch here and there. Her life, quite by chance, had a dramatic structure normally found only in novels; she was aware of the fact, and ensured that in her letters and her utterances at the time, and in her recollections afterwards, the right words were said and the right attitudes struck at the dramatically appropriate junctures. Whether it was a courageous farewell in the gloom of a night-time rail station, a vow to love unto death or a noble valediction on a mountain crag, she played her part to the full. That it was embellished and charged deliberately with drama did not make any of it less real, either for her or for the people who acted in the play of her life.
The contributions that have gone into the making of this life story are too numerous to list in full. If it hadn’t been for the late Andrew Boyle’s work in gathering the tales of her friends while they were still living, this book would not have been possible. Neither could it have been done without the memoir written by Moura’s daughter Tania, An Estonian Childhood .
Others who have helped this book on its way, and who have earned our thanks, include:
Archivists who have provided copies of documents and letters relating to Moura Budberg’s life: Arcadia Falcone of the Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas; David K. Frasier of the Lilly Library, University of Indiana; Carol Leadenham, Sean McIntyre and Nicholas Siekierski of the Hoover Institution archives, University of Stanford; Dennis J. Sears, Rare Books and Manuscripts Library, University of Illinois; and the staff of the House of Lords archives, Westminster.
Enno Must, Director of Jäneda Mõis, and Georgi Särekanno, Head of Jäneda Museum, kindly gave Deborah an hour of their time to show her round the manor in which Moura lived in Estonia and which now contains a museum devoted to her and the Benckendorff family.
Biographers
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