Anthony Blunt

Miranda Carter

2003 Nominee

Whitbread Biography Award

2002 Winner

The Orwell Prize

2001 Nominee

Guardian First Book Award

2002 Nominee

CWA Dagger for Non-Fiction

11 October 2002
9780330367660
608 pages

Synopsis

When Anthony Blunt died in 1983, he was a man about whom almost anything could be - and was - said. As Surveyor of the Queen's Pictures and Director of the Courtauld Institute, Blunt's position was assured until his exposure in 1979 left his reputation in tatters. Miranda Carter's brilliantly insightful biography gives us a vivid portrait of a human paradox. Blunt's totally discrete lives, with their permanent contradictions, serve to remind us that there is no one key to any human being's identity: we are all a series of conflicting selves.
Astonishingly good
Highly impressive... sensitive and compelling... Miranda Carter has written a richly informative biography which, in the end, does not fall into the trap of tout comprendre, c'est tout pardonner - not only because she is not seeking to pardon him, but also because there is something here that is still quite impossible to comprehend
A compelling biography... Miranda Carter's skill at scouring the different compartments of Blunt's life is deeply impressive