Parallel Lives

by Maryam Diener

Edith Tudor-Hart was a Bauhaus-trained photographer, and Ursula Kuczynski a writer and polyglot. Both were immigrant dissidents fighting fascism throughout the turbulent 30s and 40s. They never met, and yet communist agents, radical activists and devoted mothers both, their lives regularly crossed on the leafy streets of Hampstead and in the sophisticatedly bohemian world of the Isokon building – a haven for free-thinking émigrés and modernist marvel that promised a new way of living. Together but apart, they changed history – one helping form the famous Cambridge Five spy ring, the other handler of the nuclear scientist Klaus Fuchs. They were denied the chance to share the dangers they faced, but the secret nature of their work tied them by invisible threads. Maryam Diener is masterful at the blending of fact and fiction. In Parallel Lives she traces the haunting secrets, traumas and victories that bound these remarkable women. The publication coincides with the 90th anniversary of the Isokon building, and is an informative and powerful summer read from an established author.

Paperback

Published January 1, 2024

Reviews

[Owen Hatherley · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting oddity - a sort-of-historical-novel about Edith Tudor-Hart and Ursula Kuczynski which has far too much of 'as she sat in her Bauhaus chair, Edith thought about calling in on her good friend, the famous spy and journalist Kim Philby', but with an appropriately icy, restrained, non-'will you condemn' approach to these two (one full-time, one part-time) NKVD operatives. Also one of the best produced books I've read in a long time.