…
Published as part of the Jewish Lives series for Yale University Press, this concise book, with only one inside photograph, concludes with an assessment of how similar Reilly was to Bond, how successful he was as a spy, and his difficult relationship with his Jewish origins. Having distanced himself from his heritage as much as possible, Reilly denigrated ‘ugly’ Jewish women, and made surprisingly little reference in his intelligence reports to the pogroms taking place against European Jews. Avoiding speculating as to why, Morris can only admit that his subject remains ‘an enigmatic figure’.
Morris is on safest ground when framing the story in its historical context, in particular the end of the first world war and the Bolshevik revolution. But safe ground was not his subject’s natural habitat, and despite the high drama of Reilly’s life there is little atmosphere, tension or suspense in this telling. We discover on page three how Reilly dies, and learn when on page ten, a lifetime before it happens. A few more facts may have been pinned down but, despite some evocative quotations from Reilly and his associates, there is little feeling for the suave yet savage ‘Ace of Spies’ on these pages. Would Reilly have been disappointed by this rather hesitant account or pleased by his continued evasiveness beyond the grave? From what we have here, it is hard to tell.
Read the review by Clare Mulley of ‘Sidney Reilly: Master Spy’ (