Richard Gott

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For the astrophysicist, see J. Richard Gott

Richard Willoughby Gott (born 28 October 1938 Aston Tirrold, England) is a British journalist and historian, who has written extensively on Latin America. A former Latin America correspondent and features editor for the British newspaper The Guardian, he is currently an honorary research fellow at the Institute for the Study of the Americas at the University of London.

Contents 1 Early career 2 Embarrassing The Guardian 3 Books 4 References 5 External links

[edit] Early career

He studied history at Oxford University and worked at the Royal Institute of International Affairs. In the 1960s he worked at the University of Chile, where he wrote Guerrilla Movements in Latin America, "the enduring bible" on that topic. ^[1] In January 1966, Gott was a candidate in the byelection in Kingston upon Hull North byelection for the 'Radical Alliance', running on a platform which stressed opposition to the Vietnam War; although visiting London-based journalists were impressed with his campaign, he polled only 253 votes. ^[2]

In 1967 he was in Bolivia as a freelance journalist for The Guardian to witness the events surrounding the capture and murder of Ernesto Che Guevara, playing a role himself by being able to confirm to the world that the 4-5 hour-old body in question was actually Che's, having met him in Havana in 1963. ^[3]

In 1981 the BBC attempted to appoint Gott to the position of editor at its cultural magazine The Listener, but his radical politics led to him failing to gain security clearance and the post went to Russell Twisk instead.

[edit] Embarrassing The Guardian

He resigned as literary editor of the Guardian in 1994 after allegations in The Spectator that he had been an "agent of influence" for the KGB, claims which he rejected, saying that "Like many other journalists, diplomats and politicians, I lunched with Russians during the cold war." He said that his resignation was "a debt of honour to my paper, not an admission of guilt", because his failure to inform his editor of three trips abroad to meet with KGB officials at their expense had caused embarrassment to the paper during its investigation of Jonathan Aitken.^[4] In his resignation letter to the Guardian Gott admitted "that I took red gold, even if it was only in the form of expenses for myself and my partner. That, in the circumstances, was culpable stupidity, though at the time it seemed more like an enjoyable joke". The source of the allegation that he was an agent, KGB defector Oleg Gordievsky, subsequently accused former Labour Party leader Michael Foot of the same thing, which led to a successful libel action by Foot against the Sunday Times.^[5]

[edit] Books

• Hugo Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution (2005), Verso. ISBN 1-84467-533-5
• Cuba: A New History (2004) Yale University Press, New Haven. ISBN 0-300-10411-1
• In the Shadow of the Liberator: The Impact of Hugo Chávez on Venezuela and Latin America (2001), Verso. ISBN 1-85984-365-4
• The Appeasers (2000, with Martin Gilbert) Phoenix Press. ISBN 1-84212-050-6
• Guerrilla movements in Latin America (1970), Thomas Nelson

[edit] References