You are viewing your 1 free article this month. Login to read more articles.
Historian Orlando Figes is to pay damages and costs to two rivals who launched a libel case after he posted fake reviews posted on the Amazon website, according to various reports.
Figes, professor of history at Birkbeck, University of London, admitted in April to posting critical reviews of books by a number of authors, including fellow historians Rachel Polonsky and Robert Service, praising his own work and rubbishing that of his rivals. Figes denied the allegations, threatening legal action against colleagues, journals and newspapers that suggested he had written the reviews.
Prof Figes has now circulated an apology and retraction in which he accepts that his initial denial of responsibility for the reviews was false. Prof Figes also apologised to his lawyer for having given him incorrect information.