Russell Warren Howe; Journalist, Author of More Than 20 Books

Russell Warren Howe, 83, an English-born freelance journalist and author of books ranging from a biography of World War I spy and seductress Mata Hari to an examination of foreign-policy lobbyists' influence in Washington, died Dec. 17 at his home in Washington.

A spokeswoman for the D.C. medical examiner's office said determination of the cause of death is pending further tests.

Mr. Howe spent his early journalism career in Paris and New York before writing from Africa for a variety of publications, including The Washington Post, the Christian Science Monitor and the Baltimore Sun.

Mostly, he traveled hundreds of thousands of miles covering the violent independence struggles of former European colonies. This meant risking death by armed militants or from the terrible chicken meals served on African airlines, he later wrote.

Starting in the early 1970s, he settled in Washington and began a prolific freelance career. In need of income, he routinely upset public figures -- including President Jimmy Carter, former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger and United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan -- for repackaging interviews he conducted for mainstream publications and selling them to the men's magazine Penthouse.

Annan's office complained of the indignity of being nestled in print between "25 Songs for Getting It On" and "So, You Want to Be a Porn Star?" But Mr. Howe, whose interview with Annan first appeared in the Arabic language magazine al-Wasat, told a reporter that he had "full legal rights to sell this interview to anyone and everyone."

He wrote more than 20 books, including a memoir, nonfiction and swiftly paced novels. They included "Theirs the Darkness" (1955), an African travel book; "Sleeping With the FBI" (1993), the story of ex-FBI agent and convicted spy Richard W. Miller; and "The Power Peddlers" (1977), a nonfiction account of lobbyists written with Sarah Hays Trott.

His other titles included "Don't Laugh, You're Next: The Irrepressible Wit & Humor of Russell Warren Howe" (2002), a collection of his journalism.

Mr. Howe was born Aug. 1, 1925, near London, where his father was a publicity and advertising manager for Hollywood studios.

After serving as a Spitfire pilot in the Royal Air Force during World War II, he graduated from the Sorbonne in 1948 and began his journalism career at the Reuters wire service in Paris.

His 1956 London Sunday Times interview with William Faulkner resulted in the author and Nobel laureate giving an embarrassing and much-publicized statement on U.S. race relations.

"As long as there's a middle road, all right. I'll be on it," he quoted Faulkner as saying. "If it came to fighting I'd fight for Mississippi against the United States even if it meant going out into the street and shooting Negroes."

Faulkner later disavowed the remarks, and Time magazine came to Mr. Howe's defense, noting that the Mississippi-born author had "spent several days working his way through a demijohn of bourbon . . . "

Mr. Howe went on to hold a variety of jobs, including media director in the early 1970s for a European Union forerunner in Washington and defense and diplomatic writer for the Washington Times.

In a biographical statement, Mr. Howe was forthcoming about his failings. "Although he later gave up smoking and hard liquor," he wrote, "Howe had been a typically hard-drinking, wild-living correspondent of his age, and had a hectic married life."

His marriages to Lesley Summers, Glynova Johnson, Pauline Abbott and Naomi Thomson ended in divorce.

Survivors include his wife, Youngja Kim-Howe of Washington; two children from his second marriage, Ian Howe of New York and Iolande Howe of Atlanta; a son from his fourth marriage, Russell Sage of Washington; two stepchildren he adopted, former Post film critic Desson Thomson of Washington and Deirdre Parker of Silver Spring; and eight grandchildren.