Tag: Arthur Koestler

3,162 words

Part 1 here, Part 2 here, Part 3 here, Part 4 here, Part 5 here

Much of the tremendous value of Solzhenitsyn’s Two Hundred Years Together rests in how it was written completely without rancor. Only a highly cynical or unreasonable person could call it anti-Semitic — that is, a work that professes animosity or anger towards Jews as a people. (more…)

O’Brien (Richard Burton) demonstrates that 2 + 2 doesn’t always equal 4.

2,306 words

Did the international crises of 1947 and 1948 leave their mark on the writing of Nineteen Eighty-Four? I’ve spent a lot of time on this question, and so far as I can tell, the answer is – yes; but only obliquely. And George Orwell may not even have been conscious of the fact.

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3,232 words

Connolly, Burnham, Orwell, & “Corner Table”

“In the torture scenes, he is merely melodramatic: he introduces those rather grotesque machines which used to appear in terror stories for boys.”
—V. S. Pritchett, The New Statesman, June 18, 1949

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1,235 words

English original here

Jedinců, kteří nám pomáhají poukázat na znepokojivou cestu, po níž se ubírá existence velké většiny lidí, je za těchto zhoršených podmínek málo a hrozí, že budou zaměňováni se šarlatány.Do této kategorie patří bez nejmenší pochybnosti „tajemný pan Gurdžijev“, tedy Georgij Ivanovič Gurdžijev (1866 – 1949). (more…)

722 words

Translated by M. P.

Arthur Koestler, the author of Le zéro et l’infini (in English, Darkness at Noon), once played an important role in the Spanish Civil War as an agent of the Comintern. Through his writings, he set the tone of an anti-Francoist propaganda that has endured. Later, his deceptions made him an acute critic of Stalinism. (more…)

1,525 words

Translated by Greg Johnson

Czech translation here

Individuals who help us put a finger on the disturbing way in which the existence of the great majority of people has been, metaphysically speaking, degraded, are rare in our times and run the risk of being confused with charlatans.

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Jean Thiriart, 1922–1992

4,023 words

Questions by Gene H. Hogberg

Translated by Dr. David Wainwright

Part 2 of 6. (For the rest of the interview, click here.)

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