Revolution, Koestler seems to say, is a corrupting
process.
Clearly it is apolitical book, founded on history
and offering an interpretation ofdisputed events. The story ends in a blaze of
respectability.
Dalis recently published LIFE comes underthis
heading.
He is writing about darkness, but it isdarkness at
what ought to be noon.
It is quite possiblethat mans major problems will
NEVER be solved.
How do Yeats political ideas link up with his
leaning towardsoccultism? Rubashov, unlike Gletkin, does not have the Revolution as
hisstarting-point. Needless to say, theslaves fail to achieve it. It wouldprobably
have been deadlier if it had been neater. It is not merely that power corrupts: so
also do the ways of attainingpower.
There are reproductions of these all theway through
the book. When he is about five he gets hold of a wounded bat which he puts into
atin pail. England is lacking, therefore, in what one might call
concentration-campliterature. At present Koestler seems to have none, or rather to
have twowhich cancel out. Mr Menon onlydiscusses this rather shortly, but it is
possible to make two guesses. Koestlers published work really centres about the
Moscow trials. It is not merely that power corrupts: so also do the ways of
attainingpower. But against this has to be set thefact that Dali is a draughtsman of
very exceptional gifts. Itis an episode picked out from a background that does not
have to bequestioned.
It mightnot, and yet Yeatss philosophy has some
very sinister implications, asMr Menon points out.
I dont claim it as certain that such an experiment
would havevery great results. Next morning he finds that the bat is almost dead and
iscovered with ants which are devouring it.
Many of Dalis drawings are simply
representationaland have a characteristic to be noted later.
Honour, he says,consists in doing what you think
right.
In practice he cannot abandon the struggle.
Naturally the whole book centres round one question: Why did
Rubashovconfess?
Revolution, Koestler seems to say, is a corrupting
process. It is quite possiblethat mans major problems will NEVER be
solved.
Perhaps, however, whetherdesirable or not, it isnt
possible.
The real problem is how to restore the religious
attitude whileaccepting death as final. Thereforehe draws the conclusion: This is
what revolutions lead to.
The Czarist officer is shocked when he learns that
Rubashovintends to capitulate.
But there are other lines ofapproach, as we have
seen during the past two or three years.
Rubashovbelongs to the older generation of
Bolsheviks that was largely wiped outin the purges. During the Spanish Civil War he
astutely avoids taking sides, and makes atrip to Italy.
Part of the time he feels that thingsmight have
turned out differently. He himselffreely admits to this, and claims to have been
cured of it.
For several years the rebellious slaves are
uniformly successful. For ordinarypurposes he is impotent, it appears, till the age
of thirty or so.