"Darkness at Noon" by Arthur Koestler

8/10. This is Koestler's most famous novel. It explores with clinical detail the step-by-step deconstruction of ideology inside the mind of a KGB man condemned by the very system he upholds.

The author is someone who knows his communism. Born Hungarian, he became a card-carrying (German) communist in the 1930s until his ardor began to wane after Stalin began the notorious "great purge" in 1938. This period was the moment of truth for many leftists and of great upheaval in the Soviet Union. Stalin's paranoia so gripped him that he executed or sent to the gulag a full quarter of his own security apparatus consisting of the KGB, communist party members and army officers. The era also included the high-profile Moscow trials which ended with the execution of the remaining old guard of the communist party from Lenin's days. It has been said that these purges so weakened the Soviet state that it became powerless against the German invasion that came almost immediately after.

Anyhow, Koestler knows a thing or two about worshipping a false ideology, and several of his novels are based on that theme. Possibly the effects on him were permanent as he had an unstable life and is rumored to have been involved in some pretty dark deeds. He died sometime in the 80s in a suicide pact with his last wife.

The story in "Darkness..." is strange in a sense because few individuals would respond to their coming end with logical analysis right upto the last moment. In that sense this work belongs to the "1984" genre depicting the reductio ad absurdum of totalitarian ideologies. The main character is Rubashov, a commissar formerly in charge of rounding up political prisoners, extracting confessions and sentencing them. Come Stalin's purges Rubashov is also arrested for treachery against the state. Rubashov expected this and had dreamt about the moment when the chekisti would come knocking. He was the last of Lenin's people and had already lost faith in the Soviet system. However, while in prison he looks for a logical reason why he should be punished...why everyone gets punished. Under interrogation he comes to understand that the system cannot bring itself to execute him without first extracting a signed confession, however fraudulent it might be. Not only that, the system will not give up until it convinces him through coercion that he is guilty as charged. During his last moments Rubashov wonders at the hand that raises the gun to shoot him, "in whose name is this hand raised?". There is no answer. The ideology itself contains the seeds of destruction of everyone that is part of it.

This is a powerful novel...very difficult to put down. It should be required reading for anyone who feels that he is in possession of some book or ideology containing all the answers. There are many such utopian "truths" floating around such as capitalism, communism, socialism and various brands of religion. Well...maybe this novel is too complex for such personalities. After all if one is a full-grown adult and still cannot recognize the BS that is sold under one name or another then there is little hope anyway.