Introduction “Darkness at Noon” is a novel written by Arthur Koestler, a British novelist. The book was originally published in 1940. Koestler provides a story of Nicholas Rubashov a Bolshevik revolutionary who was imprisoned and charged with treason by the Soviet government in 1930s. Koestler uses Rubashov to explore the events that took place in the Moscow Show Trails in 1938. The life of Rubashov represents the account of lives of men who were victims of the Moscow Trails. The author investigates the journey of Rubashov life from the time of his arrest to the final confession and death. Koestler accounts the disturbing events of Rubashov as he experiences psychological change from his ability to resist challenges to almost total surrender. …show more content…
He is represented as a dictator who exercised his power ruthlessly and ignores the will of the people by taking advantage of the people due to their ignorance. The authors show the limitless power of the authority during the Moscow trial and the Great Purges of 1936-1938, where Stalin and the police apprehended all rebels and executed them. Additionally, the limitless power of Stalin made him to eliminate all rivals from the Communists Party including Rubashov. The results of the limitless power by Stalin resulted in deaths of many people and failed to fulfill the desire of the people. For instance, Stalin cruelty is depicted in the note that Rubashov wrote before his execution stating, “Koba, why do you need me to die?” The note shows the unjust and illogical features of the Great Purges (Koestler, …show more content…
The book intended to reflect on the lives of people who were victims of the Moscow trials in their attempts to change the world into a better place to meet the greater common good. The author wanted to provide readers with the understanding that the contradictions existing in politics is an indication of something wrong. Koestler wants to enhance people’s knowledge that social morality and the political and philosophical ideas of revolutionary activities cannot work in any government. Therefore, the author’s wants to point out that the use of an authoritative revolutionary model in a totalitarian system cannot lead to development of a just state (Koestler,
Waiting ‘Til The Midnight Hour by Peniel E. Joseph is a narrative history of black power in America. This is a book that attempts to talk about black power within the context in American Democracy. Peniel E. Joseph is also the author of Dark Days, Bright Nights, Neighborhood Rebels and The Black Power Movement.
Tucker, Robert C. "Stalinism as Revolution from Above". Stalinism. Edited by Robert C. Tucker. New York: American Council of Learned Societies, 1999.
Book Review of Night and Dawn "Never shall I forget that night, the first night in the camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever. Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live.
Intro with Thesis: A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is a novel by Alexander Solzhenitsyn that documents totalitarian communism through the eyes of an ordinary prisoner in a Soviet labor camp. This story describes the protagonist, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, as he freezes and starves with the other prisoners, trying to survive the remainder of his ten-year sentence. In this story, Solzhenitsyn uses the struggles in the camp as a way to represent the defaults of the Soviet Union under Stalin’s regime. By doing this, Solzhenitsyn uses authoritative oppression in his labour camps to demonstrate the corrupt nature of the Soviet system.
In conclusion, many soviets citizens appeared to believe that Stalin’s positive contributions to the U.S.S.R. far outweigh his monstrous acts. These crimes have been down played by many of Stalin’s successors as they stress his achievements as collectivizer, industrializer, and war leader. Among those citizens who harbor feelings of nostalgia, Stalin’s strength, authority , and achievement contrast sharply with the pain and suffering of post-revolutionary Russia.
The word “night” can be defined literally as ten hours of a 24-hour day that is dark, or metaphorically connoted as a time of evil and sadness. In the memoir Night, composed by Elie Wiesel, readers learn about a negative correlation to the period of time when light no longer appears. Wiesel leaves “a legacy of words” (vii) to ensure the past will never occur again. He explains the story without emoting and describes the events experienced by hundreds of Jews during the Holocaust. Night is a metaphor which refers to the darkness in lives, minds, and souls, and symbolizes lost hope, isolation, and transformation.
Solzhenitsyn believed that it was nearly impossible to have truly free thoughts under the prison camp conditions described in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, or in any situation where there is an authoritarian ruler. In a pris...
When most people hear the name Joseph Stalin, they usually associate the name with a man who was part of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and was responsible for the deaths of millions of people. He was willingly to do anything to improve the power of the Soviet Union’s economy and military, even if it meant executing tens of millions of innocent people (Frankforter, A. Daniel., and W. M. Spellman 655). In chapter three of Sheila Fitzpatrick’s book, Everyday Stalinism, she argues that since citizens believed the propaganda of “a radiant future” (67), they were able to be manipulated by the Party in the transformation of the Soviet Union. This allowed the Soviet government to expand its power, which ultimately was very disastrous for the people.
In 1934, Sergey Kirov a rival to Stalin was murdered. Stalin is believed to have been behind the assassination, he used it as a pretext to arrest thousands of his other opponents who in his words might have been responsible for Kirov’s murder. These purges not only affected those who openly opposed Stalin but ordinary people too. During the rule of Stain o...
The Great Terror, an outbreak of organised bloodshed that infected the Communist Party and Soviet society in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), took place in the years 1934 to 1940. The Terror was created by the hegemonic figure, Joseph Stalin, one of the most powerful and lethal dictators in history. His paranoia and yearning to be a complete autocrat was enforced by the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD), the communist police. Stalin’s ambition saw his determination to eliminate rivals such as followers of Leon Trotsky, a political enemy. The overall concept and practices of the Terror impacted on the communist party, government officials and the peasants. The NKVD, Stalin’s instrument for carrying out the Terror, the show trials and the purges, particularly affected the intelligentsia.
In the late 1930’s while the United States was going through The Great Depression the Soviet Union was going through its own turbulent times. This would be known as the Moscow Show Trials, which took place under the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. The book Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler takes place during this time period. The main character Nicholas Rubashov has been imprisoned even though he always has been loyal to the goals of the party (Koestler). This showed a shift that was happening in the country and an attempt by Stalin to eliminate any possible opposition even if they were heroes in the revolution. In the text two different concepts come to light vivisection morality where the party comes before the individual and anti-vivisection morality where the individual is sacred. Rubashov in the beginning does not embrace individualism however throughout the novel he begins to adopt individualism that he refers to as grammatical fiction. Vivisection morality is never a justifiable political system. Suppressing the rights of human beings is not only inhumane but also counter productive in creating an effective and wealthy society.
During Stalin’s regime, the individual Russian was the center of his grand plan for better or worse. Stalin wanted all of his people to be treated the same. In the factory the top producer and the worst producer made the same pay. He wanted everyone to be treated as equals. His goal to bring the Soviet Union into the industrial age put tremendous pressure on his people. Through violence and oppression Stalin tried to maintain an absurd vision that he saw for the Soviet Union. Even as individuals were looked at as being equals, they also were viewed as equals in other ways. There was no one who could be exempt when the system wanted someone imprisoned, killed, or vanished. From the poorest of the poor, to the riches of the rich, everyone was at the mercy of the regime. Millions of individuals had fake trumped up charges brought upon them, either by the government or by others who had called them o...
Stalin’s hunger for power and paranoia impacted the Soviet society severely, having devastating effects on the Communist Party, leaving it weak and shattering the framework of the party, the people of Russia, by stunting the growth of technology and progress through the purges of many educated civilians, as well as affecting The Red Army, a powerful military depleted of it’s force. The impact of the purges, ‘show trials’ and the Terror on Soviet society were rigorously negative. By purging all his challengers and opponents, Stalin created a blanket of fear over the whole society, and therefore, was able to stay in power, creating an empire that he could find more dependable.
Arthur Koestler's Darkness at Noon depicts the fallacious logic of a totalitarian regime through the experiences of Nicolas Salmanovitch Rubashov. Rubashov had fought in the revolution and was once part of the Central Committee of the Party, but he is arrested on charges of instigating attempted assassinations of No. 1, and for taking part in oppositional, counter-revolutionary activities, and is sent to a Soviet prison. Rubashov, in his idle pacing throughout his cell, recollects his past with the Party. He begins to feel impulses of guilt, most especially in those moments he was required to expel devoted revolutionaries from the Party, sending them to their death. These subconscious feelings of guilt are oftentimes represented physically in the form of toothache or through day- or night-dreams. As his thought progresses with the novel, he begins to recognize his guilt, which emerges alongside his individuality. It remains in his subconscious, and it is not until Rubashov absolves himself through silent resignation at his public trial that he is fully conscious of guilt. By joining the Party, Rubashov allows himself to forget the questions of human nature and of his individuality. The nature of his guilt lies in this betrayal of his individuality.