Customer Reviews

The Trail of the Dinosaur

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Arthur Koestler was a fine author who gave us "Darkness at Noon," "Thieves in the Night," "Promise and Fulfilment," "The Sleepwalkers," "The Thirteenth Tribe," and much more. He was also one of the authors of "The God that Failed."

This book is definitely not one of Koestler's best known works. But I enjoyed it. It is a collection of some of Koestler's essays, dating from 1946 to 1955.

The very first essay shows a clear moral dilemma. If one refuses to make any sacrifices for the sake of society, society will be destroyed. If one sacrifices everything for the supposed sake of society, society will also be destroyed. Where does one draw the line?

There is a very interesting article on the Hiss-Chambers case. Koestler notes that Chambers was attacked as a renegade ex-Communist. And Koestler quite properly ignored some confusing elements of the case (some of what Hiss was accused of looked dubious, but Hiss' intent to help the Communists was pretty much unchallenged). I think the result is a very reasonable defence of Chambers.

We also see an article on Judaism, where Koestler suggests that all Jews either go to Israel or renounce Judaism. Well, um, that's really up to them, isn't it? It is sort of like asking all Mormons to move to America or renounce Mormonism. Still, I found this idea interesting, although I certainly do not agree.

There is a hilarious story about what Russia might be like after the fall of Communism there. And the book finishes with the title essay, which discusses the dramatic increase in destructive power available to us humans in recent times, along with (according to Koestler) a corresponding decrease in moral strength.