The Oxford Companion to English Literature | Koestler, Arthur
Koestler, Arthur
(
1905
–
83
), author, born in Budapest and educated at the University of Vienna. He worked as foreign correspondent in the Middle East, Paris, and Berlin. In
1932
he joined the Communist Party and travelled in the USSR; he was imprisoned under Franco during the Spanish Civil War and broke from the Party in
1938
. In
1940
he came to England, adopting the language with his first book written in English, Scum of the Earth (
1941
). His publications manifest a wide range of political, scientific, and literary interests, and include
Darkness at Noon
(
1940
), Arrival and Departure (
1943
), and Thieves in the Night (
1946
), novels concerned with the ethics of revolution and survival. Non-fiction includes The Yogi and the Commissar and Other Essays (
1945
), The Trail of the Dinosaur and Other Essays (
1955
), and The Act of Creation (
1964
). The Roots of...
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