Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1991. British and American Philologycal Studies (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 20)

József Hruby: Two "Last Men in Europe": A. Koestler's Darkness at Noon and G. Ornwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four

57 charges ranging from espionage and high treason to plotting to assasinate the leader of the country, No 1. Rubashov, the ncxlern materialist and rationalist, stripped down to his political essence, is a composite image of many leading Soviet party officials, who fell victim to the putting into practice of what Stalin said at the Thirteenth Party Congress: "Sometimes from time to time, the master must without fail go through the ranks of the party with a broom in his hands".

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1 From the very beginning of the book two facts are obvious for us: one is that the charges are fictitous, trumped-up, a frame-up is in the making. The other is that Rubashov is inevitably doomed. In Nineteen Eighty-Four, a model and vision of a totalitarian wasteland, where an endless war between the three superpowers Eurasia, Eastasia, and Oceania is used as a means of controlling the population and demanding sacrifice on part of the individual on behalf of the State, Winston Smith is a member of the Outer Party, working for the Ministry of Truth. In the Ministry his job is rewriting the back issues of newspapers so that they conform with the latest view on events. He actually does what Rubashov only mentioned to Arlova in a humorous context. "Rubashov remarked jokingly to Arlova that the only thing left to be done was to publish a new and revised edition ot the back numbers of all newspapers". ^ He begins to feel twinges of doubt concerning the State and the Party and steps on the way of rebellion. He is a frail creature, a doomed rebel, desperately trying to become a revolutionary. In these terms Rubashov's case is just the opposite: He is a revolutionary, trying to rebel. It is Darkness at Noon where the focus is primarily psychological, but both books provide glimpses into the totalitarian abyss and can be read as insights into the totalitarian mentality. Nineteen Eighty-Four carries this examination a step further and examines totalitärianism from an epistemological point of view. Both Nicolai Rubashov and Winston Smith had a past, entirely different from their present. (In the context of the novel Rubashov has two pasts: his pre-revolutionary pasthis childhood-wich can tentatively be termed "Past Perfect", and his past as a revolutionary, the "Simple Past"). Winstons's memories are rather faint of his past, ha can recall the scenes of bickering over a piece of chocolate with his ill sister. Rubashov's memories are, however, very clear and distinct. He is an ardent defender of the new religion, the dogma of the disbelievers, the faith of the faithless, the religion of the State-Communism. Winston seeks to defend something very old, even ancient - the Self. Darkness at Noon on the psychological level at least, is the story of the discovery of what Winston