Darkness at Noon

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Arthur Koestler - Darkness at Noon

Drama: SciFi & Fantasy

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Adaptation of Arthur Koestler's nightmarish portrait of a totalitarian state.

Tables turn on Rubashov when he is imprisoned and tortured by the regime to which he dedicated his life. Stars Matthew Marsh.

At the height of the media attention during the Monica Lewinsky scandal, US President Bill Clinton reportedly referred to Arthur Koestler's novel, telling an aide: 

     "I feel like the character in the novel Darkness at Noon....I am surrounded by an oppressive force that is creating a lie about me and I can't get the truth out."

Clinton was referring to Nicholas Rubashov, the protagonist of Koestler's novel inspired by the Moscow Trials of Stalin's Russia. Rubashov, once a powerful player in the regime, finds the tables turned on him when he is imprisoned and psychologically tortured. His reflections on his previous life and experiences in prison are at the heart of this thought-provoking masterpiece.

Written after Arthur Koestler became disillusioned with Communism, Darkness at Noon is a moving and thought-provoking indictment of totalitarianism. 

Simon Scardifield's adaptation draws on Koestler's original manuscript - which had been thought lost for 75 years, after Koestler hurriedly fled Paris before the German occupation in 1940, only to be recently discovered in a Zurich library.

Director: Sasha Yevtushenko

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in July 2017.

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