Paris Post War: Art and Existentialism 1945-55

27 November 1946

I am finishing Koestler's book. The very last chapters seem to me good - that is, as soon as he abandons reporting, in which he excels. Everything he says seems to me right, but the metaphors he uses to illustrate his reasonings are clumsy. He loses his footing in the abstract and clings to images. And then this, which seems to me most important, he does not say: that one can fight an enemy only by borrowing his arms, his methods, and even his psychology, with the result that today we have conquered Hitler, while everywhere Hitlerism is triumphant.

From The Journals of Andre Gide, Vol IV: 1939-1949. (Secker & Warburg London 1951)

(Research by Kate Oldfield)

Paris Post War: Art and Existentialism 1945-55 at the Tate Gallery until 5 September.

See next Monday's Independent for reader offers.