Bookmarks: Arthur Koestler

In Summer 1984, The Paris Review sent Duncan Followell to interview Arthur Koestler. Here's an extract:

KOESTLER

[Picks up a magazine clipping.] Look at this. Did you ever see a magazine called the New Musical Express? It turns out there is a pop group called The Police—I don’t know why they are called that, presumably to distinguish them from the punks—and they’ve made an album of my essay “The Ghost in the Machine.” I didn’t know anything about it until my clipping agency sent me a review of the record.

INTERVIEWER

It was in the hit parade.

KOESTLER

What’s that it was in?

INTERVIEWER

The best-seller list for pop records. Didn’t you get a copy of the record?

KOESTLER

No. I’ve had no contact with the group.

INTERVIEWER

But obviously you are pleased.

KOESTLER

A rather difficult book has become the inspiration for a pop group. It came as a great surprise to me. I’m slightly tickled by it.

[via @thewrongwriter]