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The Lotus and the Robot
The lotus and the robot
296 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1960
8 people are currently reading
373 people want to read
About the author
Arthur Koestler
152 books947 followers
Darkness at Noon
(1940), novel of Hungarian-born British writer Arthur Koestler, portrays his disillusionment with Communism; his nonfiction works include
The Sleepwalkers
(1959) and
The Ghost in the Machine
(1967).
Arthur Koestler CBE [*Kösztler Artúr] was a prolific writer of essays, novels and autobiographies.
He was born into a Hungarian Jewish family in Budapest but, apart from his early school years, was educated in Austria. His early career was in journalism. In 1931 he joined the Communist Party of Germany but, disillusioned, he resigned from it in 1938 and in 1940 published a devastating anti-Communist novel, Darkness at Noon, which propelled him to instant international fame.
Over the next forty-three years he espoused many causes, wrote novels and biographies, and numerous essays. In 1968 he was awarded the prestigious and valuable Sonning Prize "For outstanding contribution to European culture", and in 1972 he was made a "Commander of the British Empire" (CBE).
In 1976 he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and three years later with leukaemia in its terminal stages. He committed suicide in 1983 in London.
Arthur Koestler CBE [*Kösztler Artúr] was a prolific writer of essays, novels and autobiographies.
He was born into a Hungarian Jewish family in Budapest but, apart from his early school years, was educated in Austria. His early career was in journalism. In 1931 he joined the Communist Party of Germany but, disillusioned, he resigned from it in 1938 and in 1940 published a devastating anti-Communist novel, Darkness at Noon, which propelled him to instant international fame.
Over the next forty-three years he espoused many causes, wrote novels and biographies, and numerous essays. In 1968 he was awarded the prestigious and valuable Sonning Prize "For outstanding contribution to European culture", and in 1972 he was made a "Commander of the British Empire" (CBE).
In 1976 he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and three years later with leukaemia in its terminal stages. He committed suicide in 1983 in London.
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
September 24, 2019
I've read enough Koestler books to have been intrigued by this one when it was donated to Heirloom Books in Chicago, where I volunteer five days a week. Besides my interest in him, I've also been reading along the margins of Asian societies, embarrassed by how little I know about them. This, being a book about India and Japan by a Westerner, seemed to offer an easy approach.
Koestler ostensibly visited India and Japan in the late fifties to investigate what they might have to offer as an antidote or alternative to our Western materialism. What he finds is not useful. Indeed, with the exception of one Indian land reform activist, his conclusions are almost wholly negative. On reflection, his conclusion is that both countries entered the industrial age without, like Europe, first experiencing the Enlightenment, leaving them torn between the demands of contemporary economics and their primitive, anti-rationalist thought forms.
This is hardly an exhaustive study. Koestler devotes most of his attention, respectively, to yoga and to Zen Buddhism, finding little of value in either beyond the moderately physical and psychic benefits of such meditations.
Koestler ostensibly visited India and Japan in the late fifties to investigate what they might have to offer as an antidote or alternative to our Western materialism. What he finds is not useful. Indeed, with the exception of one Indian land reform activist, his conclusions are almost wholly negative. On reflection, his conclusion is that both countries entered the industrial age without, like Europe, first experiencing the Enlightenment, leaving them torn between the demands of contemporary economics and their primitive, anti-rationalist thought forms.
This is hardly an exhaustive study. Koestler devotes most of his attention, respectively, to yoga and to Zen Buddhism, finding little of value in either beyond the moderately physical and psychic benefits of such meditations.
December 16, 2008
This book is a collection of essay about Koestler's experiences and observation of religion and cultural practices in India and Japan over the course of, I think, a year and a half.
Some points are quite insightful and I would expect accurate descriptions of his experiences with both these cultures, but that's pretty much where it ends. Without being an apologist for the institutions and cultures he criticizes, I have to say he is not as balanced and objective as he sounds at first. I cannot imagine anyone can get so deep of an appreciation or understanding of any culture, especially when one spends only a few months there. Koestler begins and ends as an outsider to these traditions, which is fine, but he described them with a tone of absolutism and objectivity, rather than suggesting ideas for consideration or reviewing these ideas with experts or anyone more familiar with the topics. I felt like he lost track of where his opinion was his opinion. Basically, it just comes out feeling very biased.
Buried in the last few pages is a line summing up his impression of his experiences, which goes something to the effect of returning to Europe feeling a little more satisfied with his identity as a European and something about the metaphor of the small continent Europe "riding on the back of the Asian bull." Seriously, what the hell is that? If not ethnic superiority.... Koestler of all people should know better with all his writing criticizing exactly this kind of naive, even racist, superficial pride. This one line makes explicit the hidden tone and patronizing perspective running throughout the writings; you never get a the feeling of a respectful and curious interest to make sense of the cultural practices and institutions.
I cannot recommend this book to anyone for anything except an interest in some of Koestler's less published opinions or Western biases in (supposedly) social science literature.
Some points are quite insightful and I would expect accurate descriptions of his experiences with both these cultures, but that's pretty much where it ends. Without being an apologist for the institutions and cultures he criticizes, I have to say he is not as balanced and objective as he sounds at first. I cannot imagine anyone can get so deep of an appreciation or understanding of any culture, especially when one spends only a few months there. Koestler begins and ends as an outsider to these traditions, which is fine, but he described them with a tone of absolutism and objectivity, rather than suggesting ideas for consideration or reviewing these ideas with experts or anyone more familiar with the topics. I felt like he lost track of where his opinion was his opinion. Basically, it just comes out feeling very biased.
Buried in the last few pages is a line summing up his impression of his experiences, which goes something to the effect of returning to Europe feeling a little more satisfied with his identity as a European and something about the metaphor of the small continent Europe "riding on the back of the Asian bull." Seriously, what the hell is that? If not ethnic superiority.... Koestler of all people should know better with all his writing criticizing exactly this kind of naive, even racist, superficial pride. This one line makes explicit the hidden tone and patronizing perspective running throughout the writings; you never get a the feeling of a respectful and curious interest to make sense of the cultural practices and institutions.
I cannot recommend this book to anyone for anything except an interest in some of Koestler's less published opinions or Western biases in (supposedly) social science literature.
July 21, 2025
A man with intimate knowledge of Nazism and Stalinism spends an inordinate number of pages deciding that (spoiler) eastern philosophy offers little, but western philosophy is pristine and covers all the bases. I may be a little hyperbolic here, but it's essentially what he's saying. I mean...jeesh. His conclusion is ridiculously simplistic.
December 7, 2018
What a disappointing work by the author of 'Darkness at Midnight' and 'Yogi and the Commissar'. I wonder if it is not because of the loss of Koestler's enthusiasm for communism - indeed his disappointment formed the basis of these two stellar works, but rather because of new found love for spirituality and eastern traditions - The Lotus refers to the essays based on his travels in India and the Robot to the essays based on his travels to Japan. There are a few interesting observations particularly about the history of Japan that I found to be useful, though the essays on India are practically worthless.
January 7, 2024
I heard about this book from the unnamed female narrator in Norman Rush's MATING and it sounded intriguing and it was.
"I was puzzled and somewhat disappointed. I failed to understand how Vinoba had achieved the fantastic feat of obtaining nearly eight million acres for nothing, from some seven hundred thousand different donors, of influencing Government legislation and galvanizing a whole subcontinent. I could find in him no trace of magic, of hypnotic power, nor did I find any sign of the rapt attention such audiences were supposed to display. It was an amorphous and indifferent audience which became more fidgety as Vinoba talked on, and now hardly even pretended to listen--only their eyes kept feasting on him, returning every few seconds for another gulp
Then it dawned on me that it was not the words that mattered. Most of them were probably acquainted with Vinoba's message. They sat at his feat as the disciples sit at the guru's feet at the ashram, reading, chatting, following their own occupations. It is not his words that matter, but his presence--they breathe him, they imbibe him, it is a process of acquiring merit by spiritual osmosis. He need not have the gift of the orator, nor any specific learning, nor mystic insight. All he need have is the quality of being a guru: that curious gift of radiating peace which is physically felt like a laying on of hands; of making people feel enriched by his mere presence; of making the ascetic life seem enviable to the sybarite, and washing the master's feet a blissful privilege
In Europe the gurus have died out, in india the tradition is still alive, though declining. It was the secret of India's greatness, the emotional yeast by which its great gurus, from Buddha to Gandhi, had kept the race in spiritual fermentation. It also had its dangers: worship of the guru could degenerate into spiritual debauch--I had a taste of it in the south, about which later. But the scene I was witnessing--muddled, casual, confused--bore the stamp of authenticity. Perhaps the Sermon on the MOunt, peasants, shepherds, and other illiterates, did not understand either what was being said and did not care whether they understood, staring with vacant adoration at their bearded guru and scratching for lice under their rags" (23-24).
"Another characteristic of authentic gurus is their unpredictability" (24).
"He was not hostile to Western science, he explained, 'but science derives from the outer light, it must be complemented by the inner light. You have developed the head; the heart did not keep pace. With us it was the opposite. It is with the development of the heart we have been concerned in India, and still are concerned. That is the way of Bhoodan. THe land which is given does not matter much in itself. It matters as a token of love. When land is given, both the donor and the receiver are changed. THe spiritual value is in that change'" (25).
"Vinoba has proved that even in the twentieth century, a saint may influence history--at least up to a point, at least in India" (36).
"I never again tried to decide whether a holy man, a Yogi, or a prophet was a saint or a charlatan, but rather to find out the relative percentage of the genuine and the other elements. It saved me from disappointment and cynicism, for nobody is a saint for twenty-four hours a day, not even in India; not even Gandhi, who always traveled in a third-class carriage but did not object to having air-conditioning installed, and the carriage to himself" (52).
"H.H. 'ONe's passive interest, too, exerts an influence. Even without any specific activity, the angle from which you approach a problem or country produces a shakti--an active force" (57).
"The Christian ascetic mortifies his body to hasten its return to dust. He proceeds by a direct way. The Yogi's life is spent on a prodigious detour. He must build up his body into a superefficient, super-sentient instrument of self-annihilation. That act of annihilation is samadhi. Beyond this there is no Heavenly Father, no smiling Virgin or loving Bridegroom waiting. Only the Real Self is waiting, whose attributes are all negative--'without shape, without horizon, without end'; who is indicated by 'neti, neti'--'not this, not this'; the ultimate Void--compressed in the reverberation of the single syllable Om" (131).
"Gandhi was expressing a basic principle of Hindu education, its emphasis on concentration, on the quasi-Yogic power of shutting oneself off from any outside distraction. By an effort of concentration, everybody ought to be able to live in his own Himalayan cave in the midst of the turbulent household" (141).
"Zen cannot be debunked because its method is self-debunking. In its mondos and koans, Japanese ambiguity reaches its metaphysical peak; it is the ultimate evasion" (233).
"The philosophy of Zen is traditionally summed up in four sentences, attributed to the Second Patriarch--the pupil of Bodhidharma:
Untouchable and unorthodox
Not founded on words and letters
Pointing directly into the human mind
Seeing into one's nature and attaining the Buddha-hood" (239).
"There is something of that Erasmian attitude in Zen's contempt for the vanity of all endeavors to approach the Absolute with the yardsticks of logic" (239).
"One of the avowed aims of Zen is to perplex and unhinge the rational mind" (255).
"its content is a kind of lyrical epigram; a mood caught in a butterfly net" (262).
"I was puzzled and somewhat disappointed. I failed to understand how Vinoba had achieved the fantastic feat of obtaining nearly eight million acres for nothing, from some seven hundred thousand different donors, of influencing Government legislation and galvanizing a whole subcontinent. I could find in him no trace of magic, of hypnotic power, nor did I find any sign of the rapt attention such audiences were supposed to display. It was an amorphous and indifferent audience which became more fidgety as Vinoba talked on, and now hardly even pretended to listen--only their eyes kept feasting on him, returning every few seconds for another gulp
Then it dawned on me that it was not the words that mattered. Most of them were probably acquainted with Vinoba's message. They sat at his feat as the disciples sit at the guru's feet at the ashram, reading, chatting, following their own occupations. It is not his words that matter, but his presence--they breathe him, they imbibe him, it is a process of acquiring merit by spiritual osmosis. He need not have the gift of the orator, nor any specific learning, nor mystic insight. All he need have is the quality of being a guru: that curious gift of radiating peace which is physically felt like a laying on of hands; of making people feel enriched by his mere presence; of making the ascetic life seem enviable to the sybarite, and washing the master's feet a blissful privilege
In Europe the gurus have died out, in india the tradition is still alive, though declining. It was the secret of India's greatness, the emotional yeast by which its great gurus, from Buddha to Gandhi, had kept the race in spiritual fermentation. It also had its dangers: worship of the guru could degenerate into spiritual debauch--I had a taste of it in the south, about which later. But the scene I was witnessing--muddled, casual, confused--bore the stamp of authenticity. Perhaps the Sermon on the MOunt, peasants, shepherds, and other illiterates, did not understand either what was being said and did not care whether they understood, staring with vacant adoration at their bearded guru and scratching for lice under their rags" (23-24).
"Another characteristic of authentic gurus is their unpredictability" (24).
"He was not hostile to Western science, he explained, 'but science derives from the outer light, it must be complemented by the inner light. You have developed the head; the heart did not keep pace. With us it was the opposite. It is with the development of the heart we have been concerned in India, and still are concerned. That is the way of Bhoodan. THe land which is given does not matter much in itself. It matters as a token of love. When land is given, both the donor and the receiver are changed. THe spiritual value is in that change'" (25).
"Vinoba has proved that even in the twentieth century, a saint may influence history--at least up to a point, at least in India" (36).
"I never again tried to decide whether a holy man, a Yogi, or a prophet was a saint or a charlatan, but rather to find out the relative percentage of the genuine and the other elements. It saved me from disappointment and cynicism, for nobody is a saint for twenty-four hours a day, not even in India; not even Gandhi, who always traveled in a third-class carriage but did not object to having air-conditioning installed, and the carriage to himself" (52).
"H.H. 'ONe's passive interest, too, exerts an influence. Even without any specific activity, the angle from which you approach a problem or country produces a shakti--an active force" (57).
"The Christian ascetic mortifies his body to hasten its return to dust. He proceeds by a direct way. The Yogi's life is spent on a prodigious detour. He must build up his body into a superefficient, super-sentient instrument of self-annihilation. That act of annihilation is samadhi. Beyond this there is no Heavenly Father, no smiling Virgin or loving Bridegroom waiting. Only the Real Self is waiting, whose attributes are all negative--'without shape, without horizon, without end'; who is indicated by 'neti, neti'--'not this, not this'; the ultimate Void--compressed in the reverberation of the single syllable Om" (131).
"Gandhi was expressing a basic principle of Hindu education, its emphasis on concentration, on the quasi-Yogic power of shutting oneself off from any outside distraction. By an effort of concentration, everybody ought to be able to live in his own Himalayan cave in the midst of the turbulent household" (141).
"Zen cannot be debunked because its method is self-debunking. In its mondos and koans, Japanese ambiguity reaches its metaphysical peak; it is the ultimate evasion" (233).
"The philosophy of Zen is traditionally summed up in four sentences, attributed to the Second Patriarch--the pupil of Bodhidharma:
Untouchable and unorthodox
Not founded on words and letters
Pointing directly into the human mind
Seeing into one's nature and attaining the Buddha-hood" (239).
"There is something of that Erasmian attitude in Zen's contempt for the vanity of all endeavors to approach the Absolute with the yardsticks of logic" (239).
"One of the avowed aims of Zen is to perplex and unhinge the rational mind" (255).
"its content is a kind of lyrical epigram; a mood caught in a butterfly net" (262).
August 2, 2018
I saw a quote from Arthur Koestler's The Lotus And The Robot (1960) in a book of essays by Alan Booth, This Great Stage of Fools, coupled with the fact that I had read his Darkness At Noon earlier and the intriguing title of the book, inspired me to search out a copy. However, it was only of mild interest for me. Part One is about India and Koestler has some sort of spiritual interest in the orient coupled with New York intellectual interest in psychoanalysis that made most of it tedious for me. Especially the long quotes from translated religious texts. I found myself skipping long passages and whole sections of writing. The most interesting bits for me were those about the travel writing types of commentary about squalid conditions and problems he encountered as a traveler. Part Two takes place in Japan and again he relies too much on long passages of books written by others to explain contemporary Japan. Here he is also tediously interested in Zen Buddhism. I suppose I wanted more of a travelogue and found it very much out of date without many incisive insights into either country.
April 10, 2022
interesting but outdated, a lot has changed in Asia in last 50 years. infact thanks to technology and internet many things are exactly same in east as in west.
one thing is sure though many in east won't like it much, yet it is good as a historical document of observations by someone who is not from east.
one thing is sure though many in east won't like it much, yet it is good as a historical document of observations by someone who is not from east.
March 13, 2023
The India section is much too close to a few selected ethnographic sites and much less carries the intrigue of the sweeping yet compelling generalisations that characterises the Japan part. But overall wonderful read. Looking forward to a take by a Japan observer!
May 31, 2017
good book, to be read into it's context and aware of author's expression
March 3, 2020
A very necessary reality check. It is highly suspicous to me that this book is not more widely available.
May 3, 2020
Or maybe closer to three stars, rather narrow minded, pedantic evaluation of Hinduism and zen from a very rational western point of view.
September 7, 2024
Huh, quite something.
November 5, 2010
A debunking of the fantasy of the "spiritual east" by someone, Arthur Koestler, best known for Darkness At Noon, who actually seems fairly sympathetic to that way of thinking (believed in telepathy) and a pretty well-written piece of journalism, especially the opening chapters on post-independence India circa 1950's. I actually enjoyed it; didn't knock my socks off, but would like to read other things by Koestler, who I learned of from a NY Review of Books rehabilition piece awhile back.
maybe-someday
October 1, 2008It didn't get a great review here http://www.amazon.com/review/R8AGXPVJ...
Read
April 21, 2009India has some problems. Japan has different problems. Maybe western civilization isn't so bad after all.
Currently reading
November 12, 2010As much as I love the premise of this book I cannot get past the second chapter. After reading pages over and over again I think it's time to take a break and move on.
August 2, 2022
A profound insight between two contrasting cultures of India and Japan, by one of the greatest thinkers of the 20th century, Arthur Koestler.
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews