In his magisterial three-volume history, “Main Currents of Marxism,” Kolakowski recorded how that political theory developed over time; but he also diagnosed the political, intellectual, and moral predicament of the European continent over the two centuries partly shaped by Marxist beliefs. In his “Conversations with the Devil,” he created an amusing world parallel to traditional Christian “morality tales,” and deployed his sense of humor to question the hackneyed verities of religion and its opponents, strip them of their philistine shells, yet defend the true moral meaning underlying the old beliefs.