Albert Camus The Stranger Pdf
The Complete stranger by Albert Camus is an extremely brief novel that can easily read in a mid-day. Nonetheless, digesting the content will definitely take much longer as this little novel elevates serious concerns regarding morality, culture, justice, faith, as well as individuality. But with our The Stranger pdf download, you cannot go.
Portrait from New York World-Telegram and Sun Photograph Collection, 1957 | |
Born | 7 November 1913 |
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Died | 4 January 1960 (aged 46) Villeblevin, France |
Cause of death | Car accident |
Alma mater | University of Algiers |
The Stranger / The Outsider The Myth of Sisyphus The Rebel The Plague | |
Era | 20th-century philosophy |
Region | Western philosophy |
School | Continental philosophy Absurdism Existentialism Anarchism Syndicalism |
Main interests | Ethics, humanity, justice, politics, suicide |
Absurdism | |
| |
Signature |
The Stranger PDF - Download as PDF File (.pdf) or view presentation slides online. The stranger by Albert Camus. Free download or read online The Outsider pdf (ePUB) book. The first edition of this novel was published in 1942, and was written by Albert Camus. The book was published in multiple languages including English language, consists of 111 pages and is available in Paperback format.
Albert Camus (/kæˈmuː/; French: [albɛʁ kamy](listen); 7 November 1913 – 4 January 1960) was a French philosopher, author, and journalist. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature at the age of 44 in 1957, the second youngest recipient in history.
Camus was born in Algeria to French parents. He spent his childhood in a poor neighbourhood and later studied philosophy at the University of Algiers. He was in Paris when the Germans invaded France during World War II. Camus tried to flee but finally joined the French Resistance where he served as editor-in-chief at Combat, an outlawed newspaper. After the war, he was a celebrity figure and gave many lectures around the world. He married twice but had many extramarital affairs. Camus was politically active. He was part of the Left that opposed the Soviet Union because of its totalitarianism. Camus was a moralist and was leaning towards anarcho-syndicalism. He was part of many organisations seeking European integration. During the Algerian War, he kept a neutral stance advocating for a multicultural and pluralistic Algeria, a position that caused controversy and was rejected by most parties.
Philosophically, Camus's views contributed to the rise of the philosophy known as absurdism. He is also considered to be an existentialist, despite his having firmly rejected the term throughout his lifetime.
- 1Life
- 5Philosophy
- 7Works
- 10Further reading
Life[edit]
Early years and education[edit]
Albert Camus was born on 7 November 1913 in a working-class neighbourhood in Mondovi (present-day Dréan), in French Algeria. His mother, Catherine Hélène Sintès Camus, was of Spanish-(Balearic) descent. She could only hear with her left ear. His father, Lucien Camus, a poor French-Algerian agricultural worker, died in the Battle of the Marne in 1914 during World War I—Camus never knew him. Camus, his mother and other relatives lived without many basic material possessions during his childhood in the Belcourt section of Algiers. He was a second-generation French immigrant to Algeria. His parental grandfather, along with many others of his generation, had moved to Africa for a better life during the first decades of the 19th century. Hence, he was called pied-noir, 'black foot'—a slang term for French who were born in Algeria—and his binational identity and his poor background had a substantial effect on his later life.[1] Nevertheless, Camus was a French citizen, in contrast to the Arab or Berberic inhabitants of Algeria who were denied the associated privileges this brought.[2] During his childhood, Camus developed a love for soccer and swimming.[3]
Under the influence of his teacher Louis Germain, Camus gained a scholarship in 1924 to continue his studies at a prestigious lyceum (secondary school) near Algiers.[4]In 1930, he was diagnosed with tuberculosis.[3] Because it is a transmitted disease, he moved out of his home and stayed with his uncle Gustave Acault, a butcher, who influenced the young Camus. It was at that time that Camus turned to philosophy, with the mentoring of his philosophy teacher Jean Grenier. He was impressed by ancient Greek philosophers and Friedrich Nietzsche.[3] During that time, he was only able to study part-time. To earn money, he took odd jobs: as a private tutor, car parts clerk, and assistant at the Meteorological Institute.[5]
In 1933, Camus enrolled at the University of Algiers and completed his licence de philosophie (BA) in 1936; after presenting his thesis on Plotinus.[6] Camus developed an interest in early Christian philosophers, but Nietzsche and Arthur Schopenhauer had paved the way towards pessimism and atheism. Camus also studied novelist-philosophers such as Stendhal, Herman Melville, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, and Franz Kafka.[7] In 1933, also met Simone Hié, who would become his first wife.[5]
Camus played goalkeeper for the Racing Universitaire d'Alger junior team from 1928 to 1930.[8] The sense of team spirit, fraternity, and common purpose appealed to Camus enormously.[9] In match reports, he was often praised for playing with passion and courage. Any football ambitions disappeared when he contracted tuberculosis at the age of 17.[8] Camus drew parallels among football, human existence, morality, and personal identity. For him, the simplistic morality of football contradicted the complicated morality imposed by authorities such as the state and Church.[8]
Young Camus[edit]
In 1934, aged 20, Camus was in a relationship with a beautiful drug addict named Simone Hié.[10] She was addicted to morphine, a drug she used to ease her menstrual pains. His uncle Gustave did not approve of the relationship, but Camus married Hié to help her fight her addiction. He later discovered she was in a relationship with her doctor at the same time and the couple later divorced.[5] Camus, a handsome man, was a womanizer throughout his life.[11]
Camus joined the French Communist Party (PCF) in early 1935. He saw it as a way to 'fight inequalities between Europeans and 'natives' in Algeria,' even though he was not a Marxist and had not read Das Kapital (Capital). He explained: 'We might see communism as a springboard and asceticism that prepares the ground for more spiritual activities.' Camus left the PCF a year later.[12] In 1936, the independence-minded Algerian Communist Party (PCA) was founded, and Camus joined it after his mentor Grenier advised him to do so. Camus's main role within the PCA was to organise the Théâtre du Travail (Workers' Theatre). Camus was also close to the Parti du Peuple Algérien (Algerian People's Party/PPA), which was a moderate anti-colonialist/nationalist party. As tensions in the interwar period escalated, the Stalinist PCA and PPA broke ties. Camus was expelled from the PCA for refusing to follow the party line. This series of events sharpened his belief in human dignity. Camus's mistrust of bureaucracies that aimed for efficiency instead of justice grew. He continued his involvement with theatre and renamed his group Théâtre de l'Equipe (Team's Theatre). Some of his scripts were the basis for his later novels.[13]
In 1938, Camus began working for the leftist newspaper Alger Républicain (founded by Pascal Pia) as he had strong anti-fascist feelings, and the rise of fascist regimes in Europe was worrying him. By then, Camus had developed strong feelings against authoritative colonialism as he witnessed the harsh treatment of the Arabs and Berbers by French authorities. Alger Républicain was banned in 1940 and Camus flew to Paris to take a new job at Paris-Soir as editor-in-chief. In Paris, he almost completed his 'first cycle' of works dealing with the absurd and the meaningless—the novel L’Étranger (The Outsider (UK), or The Stranger (US), the philosophical essay Le Mythe de Sisyphe (The Myth of Sisyphus) and the play Caligula. Each cycle consisted of a novel, an essay and a theatrical play. [14]
World War II, Resistance and Combat[edit]
Soon after Camus moved to Paris, the outbreak of World War II reached France. Camus volunteered to join the army but was not accepted having suffered from tuberculosis. As the Germans were marching towards Paris, Camus fled. He was laid-off from Paris Soir and ended up in Lyon where he married pianist and mathematician Francine Faure on 3 December 1940.[15] Camus and Faure moved back to Algeria (Oran) where he taught in primary schools.[16] Because of his tuberculosis, he was forced to move to the French Alps. There he began writing his second cycle of works, this time dealing with revolt—a novel La Peste (The Plague) and a play Le Malentendu (The Misunderstanding). By 1943 he was known because of his earlier work. He returned to Paris where he met and became friends with Jean-Paul Sartre. He also became part of a circle of intellectuals including Simone de Beauvoir, André Breton and others. Among them was the actress Maria Casarès who would later have an affair with Camus.[17]
Camus took an active role in the underground resistance movement against the Germans during the French Occupation. Upon his arrival in Paris, he started working as a journalist and editor of the banned newspaper Combat. He continued writing for the paper after the liberation of France.[17] Camus used a pseudonym for his Combat articles and used false ID cards to avoid being captured. During that period he composed four Lettres à un ami allemand (Letters to a German Friend), explaining why resistance was necessary.[18]
Post-World War II[edit]
Presentation by Olivier Todd on Albert Camus: A Life, December 15, 1997, C-SPAN |
After the War, Camus lived in Paris with Faure, who gave birth to twins—Catherine and Jean—in 1945.[19] Camus was now a celebrated writer known for his role in the resistance. He gave lectures at various universities in the United States and Latin America on two separate trips. He also visited Algeria once more, only to leave disappointed by the continuation of oppressive colonial policies, which he had warned about so many times. During this period he completed the second cycle of his work, with the novel L'Homme révolté (The Rebel). Camus attacked totalitariancommunism while advocating for libertariansocialism and anarcho-syndicalism. Upsetting many of his colleagues and contemporaries in France with his rejection of communism, the book brought about the final split with Sartre. His relations with the Marxist Left deteriorated further during the Algerian War.[20]
Camus was a strong supporter of European integration and participated in various marginal organisations working towards that end.[21] In 1944, he founded the Comité Français pour la Féderation Européenne – CFFE (French Committee for the European Federation) declaring that Europe 'can only evolve along the path of economic progress, democracy, and peace if the nation states become a federation.'[21] In 1947–48, he founded the Groupes de liaison internationale – GLI (Revolutionary Union Movement )[22] a trade union movement in the context of revolutionary syndicalism (syndicalisme révolutionnaire). According to Olivier Todd, in his biography Albert Camus, une vie, (Albert Camus: A Life) it was a group opposed to some tendencies of the Surrealist movement of André Breton. His colleagues were Nicolas Lazarévitch, Louis Mercier, Roger Lapeyre, Paul Chauvet, Auguste Largentier, and Jean de Boë.[23] His main aim was to express the positive side of surrealism and existentialism, rejecting the negativity and the nihilism of André Breton. Camus also raised his voice against the Soviet intervention in Hungary and the totalitarian tendencies of Franco's regime in Spain.[21]
Camus had numerous affairs, particularly an irregular and eventually public affair with the Spanish-born actress María Casares, with whom he had an extensive correspondence.[24] Faure did not take this affair lightly. She had a mental breakdown and needed hospitalisation in the early 1950s. Camus, who felt guilty, withdrew from public life and was slightly depressed for some time.[25]Art of war pdf download.
In 1957, Camus received the news that he was to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. This came as a shock to him. He was anticipating André Malraux would win the prestigious award. At age 44, he was the second-youngest recipient of the prize, after Rudyard Kipling who was 42. After this he began working on his autobiography Le Premier Homme (The First Man) in an attempt to examine 'moral learning'. He also turned to the theatre once more. [26] Financed by the money he received with his Nobel Prize, he adapted and directed for the stage Dostoyesvsky's novel Demons. The play opened in January 1959 at the Antoine Theatre in Paris and was a critical success.[27]
Death[edit]
Camus died on 4 January 1960 at the age of 46, in a car accident near Sens, in Le Grand Fossard in the small town of Villeblevin. He was leaving Paris for a vacation with his publisher, Michel Gallimard, who was driving with his family.[28] Gallimard died a few days later. 144 pages of a handwritten manuscript entitled Le premiere homme (The First Man) were found in the wreckage. Camus had predicted this unfinished novel based on his childhood in Algeria would be his finest work.[19] Camus was buried in the Lourmarin Cemetery, Lourmarin, Vaucluse, France, where he had lived. [29] His friend Sartre read a touching eulogy, paying tribute to Camus’s heroic 'stubborn humanism'.[30]
Literary career[edit]
Albert Camus The Stranger Pdf
Camus's first publication was a play Revolte dans les Asturies (Revolt in the Asturias) written with three friends in May 1936. The subject was the 1934 revolt by Spanish miners that was brutally suppressed by the Spanish government resulting in 1,500 to 2,000 deaths. In May 1937 he wrote his first book, L'Envers et l'Endroit (Betwixt and Between also translated as The Wrong Side and the Right Side). Both were published by Edmond Charlot's small publishing house.[31]
Camus separated his work into three cycles. Each cycle consisted of a novel, a play and an essay. The first was the cycle of the absurd consisting of L'Étranger, Le Mythe de Sysiphe and Caligula. The second was the cycle of the revolt which included La Peste (The Plague), L'Homme révolté (The Rebel) and Les Justes (The Just Assassins). The third, the cycle of the love, consisted of Nemesis. Each cycle was an examination of a theme with the use of a pagan myth and including biblical motifs. [32]
The books in the first cycle were published between 1942 and 1944, but the theme was conceived earlier, at least as far back as 1936.[33] With this cycle, Camus aims to pose a question on the human condition, discuss the world as an absurd place, and warn humanity of the consequences of totalitarianism.[34]
Camus began his work on the second cycle while he was in Algeria, in the last months of 1942, just as the Germans were reaching North Africa.[35] In the second cycle, Camus used Prometheus, who is depicted as a revolutionary humanist, to highlight the nuances between revolution and rebellion. He analyses various aspects of rebellion, its metaphysics, its connection to politics, and examines it under the lens of modernity, of historicity and the absence of a God.[36]
After receiving the Nobel Prize award, Camus gathered, clarified, and published his pacifist leaning views at Actuelles III: Chronique algérienne 1939–1958 (Algerian Chronicles). He then decided to distance himself from the Algerian War as he found the mental burden too heavy. He turned to theatre and the third cycle which was about love and the goddess Nemesis.[26]
Two of Camus's works were published posthumously. The first entitled La mort heureuse (A Happy Death) (1970), features a character named Patrice Mersault, comparable to The Stranger's Meursault. There is scholarly debate about the relationship between the two books. The second was an unfinished novel, Le Premier homme (The First Man) (1995), which Camus was writing before he died. It was an autobiographical work about his childhood in Algeria.
The publication of this book in 1994 has sparked a widespread reconsideration of Camus's allegedly unrepentant colonialism.[37]
Years | Pagan myth | Biblical motif | Novel | Plays |
---|---|---|---|---|
1937–42 | Sisyphus | Alienation, exile | The Stranger (L’Étranger) | Caligula, The Misunderstanding (Le Malentendu) |
1943–52 | Prometheus | Rebellion | The Plague (La Peste) | The State of Siege (L'État de siège) The Just (Les Justes) |
1952–58 | Guilt, the fall; exile & the kingdom; John the Baptist, Christ | The Fall (La Chute) | Adaptations of The Possessed (Dostoevsky); Faulkner's Requiem for a Nun | |
1958– | Nemesis | The Kingdom | The First Man (Le Premier Homme) |
Political stance[edit]
Camus was a moralist; he claimed morality should guide politics. While he did not deny that morals change over time, he rejected classical Marxist doctrine that history defines morality.
Camus was also strongly critical of authoritarian communism, especially in the case of Soviet Marxism, which he considered totalitarianism. Camus rebuked Soviet apologists and their 'decision to call total servitude freedom'.[39] As a proponent of libertarian socialism, he claimed the USSR was not socialist, and the United States was not liberal.[40] His fierce critique of the USSR caused him to clash with others on the political Left, most notably with his friend, Jean-Paul Sartre.
Active in the French Resistance to the German occupation of France during World War II, Camus wrote for and edited the famous Resistance journal Combat. Of the French collaboration with the German occupiers, he wrote: 'Now the only moral value is courage, which is useful here for judging the puppets and chatterboxes who pretend to speak in the name of the people.'[41] After France's liberation, Camus remarked, 'This country does not need a Talleyrand, but a Saint-Just.'[42] The reality of the bloody postwar tribunals soon changed his mind: Camus publicly reversed himself and became a lifelong opponent of capital punishment.[42]
Camus leaned towards anarchism, a tendency that intensified after the 1950s when the moral bankruptcy of the Soviet Union became evident.[43]Camus had been firm against any kind of exploitation, authority and property, bosses, the State and centralisation.[44] Philosophy professor at the University of Montana David Sherman considers Camus an anarchosyndicalist.
For Camus, this claim is ultimately grounded in human nature itself, which, among other things, is characterized by a strong impulse toward both spontaneity and creativity, and his commitment to a radically democratic ('bottom up') form of political organization, as manifested in revolutionary trade-unionism or the Paris Commune of 1871, is, arguably, most in keeping with this fundamental condition of human flourishing. Politically, therefore, whether in 1944 or 1954, Camus is best understood as a libertarian socialist or, more exactly, an anarcho-syndicalist—anarcho-syndicalism being the theory that politics should begin with voluntary associations of cooperative, labor-based groups rather than the state.[45][46]
Graeme Nicholson, considers Camus an existentialist anarchist.[47]
The anarchist André Prudhommeaux first introduced him at a meeting of the Cercle des Étudiants Anarchistes (Anarchist Student Circle) in 1948 as a sympathiser familiar with anarchist thought. Camus wrote for anarchist publications such as Le Libertaire, La Révolution prolétarienne, and Solidaridad Obrera (Workers' Solidarity), the organ of the anarcho-syndicalist Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) (National Confederation of Labor).[48]
Camus kept a neutral stance during the Algerian Revolution.(1954–62) While he was against the violence of the National Liberation Front (FLN) he acknowledged the injustice and brutalities imposed by colonialist France. He was supportive of Pierre Mendès' Unified Socialist Party (PSU) and its approach to the crisis;· Mendes advocated reconciliation. Camus also supported a like-minded Algerian militant, Aziz Kessous. Camus travelled to Algeria to negotiate a truce between both belligerents but was met with distrust by all parties.[49] His confrontation with an Algerian nationalist during his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize caused a sensation. When confronted with the dilemma of choosing between his mother and justice, his response was: 'I have always condemned terrorism, and I must condemn a terrorism that works blindly in the streets of Algiers and one day might strike at my mother and family. I believe in justice, but I will defend my mother before justice.'[50] Camus's critics claimed it reactionary and a result of a colonialist attitude.[51] According to David Sherman, though, Camus was aiming to highlight the false dichotomy of the two choices as the use of terrorism and indiscriminate violence could not bring justice under any circumstances.[50]
He was sharply critical of the proliferation of nuclear weapons and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.[52] In the 1950s, Camus devoted his efforts to human rights. In 1952, he resigned from his work for UNESCO when the UN accepted Spain, under the leadership of General Franco, as a member.[25] Camus maintained his pacifism and resisted capital punishment anywhere in the world. He wrote an essay against capital punishment in collaboration with Arthur Koestler, the writer, intellectual, and founder of the League Against Capital Punishment entitled Reflexions sur la peine Capitale, published by Calmann-Levy in 1957.[53]
Algeria[edit]
The Stranger Camus
Born in Algeria to French parents, Camus was familiar with the institutional racism of France against Arabs, but he was not part of a rich elite. He lived in very poor conditions as a child but was a citizen of France and as such was entitled to citizens' rights; the Arab and Berberic majority of the country were not.[54]
Camus was a vocal advocate of the 'new Mediterranean Culture'. This was a term he used to describe his vision of embracing the multi-ethnicity of the Algerian people, in opposition to 'Latiny', a popular pro-fascist and antisemitic ideology among other Pieds-Noirs—or French or Europeans born in Algeria . For Camus, this vision encapsulated the Hellenic humanism which survived among ordinary people around the Mediterranean Sea.[55] His 1938 address on 'The New Mediterranean Culture' represents Camus's most systematic statement of his views at this time. Camus also supported the Blum-Viollette proposal to grant Algerians full French citizenship in a manifesto with arguments defending this assimilative proposal on radical egalitarian grounds. [56] In 1939, Camus wrote a stinging series of articles for Alger Republicain on the atrocious living conditions of the inhabitants of the Kabylie highlands. He advocated for economic, educational and political reforms as a matter of emergency.[57]
In 1945, following the Sétif and Guelma massacre after Arab revolts against French mistreatment, Camus was one of only a few mainland journalists to visit the colony. He wrote a series of articles reporting on conditions, and advocating for French reforms and concessions to the demands of the Algerian people.[58]
When the Algerian War began in 1954, Camus was confronted with a moral dilemma. He identified with the Pieds-Noirs such as his own parents and defended the French government's actions against the revolt. He argued the Algerian uprising was an integral part of the 'new Arab imperialism' led by Egypt, and an 'anti-Western' offensive orchestrated by Russia to 'encircle Europe' and 'isolate the United States'.[59] Although favouring greater Algerian autonomy or even federation, though not full-scale independence, he believed the Pieds-Noirs and Arabs could co-exist. During the war, he advocated a civil truce that would spare the civilians. It was rejected by both sides who regarded it as foolish. Behind the scenes, he began working for imprisoned Algerians who faced the death penalty.[60] His position drew much criticism from the left who considered colonialism unacceptable. In their eyes, Camus was no longer the defender of the oppressed.[61]
Camus once confided that the troubles in Algeria 'affected him as others feel pain in their lungs.'[62]
Philosophy[edit]
Existentialism[edit]
Even though Camus is mostly connected to Absurdism,[63] he is routinely categorized as an Existentialist, a term he rejected on several occasions.[64]
Camus himself cited his philosophical origins (ancient Greek philosophy, Nietzsche, 17th-century moralists) whereas existentialism arises from the 19th German philosophy (such as Kierkegaard, Karl Jaspers and Heidegger).[65] He also cited his work, The Myth of Sisyphus, which he claimed was a criticism of various aspects of existentialism.[66] Camus was rejecting existentialism as a philosophy, but his critique was mostly focusing on Sartrean existentialism, and to a lesser extent on religious existentialism. He thought that the importance of history held by Marx and Sartre was incompatible with his belief in human freedom.[67] David Sherman and others also suggest the rivalry between Sartre and Camus also played a part in his rejection of existentialism.[68] David Simpson argues further that his humanism and belief in human nature set him apart from the existentialist doctrine that existence precedes essence.[69]
On the other hand, Camus focused most of his philosophy around existential questions. The absurdity of life, the inevitable ending (death) is highlighted in his acts. His belief that the absurd—life being void of meaning, or man's inability to know that meaning if it were to exist—was something that man should embrace. His anti-Christianity, his commitment to individual moral freedom and responsibility are only a few of the similarities with other existential writers.[70] More importantly, Camus addressed one of the fundamental questions of existentialism: the problem of suicide. He wrote: 'There is only one really serious philosophical question, and that is suicide.' Camus viewed the question of suicide as arising naturally as a solution to the absurdity of life.[71]
Absurdism[edit]
Many existentialist writers have addressed the Absurd, each with their own interpretation of what it is and what makes it important. Kierkegaard explains that the absurdity of religious truths prevents us from reaching God rationally.[72] Sartre recognizes the absurdity of individual experience. Camus's thoughts on the Absurd begins with his first cycle of books and the literary essay Le Mythe de Sisyphe, his major work on the subject. In 1942 he published the story of a man living an absurd life in L'Étranger. He also wrote a play about Caligula, a Roman Emperor, pursuing an absurd logic, which was not performed until 1945. His early thoughts appeared in his first collection of essays, L'Envers et l'endroit (Betwixt and Between) in 1937. Absurd themes were expressed with more sophistication in his second collection of essays, Noces (Nuptials), in 1938 and The Wrong Side and the Right Side. In these essays, Camus reflects on the experience of the Absurd.[73] Aspects of the notion of the Absurd can be found in The Plague.[74]
Camus follows Sartre's definition of the Absurd: 'That which is meaningless. Thus man's existence is absurd because his contingency finds no external justification'.[72] The Absurd is created because man, who is placed in an unintelligent universe, realises that human values are not founded on a solid external component; or as Camus himself explains, the Absurd is the result of the 'confrontation between human need and the unreasonable silence of the world.'[75] Even though absurdity is inescapable, Camus does not drift towards nihilism. But the realization of absurdity leads to the question: Why should someone continue to live? Suicide is an option that Camus firmly dismisses as the renunciation of human values and freedom. Rather, he proposes we accept that absurdity is a part of our lives and live with it.[76]
The turning point in Camus's attitude to the Absurd occurs in a collection of four letters to an anonymous German friend, written between July 1943 and July 1944. The first was published in the Revue Libre in 1943, the second in the Cahiers de Libération in 1944, and the third in the newspaper Libertés, in 1945. The four letters were published as Lettres à un ami allemand (Letters to a German Friend) in 1945, and were included in the collection Resistance, Rebellion, and Death.
Camus regretted the continued reference to himself as a 'philosopher of the absurd'. He showed less interest in the Absurd shortly after publishing Le Mythe de Sisyphe. To distinguish his ideas, scholars sometimes refer to the Paradox of the Absurd, when referring to 'Camus's Absurd'.[77]
Revolt[edit]
Camus is known for articulating the case for revolting against any kind of oppression, injustice, or whatever disrespects the human condition. He is cautious enough, however, to set the limits on the rebellion.[78]L'Homme révolté (The Rebel) explains in detail his thoughts on the issue. There, he builds upon the absurd (described in The Myth of Sisyphus) but goes further. In the introduction, where he examines the metaphysics of rebellion, he concludes with the phrase 'I revolt, therefore we exist' implying the recognition of a common human condition. [79] Camus also delineates the difference between revolution and rebellion and notices that history has shown that the rebel's revolution might easily end up to be an oppressive regime. So he places importance on the morals accompanying the revolution.[80] Camus poses a crucial question: Is it possible for humans to act in an ethical and meaningful manner, in a silent universe? According to him the answer is yes, as the experience and awareness of the Absurd creates the moral values and also sets the limits of our actions.[81] Camus separates the modern form of rebellion into two modes. First, there is the metaphysical rebellion, which is 'the movement by which man protests against his condition and against the whole of creation.' The other mode, historical rebellion, is the attempt to materialize the abstract spirit of metaphysical rebellion and change the world. In this attempt, the rebel must balance between the evil of the world and the intrinsic evil which every revolt carries, and not cause any unjustifiable suffering.[82]
Legacy[edit]
Camus's novels and philosophical essays are still influential. After his death, interest in Camus followed the rise (and diminution) of the New Left. Following the collapse of Soviet Union, interest in his alternative road to communism resurfaced.[83] He is remembered for his skeptical humanism and his support for political tolerance, dialogue, and civil rights.[84]
Although Camus has been linked to anti-Soviet communism, reaching as far as anarcho-syndicalism, some neo-liberals have tried to associate him with their policies, e.g. when the French President Nicolas Sarkozy suggested that his remains to be moved to the Panthéon, an idea that angered many on the Left.[85]
Works[edit]
Novels[edit]
- The Stranger (L'Étranger, often translated as The Outsider) (1942)
- The Plague (La Peste) (1947)
- The Fall (La Chute) (1956)
- A Happy Death (La Mort heureuse) (written 1936–38, published posthumously 1971)
- The First Man (Le premier homme) (incomplete, published posthumously 1995)
Short stories[edit]
- Exile and the Kingdom (L'exil et le royaume) (collection, 1957), containing the following short stories:
- 'The Adulterous Woman' (La Femme adultère)
- 'The Renegade or a Confused Spirit' (Le Renégat ou un esprit confus)
- 'The Silent Men' (Les Muets)
- 'The Guest' (L'Hôte)
- 'Jonas or the Artist at Work' (Jonas ou l'artiste au travail)
- 'The Growing Stone' (La Pierre qui pousse)
Albert Camus The Stranger Pdf
Non-fiction books[edit]
- Christian Metaphysics and Neoplatonism (1935)
- Betwixt and Between (L'envers et l'endroit, also translated as The Wrong Side and the Right Side) (collection, 1937)
- Nuptials (Noces) (1938)
- The Myth of Sisyphus (Le Mythe de Sisyphe) (1942)
- The Rebel (L'Homme révolté) (1951)
- Notebooks 1935–1942 (Carnets, mai 1935 —fevrier 1942) (1962)
- Notebooks 1942–1951 (1965)
- American Journals (1978)
- Notebooks 1951–1959 (2008). Published as Carnets Tome III : Mars 1951 – December 1959 (1989)
- Algerian Chronicles (2013) (originally published in 1958 as Chroniques algériennes)
- Correspondance (1944-1959) The correspondance of Albert Camus and Maria Casarès. Prefrace by his daughter, Catherine Camus (2017)
Plays[edit]
- Caligula (performed 1945, written 1938)
- The Misunderstanding (Le Malentendu) (1944)
- The State of Siege (L'État de Siège) (1948)
- The Just Assassins (Les Justes) (1949)
- Requiem for a Nun (Requiem pour une nonne, adapted from William Faulkner's novel by the same name) (1956)
- The Possessed (Les Possédés, adapted from Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel Demons) (1959)
Essays[edit]
- The Crisis of Man (Lecture at Columbia University) (28 March 1946)
- Neither Victims Nor Executioners (Series of essays in Combat) (1946)
- Why Spain? (Essay for the theatrical play L' Etat de Siège) (1948)
- Summer (L'Été) (1954)
- The Ancient Greek Tragedy (Parnassos lecture in Greece) (1956)
- Reflections on the Guillotine (Réflexions sur la guillotine) (Extended essay, 1957)
- Create Dangerously (Essay on Realism and Artistic Creation, lecture at the University of Uppsala in Sweden) (1957)
Collected essays[edit]
- Resistance, Rebellion, and Death (1961) – a collection of essays selected by the author, including the 1945 Lettres à un ami allemand (Letters to a German Friend) and A Defense of Intelligence, a 1945 speech given at a meeting organized by Amitié Française.[86] ; also includes Why Spain?, Reflections on the Guillotine, and Create Dangerously
- Lyrical and Critical Essays (1970) – essays which include L'envers et l'endroit,Noces, and L'Eté
- Youthful Writings (1976)
- Between Hell and Reason: Essays from the Resistance Newspaper 'Combat', 1944–1947 (1991)
- Camus at 'Combat': Writing 1944–1947 (2005)
- Albert Camus Contre la Peine de Mort (2011)
References[edit]
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 10; Hayden 2016, p. 7; Lottman 1979, p. 11; Carroll 2007, pp. 2-3.
- ^Carroll 2007, pp. 2-3.
- ^ abcSherman 2009, p. 11.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 8.
- ^ abcHayden 2016, p. 9.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 11: Camus thesis was titled 'Rapports de l'hellénisme et du christianisme à travers les oeuvres de Plotin et de saint Augustin' ('Relationship of Greek and Christian Thought in Plotinus and St. Augustine') for his diplôme d'études supérieures (roughly equivalent to an MA thesis).
- ^Simpson 2019, Background and Influences.
- ^ abcClarke 2009, p. 488.
- ^Lattal 1995.
- ^Cohn 1986, p. 30; Hayden 2016.
- ^Sherman 2009; Hayden 2016, p. 13.
- ^Todd 2000, pp. 249–250; Sherman 2009, p. 12.
- ^Hayden 2016, pp. 10–11.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 12; Sherman 2009, pp. 12–13.
- ^Hayden 2016, pp. 13–14.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 13.
- ^ abHayden 2016; Sherman 2009, p. 13.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 15.
- ^ abWillsher 2011.
- ^Hayden 2016, pp. 16–17.
- ^ abcHayden 2016, p. 18.
- ^Todd 2000, pp. 249–250.
- ^Boulouque 2000.
- ^Sherman 2009, pp. 14–17; Zaretsky 2018.
- ^ abSherman 2009, p. 17.
- ^ abHayden 2016, p. 19.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 18.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 19; Simpson 2019, Life.
- ^Bloom 2009, p. 52.
- ^Simpson 2019, Life.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 11.
- ^Sharpe 2015, pp. 41–44.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 23.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 41.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 14.
- ^Hayden 2016, pp. 45–47.
- ^Carroll 2007.
- ^Sharpe 2015, p. 44.
- ^Foley 2008, pp. 75–76.
- ^Sherman 2009, pp. 185–87.
- ^Bernstein 1997.
- ^ abBronner 2009, p. 74.
- ^Dunwoodie 1993, p. 86; Marshall 1993, p. 445.
- ^Dunwoodie 1993, p. 87.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 185.
- ^University Of Montana 2015.
- ^Nicholson 1971, p. 14.
- ^Dunwoodie 1993, pp. 87-87: See also appendix p 97; Hayden 2016, p. 18.
- ^Sherman 2009, pp. 17–18 & 188; Cohn 1986, pp. 30 & 38.
- ^ abSherman 2009, p. 191.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 19; Simpson 2019; Marshall 1993, p. 584.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 87.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 73 & 85.
- ^Carroll 2007, pp. 3-4.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 141-143.
- ^Hayden 2016, p. 145.
- ^Sharpe 2015, p. 356.
- ^Foley 2008, pp. 150–151.
- ^Sharpe 2015, p. 322.
- ^Foley 2008, p. 161.
- ^Carroll 2007, pp. 7-8.
- ^Sharpe 2015, p. 9.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 3.
- ^Sharpe 2015, p. 3.
- ^Foley 2008, pp. 1–2; Sharpe 2015, p. 29.
- ^Foley 2008, pp. 2.
- ^Foley 2008, p. 3; Sherman 2009, p. 3.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 4; Simpson 2019, Existentialism.
- ^Simpson 2019, Existentialism.
- ^Sharpe 2015, pp. 5–6; Simpson 2019, Existentialism.
- ^Aronson 2017, Introduction.
- ^ abFoley 2008, pp. 5–6.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 23.
- ^Sherman 2009, p. 8.
- ^Foley 2008, p. 6.
- ^Foley 2008, p. 7-10.
- ^Curtis 1972, p. 335-348.
- ^Sharpe 2015, p. 18; Simpson 2019, Revolt.
- ^Foley 2008, pp. 55–56.
- ^Foley 2008, pp. 56–58.
- ^Hayden 2016, pp. 43–44.
- ^Hayden 2016, pp. 50–55.
- ^Sherman 2009, pp. 207–208.
- ^Sharpe 2015, pp. 241–242.
- ^Zaretsky 2013, pp. 3–4; Sherman 2009, p. 208.
- ^Orme 2007.
Sources[edit]
- Aronson, Ronald (2017). 'Albert Camus'. In Edward N. Zalta (ed.). The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
- Bernstein, Richard (19 December 1997). 'In Camus's notebooks and letters, as quoted in, 'Albert Camus: A Life', By Olivier Todd'. The New York Times. Archived from the original on 10 May 2006. Retrieved 17 October 2009.
- Bloom, Harold (2009). Albert Camus. Infobase Publishing. ISBN978-1-4381-1515-3.
- Boulouque, Sylvain (2000). 'Nicolas Lazarévitch, Itinéraire d'un syndicaliste révolutionnaire'. Communisme.
- Bronner, Stephen Eric (15 September 2009). Camus: Portrait of a Moralist. University of Chicago Press. ISBN978-0-226-07567-9. Retrieved 3 September 2011.
- Carroll, David (4 May 2007). Albert Camus the Algerian: Colonialism, Terrorism, Justice. Columbia University Press. ISBN9780231511766.
- Clarke, Liam (2009). 'Football as a metaphor: learning to cope with life, manage emotional illness and maintain health through to recovery'. Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing. Wiley. 16 (5): 488–492. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2850.2009.01403.x. ISSN1351-0126. PMID19538606.
- Cohn, Robert Greer (1986). 'The True Camus'. The French Review. 60 (1): 30–38. JSTOR393607.
- Curtis, Jerry L. (1 August 1972). 'The absurdity of rebellion'. Man and World. 5 (3): 335–348. doi:10.1007/bf01248640. ISSN0025-1534.
- Dunwoodie, Peter (1993). 'Albert Camus and the Anarchist Alternative'. Australian Journal of French Studies. Liverpool University Press. 30 (1): 84–104. doi:10.3828/ajfs.30.1.84. ISSN0004-9468.
- Foley, John (2008). Albert Camus: From the Absurd to Revolt. McGill-Queen's University Press. ISBN978-0-7735-3467-4.
- Hayden, Patrick (9 February 2016). Camus and the Challenge of Political Thought: Between Despair and Hope. Springer. ISBN978-1-137-52583-3.
- Lattal, Ashley (1995). 'Albert Camus'. Users.muohio.edu. Retrieved 17 October 2009.
- Lottman, Herbert (1979). Albert Camus: A Biography. Axis. ISBN978-1-870845-12-0.
- Marshall, Peter H. (1993). Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism. Fontana. ISBN978-0-00-686245-1.
- Nicholson, Graeme (1971). 'Camus and Heidegger: Anarchists'. University of Toronto Quarterly. 41: 14–23. doi:10.3138/utq.41.1.14.
- Orme, Mark (2007). The Development of Albert Camus's Concern for Social and Political Justice: 'justice Pour Un Juste'. Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. ISBN978-0-8386-4110-1.
- Sharpe, Matthew (3 September 2015). Camus, Philosophe: To Return to our Beginnings. BRILL. ISBN978-90-04-30234-1.
- Sherman, David (30 January 2009). Camus. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN978-1-4443-0328-5.
- Simpson, David (2019). 'Albert Camus (1913—1960)'. The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. ISSN2161-0002.
- 'Philosophy'. University Of Montana. 4 December 2015. Archived from the original on 4 December 2015. Retrieved 4 May 2019.
- Todd, Olivier (2000). Albert Camus: A Life. Carroll & Graf. ISBN978-0-7867-0739-3.
- Willsher, Kim (7 August 2011). 'Albert Camus might have been killed by the KGB for criticising the Soviet Union, claims newspaper'. The Guardian. Retrieved 13 June 2019.
- Zaretsky, Robert (2018). ''No Longer the Person I Was': The Dazzling Correspondence of Albert Camus and Maria Casarès'. Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved 13 April 2018.
- Zaretsky, Robert (7 November 2013). A Life Worth Living. Harvard University Press. ISBN978-0-674-72837-0.
Further reading[edit]
Selected biographies[edit]
- Thody, Philip Malcolm Waller (1957). Albert Camus: A Study of His Work. Hamish Hamilton.
- Brisville, Jean-Claude (1959). Camus. Gallimard.
- Parker, Emmett (1965). Albert Camus: The Artist in the Arena. Univ of Wisconsin Press. ISBN978-0-299-03554-9.
- King, Adele (1964). Albert Camus. Grove Press.
- McCarthy, Patrick (1982). Camus: A Critical Study of His Life and Work. Hamish Hamilton. ISBN978-0-241-10603-7.
- Sprintzen, David (February 1991). Camus: A Critical Examination. Temple University Press. ISBN978-0-87722-827-1.
- King, Adele (12 June 1992). Camus's L'Etranger: Fifty Years on. Palgrave Macmillan UK. ISBN978-1-349-22003-8.
- Bloom, Harold (2009). Albert Camus. Infobase Publishing. ISBN978-1-4381-1515-3.
- Pierre Louis Rey (2006). Camus: l'homme révolté. Gallimard. ISBN978-2-07-031828-5.
- Hawes, Elizabeth (2009). Camus, a Romance. Grove Press. ISBN978-0-8021-1889-9.
- Carroll, Sean B. (2013). Brave Genius: A Scientist, a Philosopher, and Their Daring Adventures from the French Resistance to the Nobel Prize. Crown Publishers. ISBN978-0-307-95234-9.
External links[edit]
- Raymond Gay-Crosier Camus collection at University of Florida Library
- Works by Albert Camus at Faded Page (Canada)
- Works by Albert Camus at Open Library
- Camus, BBC Radio 4 discussion with Peter Dunwoodie, David Walker & Christina Howells (In Our Time, Jan. 3, 2008)