The world I live in is loathsome to me, but I feel one with the men who suffer in it.
albert Camusquotes
1913 - 1960
French-Algerian novelist and essayist, Albert Camus (1913-1960) is often called a “spokesman for his generation” and a “mentor for the next.” His dominant contribution to philosophy was his reflection on the Absurd. In The Myth of Sisyphus he calls for a revolt against the futile search for the meaning of life, and to fight for values like truth, moderation and justice while creating personal meaning and autonomy.
In an era of nihilists and communists, Camus was neither and often wrote against such ideas (and often fought drunk, offended communists). During the Nazi Occupation in Paris, Camus joined a resistance movement and wrote as an underground journalist. As a political theorist, he outlined ideas for a liberal humanism that rejected Christian and Marxist dogma.
His dedicated search for moral order (The Rebel), his consistent assertion for human dignity and fraternity (The Plague) won him the Nobel Peace Prize for Literature in 1957 at the age of 44. In characteristic modesty, Camus asserted it should have gone to André Malraux.
Perhaps surprisingly, it was as a playwright that he found the most satisfaction and personal success. His adaptations of Requiem for a Nun and Possession are his most recognized contributions to the theater.
Writing always beyond his ability, Camus said this practice inspired continual effort, but also caused personal exhaustion. He wrestled with depression, and wrote under the burden of perfectionism – never happy in his work, yet always pressing onward.
Camus died in a car accident at the age of 46; his death considered a tragic loss to literature.
Thus, in a middle course between these heights and depths, they drifted through life rather than lived, the prey of aimless days and sterile memories, like wandering shadows that could have acquired substance only by consenting to root themselves in the solid earth of their distress.
What I believe to be true I must therefore preserve. What seems to me so obvious, even against me, I must support.
If the descent is thus sometimes performed in sorrow, it can also take place in joy.
Still, obviously, one can’t be sensible all the time.
If the world were clear, art would not exist.
Let’s not beat around the bush; I love life — that’s my real weakness. I love it so much that I am incapable of imagining what is not life.
Freedom is not a reward or a decoration that you toast in champagne. On the contrary, it’s hard graft and a long-distance run, all alone, very exhausting. Alone in a dreary room, alone in the dock before the judges, and alone to make up your mind, before yourself and before the judgement of others. At the end of every freedom there is a sentence, which is why freedom is too heavy to bear.
He’s incapable of suffering for a long time, or being happy for a long time. Which means that he’s incapable of anything really worth while.
At a certain level of suffering or injustice no one can do anything for anyone. Pain is solitary.