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Resistance, Rebellion and Death: Essays
In the speech he gave upon accepting the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957, Albert Camus said that a writer "cannot serve today those who make history; he must serve those who are subject to it." And in these twenty-three political essays, he demonstrates his commitment to history's victims, from the fallen maquis of the French Resistance to the casualties of the Cold War.
Resistance, Rebellion and Death displays Camus's rigorous moral intelligence addressing issues that range from colonial warfare in Algeria to the social cancer of capital punishment. But this stirring book is above all a reflection on the problem of freedom, and, as such, belongs in the same tradition as the works that gave Camus his reputation as the conscience of our century: The Stranger, The Rebel and The Myth of Sisyphus.
Resistance, Rebellion and Death displays Camus's rigorous moral intelligence addressing issues that range from colonial warfare in Algeria to the social cancer of capital punishment. But this stirring book is above all a reflection on the problem of freedom, and, as such, belongs in the same tradition as the works that gave Camus his reputation as the conscience of our century: The Stranger, The Rebel and The Myth of Sisyphus.
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1960
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About the author
Albert Camus
972 books38.5k followersWorks, such as the novels
The Stranger
(1942) and
The Plague
(1947), of Algerian-born French writer and philosopher Albert Camus concern the absurdity of the human condition; he won the Nobel Prize of 1957 for literature.
Origin and his experiences of this representative of non-metropolitan literature in the 1930s dominated influences in his thought and work.
He also adapted plays of Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Lope de Vega, Dino Buzzati, and Requiem for a Nun of William Faulkner. One may trace his enjoyment of the theater back to his membership in l'Equipe, an Algerian group, whose "collective creation" Révolte dans les Asturies (1934) was banned for political reasons.
Of semi-proletarian parents, early attached to intellectual circles of strongly revolutionary tendencies, with a deep interest, he came at the age of 25 years in 1938; only chance prevented him from pursuing a university career in that field. The man and the times met: Camus joined the resistance movement during the occupation and after the liberation served as a columnist for the newspaper Combat.
The essay Le Mythe de Sisyphe (The Myth of Sisyphus), 1942, expounds notion of acceptance of the absurd of Camus with "the total absence of hope, which has nothing to do with despair, a continual refusal, which must not be confused with renouncement - and a conscious dissatisfaction."
Meursault, central character of L'Étranger (The Stranger), 1942, illustrates much of this essay: man as the nauseated victim of the absurd orthodoxy of habit, later - when the young killer faces execution - tempted by despair, hope, and salvation.
Besides his fiction and essays, Camus very actively produced plays in the theater (e.g., Caligula, 1944).
The time demanded his response, chiefly in his activities, but in 1947, Camus retired from political journalism.
Doctor Rieux of La Peste (The Plague), 1947, who tirelessly attends the plague-stricken citizens of Oran, enacts the revolt against a world of the absurd and of injustice, and confirms words: "We refuse to despair of mankind. Without having the unreasonable ambition to save men, we still want to serve them."
People also well know La Chute (The Fall), work of Camus in 1956.
Camus authored L'Exil et le royaume (Exile and the Kingdom) in 1957. His austere search for moral order found its aesthetic correlative in the classicism of his art. He styled of great purity, intense concentration, and rationality.
Camus died at the age of 46 years in a car accident near Sens in le Grand Fossard in the small town of Villeblevin.
Chinese 阿尔贝·加缪
Origin and his experiences of this representative of non-metropolitan literature in the 1930s dominated influences in his thought and work.
He also adapted plays of Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Lope de Vega, Dino Buzzati, and Requiem for a Nun of William Faulkner. One may trace his enjoyment of the theater back to his membership in l'Equipe, an Algerian group, whose "collective creation" Révolte dans les Asturies (1934) was banned for political reasons.
Of semi-proletarian parents, early attached to intellectual circles of strongly revolutionary tendencies, with a deep interest, he came at the age of 25 years in 1938; only chance prevented him from pursuing a university career in that field. The man and the times met: Camus joined the resistance movement during the occupation and after the liberation served as a columnist for the newspaper Combat.
The essay Le Mythe de Sisyphe (The Myth of Sisyphus), 1942, expounds notion of acceptance of the absurd of Camus with "the total absence of hope, which has nothing to do with despair, a continual refusal, which must not be confused with renouncement - and a conscious dissatisfaction."
Meursault, central character of L'Étranger (The Stranger), 1942, illustrates much of this essay: man as the nauseated victim of the absurd orthodoxy of habit, later - when the young killer faces execution - tempted by despair, hope, and salvation.
Besides his fiction and essays, Camus very actively produced plays in the theater (e.g., Caligula, 1944).
The time demanded his response, chiefly in his activities, but in 1947, Camus retired from political journalism.
Doctor Rieux of La Peste (The Plague), 1947, who tirelessly attends the plague-stricken citizens of Oran, enacts the revolt against a world of the absurd and of injustice, and confirms words: "We refuse to despair of mankind. Without having the unreasonable ambition to save men, we still want to serve them."
People also well know La Chute (The Fall), work of Camus in 1956.
Camus authored L'Exil et le royaume (Exile and the Kingdom) in 1957. His austere search for moral order found its aesthetic correlative in the classicism of his art. He styled of great purity, intense concentration, and rationality.
Camus died at the age of 46 years in a car accident near Sens in le Grand Fossard in the small town of Villeblevin.
Chinese 阿尔贝·加缪
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 224 reviews
December 13, 2015
Albert Camus is one of the great consciences of the 20th century, along with Adam Michnik of Poland, Vaclav Havel of Czechoslovakia, and Aleksander Solzhenitsyn of Russia. The essays in Resistance, Rebellion and Death: Essays come from the 1940s and 1950s. The subjects dealt with include Nazism, Hungary (1956), capital punishment, Algeria, and the moral responsibility of the writer.
The more I read of Camus, the more I admire him -- as a writer, as a philosopher, and as a political thinker. When he died in that 1960 car crash, we lost someone we badly needed in this era of moral ambiguity.
The more I read of Camus, the more I admire him -- as a writer, as a philosopher, and as a political thinker. When he died in that 1960 car crash, we lost someone we badly needed in this era of moral ambiguity.
July 21, 2009
"...But I merely wanted to express that anguish I feel every day when faced with the decrease of liberal energies, the prostituting of words, the slandered victims, the smug justification of oppression, the insane admiration of force. We see a multiplication of those minds of whom it has been said that they seemed to count an inclination towards slavery as an ingredient of virtue. We see the intelligence seeking justifications for its fear, and finding them readily, for every cowardice has its own philosophy. Indignation is measured, silences take counsel from one another, and history has ceased to be anything but Noah's cloak that is spread over the victims' obscenity. In short, all flee real responsibility, the effort of being consistent or having an opinion of one's own, in order to take refuge in the parties or groups that will think for them, express their anger for them, and make their plans for them. Contemporary intelligence seems to measure the truth of doctrines and causes solely by the number of armored divisions on the field. Thenceforth everything is good that justifies the slaughter of freedom, whether it be the nation, the people, or the grandeur of the State. The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving the servants of tyranny a good conscience..."
Favorite Quote: The world I live in is loathsome to me, but I feel one with the men who suffer in it.
Favorite Quote: The world I live in is loathsome to me, but I feel one with the men who suffer in it.
March 24, 2011
I find it incredibly depressing that certain books are out of print and somewhat difficult to find. This is one of them. This is one of those books whose relevance is not constrained to the time it was written in. Change the names of the countries and people and it could have been written for today. I genuinely believe everyone should read this who cares about the world around them and what's going on in it.
It also does a fantastic job of fleshing out much of Camus' philosophies that are covered in his novels in a much more direct way since it takes the fictional aspect out of them.
It also does a fantastic job of fleshing out much of Camus' philosophies that are covered in his novels in a much more direct way since it takes the fictional aspect out of them.
May 22, 2024
‘It is merely that we didn’t give the same meaning to the same words; we no longer speak the same language. Words always take on the colour of the deeds or the sacrifices they evoke.’
You are either with Camus, or Sartre, right? Two-timing both is just pretty fucking bizarre, no? Who am I to say. Regardless, I’ve always been team Camus, still is, and reading this just reconfirms/reminds me of it. And I think this is a ‘lite’ version, or at least a more digestible biblio-platter of the core ideas of The Rebel. Fab intro to Camus’ political stance amongst his other views (France, Algeria, ‘art’, etc). But notably that – because that is precisely what wrecked his friendship with Sartre. Anyway I can never bring myself to finish anything written by Sartre, so that should be telling enough.
‘In the battles of our time I have always been on the side of the obstinate, on the side of those who have never despaired of a certain honour. I have shared and I still share many of the contemporary frenzies. But I have never been able to get myself to spit, as so many others do, on the word “honour.” Doubtless because I was and am aware of my human weaknesses and of my injustices, because I instinctively knew and still know that honour (like pity) is an unreasonable virtue that takes the place of justice and reason, which have become powerless. The man whose blood, extravagances, and frail heart lead him to the commonest weaknesses must rely on something in order to get to the point of respecting himself and hence of respecting others. This is why I loathe a certain self-satisfied virtue. I loathe society’s dreadful morality because it results, exactly like absolute cynicism, in making men despair and in keeping them from taking responsibility for their own life with all its weight of errors and greatness.’
‘I confess, insofar as I am concerned, that I cannot love all humanity except with a vast and somewhat abstract love. But I love a few men, living or dead, with such force and admiration that I am always eager to preserve in others what will someday perhaps make them resemble those I love. Freedom is nothing else but a chance to be better, whereas enslavement is a certainty of the worst.’
‘Sometimes on a street corner, in the brief intervals of the long struggle that involves us all, I happen to think of all those places in Europe I know well. It is a magnificent land moulded by suffering and history. I relive those pilgrimages I once made with all the men of the West: the roses in the cloisters of Florence, the gilded bulbous domes of Krakow, the Hradschin and its dead palaces, the contorted statues of the Charles Bridge over the Ultava, the delicate gardens of Salzburg. All those flowers and stones, those hills and those landscapes where men’s time and the world’s time have mingled old trees and monuments—My memory has fused together such superimposed images to make a single face, which is the face of my true native land.
And then I feel a pang when I think that, for years now, your shadow has been cast over that vital, tortured face. Yet some of those places are ones that you and I saw together. It never occurred to me then that someday we should have to liberate them from you. And even now, at certain moments of rage and despair, I am occasionally sorry that the roses continue to grow in the cloister of San Marco and the pigeons drop in clusters from the Cathedral of Salzburg, and the red geraniums grow tirelessly in the little cemeteries of Silesia.—But at other moments, and they are the only ones that count, I delight in this. For all those landscapes, those flowers and those ploughed fields, the oldest of lands, show you every spring that there are things you cannot choke in blood. That is the image on which I can close.’
May 17, 2020
Worth reading just for "Reflections on the Guillotine," which is perhaps the single most persuasive argument against capital punishment I have ever read.
November 21, 2020
The last time I saw him was in Paris in the spring of 1944. We were never closer to each other than during that last meeting. We had met in a restaurant in Rue Saint-Benoît, and afterward, walking along the quais in beautiful weather, we had spoken at length of the future. We were in such deep agreement that for the first time I felt an absolute confidence in the future of our country.
Camus writes here of the last time he saw his friend Rene Leynaud who was later murdered by the Nazis.
Camus is one of my favorite authors. There are many well written passages in this collection too. Most of Camus’ essays are on resistance. It should be noted that many of the essays seem quite dated. Writing about Algeria, Spain and Hungary in the early ‘50s is a little hard for me to place contextually. But other essays feel like they could be written about our current Trump dystopia.
Here are some passages including this part of a letter that Camus sent to a German friend who joined the Nazi party. It was was sent shortly before the liberation of Paris in 1944.
The dawn about to break will mark your final defeat. I know that heaven, which was indifferent to your horrible victories, will be equally indifferent to your just defeat. Even now I expect nothing from heaven. But we shall at least have helped save man from the solitude to which you wanted to relegate him. Because you scorned such faith in mankind, you are the men who, by thousands, are going to die solitary. Now, I can say farewell to you.
or his essay arguing against the guillotine
If fear of death is, indeed, a fact, another fact is that such fear, however great it may be, has never sufficed to quell human passions. Bacon is right in saying that there is no passion so weak that it cannot confront and overpower fear of death. Revenge, love, honor, pain, another fear manage to overcome it. How could cupidity, hatred, jealousy fail to do what love of a person or a country, what a passion for freedom manage to do? For centuries the death penalty, often accompanied by barbarous refinements, has been trying to hold crime in check; yet crime persists.
If you like Camus or like humanist writing you will appreciate this book.
4 stars
Camus writes here of the last time he saw his friend Rene Leynaud who was later murdered by the Nazis.
Camus is one of my favorite authors. There are many well written passages in this collection too. Most of Camus’ essays are on resistance. It should be noted that many of the essays seem quite dated. Writing about Algeria, Spain and Hungary in the early ‘50s is a little hard for me to place contextually. But other essays feel like they could be written about our current Trump dystopia.
Here are some passages including this part of a letter that Camus sent to a German friend who joined the Nazi party. It was was sent shortly before the liberation of Paris in 1944.
The dawn about to break will mark your final defeat. I know that heaven, which was indifferent to your horrible victories, will be equally indifferent to your just defeat. Even now I expect nothing from heaven. But we shall at least have helped save man from the solitude to which you wanted to relegate him. Because you scorned such faith in mankind, you are the men who, by thousands, are going to die solitary. Now, I can say farewell to you.
or his essay arguing against the guillotine
If fear of death is, indeed, a fact, another fact is that such fear, however great it may be, has never sufficed to quell human passions. Bacon is right in saying that there is no passion so weak that it cannot confront and overpower fear of death. Revenge, love, honor, pain, another fear manage to overcome it. How could cupidity, hatred, jealousy fail to do what love of a person or a country, what a passion for freedom manage to do? For centuries the death penalty, often accompanied by barbarous refinements, has been trying to hold crime in check; yet crime persists.
If you like Camus or like humanist writing you will appreciate this book.
4 stars
October 17, 2016
I've always had conflicting feelings about Camus. He is a naive political writer; but I have always felt uncomfortable with my judgment of this naivetè. There are times when I suspect he had, in his reading of the world, reached a higher naiveté, the naiveté of wise men and the thinking faithful -- that he truly did understand more sophisticated views, but also saw them for what they truly were: sophistical.
There are a great many moments that reinforce this feeling. When, for example, moral questions brought about by recent events (shootings, bombings, the disaster that is our climate—that is, the usual, tired suspects) impress themselves upon you, when the world presents itself in its starkest, least subtle terms, it can be tremendously helpful to be reminded that the search for subtlety and nuance (the most recent instances of which might be the innumerable pieces being printed by Eggers, Saunders, and many others on the humanity of a certain sect of racist conservatives, as though this were some great secret, as if a sin could belong to anything but a human) is often more akin to navel-gazing than truth-seeking.
Still, I do not enjoy the essays in this book, and most days I find myself thinking Camus really was just naive in the common sense of the term. If the essays are edifying, they are more so as tools and reminders than as exemplars of thought or essais, in Montaigne's sense, into unknown moral, intellectual, or humanistic waters. These are not subtle or interesting pieces. They probe nothing, and deal with absolutes, rather than dilemmas. Therefore I cannot give the book a full-hearted recommendation. But I would like to, and that should say something in its favor.
It is a strange thing, to find yourself at once believing that a writer and his work have been tremendously important to you and your moral development, if only due to the thousand accidents of biography, and at the same time to understand that if you came upon him for the first time now, you would never give him a second glance. People often talk about coming to books too early to appreciate them; but what about coming too late? Happily, I found him at just the right time; and for this reason I wouldn't warn anyone away. Perhaps it is the right time for you, too. Come in, there are riches here. Just make sure you find the first course to your liking before you decide to stay.
There are a great many moments that reinforce this feeling. When, for example, moral questions brought about by recent events (shootings, bombings, the disaster that is our climate—that is, the usual, tired suspects) impress themselves upon you, when the world presents itself in its starkest, least subtle terms, it can be tremendously helpful to be reminded that the search for subtlety and nuance (the most recent instances of which might be the innumerable pieces being printed by Eggers, Saunders, and many others on the humanity of a certain sect of racist conservatives, as though this were some great secret, as if a sin could belong to anything but a human) is often more akin to navel-gazing than truth-seeking.
Still, I do not enjoy the essays in this book, and most days I find myself thinking Camus really was just naive in the common sense of the term. If the essays are edifying, they are more so as tools and reminders than as exemplars of thought or essais, in Montaigne's sense, into unknown moral, intellectual, or humanistic waters. These are not subtle or interesting pieces. They probe nothing, and deal with absolutes, rather than dilemmas. Therefore I cannot give the book a full-hearted recommendation. But I would like to, and that should say something in its favor.
It is a strange thing, to find yourself at once believing that a writer and his work have been tremendously important to you and your moral development, if only due to the thousand accidents of biography, and at the same time to understand that if you came upon him for the first time now, you would never give him a second glance. People often talk about coming to books too early to appreciate them; but what about coming too late? Happily, I found him at just the right time; and for this reason I wouldn't warn anyone away. Perhaps it is the right time for you, too. Come in, there are riches here. Just make sure you find the first course to your liking before you decide to stay.
October 23, 2012
A tour de force. One man, both artist and philosopher, tackling the great dilemmas and ideas of his time, with thought that is clean, bristling with energy and timeless. A superb collection of essays concerning topics from the French Resistance in WWII, racism and strife in French-Arab Algeria, the death penalty and the philosophy of art.
October 17, 2017
Albert Camus is a lucid and engaging writer; even in translation, one can recognize the powerful originality of his metaphors and analogies. And unlike some his of continental peers, he endorses a fairly common-sense version of classical liberalism. As he writes in "Bread and Freedom," freedom is the paramount human value: If you have food, say, but no freedom, then you live in precarity. But freedom, as a matter of definition, entails access to food and other necessities.*
Many of these essays focus on particular issues of the day—the Resistance, the colonization of Algeria, etc. But their relevance wends its fingers into the present. In the pieces on Algeria, Camus raises the generational dilemma of colonialism: to what extent are second (or third or fourth…) generation colonizers morally responsible for the actions of their forbearers? He doesn't provide concrete answers (are there any?), but frames the issue with sympathy and intellectual integrity.
An especial highlight is "Reflections on the Guillotine," which finds Camus railing against France's death penalty. Notably, he points out the consequentialist perils of capital punishment, given the risk of wrongful imprisonment, and the fact that would-be criminals are unlikely to be deterred by potential future punishments. Both insights continue to crop up in present-day debates on the subject.
I could see myself upping this rating upon a second read through.
* Martha Nussbaum and Amartya Sen, in developing their "capability approach" to economics, have made similar arguments.
Many of these essays focus on particular issues of the day—the Resistance, the colonization of Algeria, etc. But their relevance wends its fingers into the present. In the pieces on Algeria, Camus raises the generational dilemma of colonialism: to what extent are second (or third or fourth…) generation colonizers morally responsible for the actions of their forbearers? He doesn't provide concrete answers (are there any?), but frames the issue with sympathy and intellectual integrity.
An especial highlight is "Reflections on the Guillotine," which finds Camus railing against France's death penalty. Notably, he points out the consequentialist perils of capital punishment, given the risk of wrongful imprisonment, and the fact that would-be criminals are unlikely to be deterred by potential future punishments. Both insights continue to crop up in present-day debates on the subject.
I could see myself upping this rating upon a second read through.
* Martha Nussbaum and Amartya Sen, in developing their "capability approach" to economics, have made similar arguments.
September 25, 2016
These are several essays written by Camus covering lots of Political, social, artistic topics. I got to touch the artistic & noble side of him in so many paragraphs as per my excerpts below, however I loathed his articles about Algeria as I couldn't understand his point of view. Freedom should be the same for all nations, not to be seek when the Oppressor is France for God's sake!
* Man is that force which ultimately cancels all tyrants and gods.
* And we, who call ourselves defenders of the spirit, know nevertheless that the spirit can die when the force crushing it is great enough.
* I, on the contrary, chose justice in order to remain faithful to the world. I continue to believe that this world has no ultimate meaning. But I know that something in it has a meaning and that is man, because he is the only creature to insist on having one.
* If someone takes away your bread, he suppresses your freedom at the same time. But if someone takes away your freedom, you may be sure that your bread is threatened, for it depends no longer on your and your struggle but on the whim of a master.
* For it was not a learned professor but a Budapest blacksmith who wrote: "I want to be considered an adult eager to think and capable of thought. I want to be able to express my thoughts without having anything to fear and I want, also, to be listened to"
* And the truth , as I see it at least, is that the artist is groping his way in the dark, just like the man in the street - incapable himself from the world's misfortune and passionately longing for solitude and silence, dreaming of justice, yet being himself a source of injustice; dragged - even though he thinks he is driving it - behind a chariot that is bigger than he.
* Man is that force which ultimately cancels all tyrants and gods.
* And we, who call ourselves defenders of the spirit, know nevertheless that the spirit can die when the force crushing it is great enough.
* I, on the contrary, chose justice in order to remain faithful to the world. I continue to believe that this world has no ultimate meaning. But I know that something in it has a meaning and that is man, because he is the only creature to insist on having one.
* If someone takes away your bread, he suppresses your freedom at the same time. But if someone takes away your freedom, you may be sure that your bread is threatened, for it depends no longer on your and your struggle but on the whim of a master.
* For it was not a learned professor but a Budapest blacksmith who wrote: "I want to be considered an adult eager to think and capable of thought. I want to be able to express my thoughts without having anything to fear and I want, also, to be listened to"
* And the truth , as I see it at least, is that the artist is groping his way in the dark, just like the man in the street - incapable himself from the world's misfortune and passionately longing for solitude and silence, dreaming of justice, yet being himself a source of injustice; dragged - even though he thinks he is driving it - behind a chariot that is bigger than he.
November 20, 2025
Camus is the voice of a generation, not by choice or destiny, but by bravery and unwavering belief in liberty and art, both of which are wrapped in the human spirit.
This work certainly fleshes out Camus character and philosophy more than any other of his writings. I loved the collection of letters to a German friend, published during the occupation of Paris by his own underground anti-Nazi newspaper, proclaiming the doctrines of freedom and responsibility for a unified Europe. I enjoyed the Algerian resistance works, however it did feel like a lack of historical context and understanding limited my reading experience. Reflections on the Guillotine was incredible, touching on the morality of the masses and control of the state, fighting not for criminals but for human beings and the right to life. Live bravely, create dangerously.
This work certainly fleshes out Camus character and philosophy more than any other of his writings. I loved the collection of letters to a German friend, published during the occupation of Paris by his own underground anti-Nazi newspaper, proclaiming the doctrines of freedom and responsibility for a unified Europe. I enjoyed the Algerian resistance works, however it did feel like a lack of historical context and understanding limited my reading experience. Reflections on the Guillotine was incredible, touching on the morality of the masses and control of the state, fighting not for criminals but for human beings and the right to life. Live bravely, create dangerously.
February 8, 2009
This is a collection of articles Camus wrote between 1939-1958, concerning the siuation in French Algeria.
Read
May 22, 2019I’m not good at giving stars to books.
In the beginning, if I really liked a book I’d give four or five stars, but to this day I don’t know what that means. Then I decided to leave it to the instinct when in the last page of the book.
But even if I accept my relativism as original, not biased, or accidentally condescending and that I have come up with a perfect “star-giving” mechanism, I’d still ask myself “How could you rate a philosopher like Camus with stars and grades? Isn’t philosophy’s goal to set thinking free from all tyrannical attempts to stop its search from meaning. Where would we be today if it weren’t for the thinkers who every now and then jump off the crowds just to show that as a metaphor, humanity as an ocean is better than a river.
Here’s another quote from the book, in addition to the one I posted when I started reading it.
Nothing is given to men, and the little they can conquer is paid for with unjust deaths. But man’s greatness lies elsewhere. It lies in his decision to be stronger than his condition. And if his condition is unjust, he has only one way of overcoming it, which is to be just himself.
In the beginning, if I really liked a book I’d give four or five stars, but to this day I don’t know what that means. Then I decided to leave it to the instinct when in the last page of the book.
But even if I accept my relativism as original, not biased, or accidentally condescending and that I have come up with a perfect “star-giving” mechanism, I’d still ask myself “How could you rate a philosopher like Camus with stars and grades? Isn’t philosophy’s goal to set thinking free from all tyrannical attempts to stop its search from meaning. Where would we be today if it weren’t for the thinkers who every now and then jump off the crowds just to show that as a metaphor, humanity as an ocean is better than a river.
Here’s another quote from the book, in addition to the one I posted when I started reading it.
Nothing is given to men, and the little they can conquer is paid for with unjust deaths. But man’s greatness lies elsewhere. It lies in his decision to be stronger than his condition. And if his condition is unjust, he has only one way of overcoming it, which is to be just himself.
April 12, 2022
Wonder if Camus had a feeling how relevant his writing would be over half a century later. Elegant prose and sound ideas, though 40 pages against the death sentence (preaching to the choir here) was a bit too much (though written with purpose and strength).
December 7, 2016
Powerfully and staggeringly timely.
Man is mortal. That may be, but let us die resisting; and if our lot is complete annihilation, let us not behave in such a way that it seems justice!
I chose justice in order to remain faithful to the world. I continue to believe that this world has no ultimate meaning. But I know that something in it has a meaning and that is man, because he is the only creature to insist on having one: hence he must be saved if we want to save the idea we have of life.
Despite the clamors and the violence, we tried to preserve in our hearts the memory of a happy sea, of a remembered hill, the smile of a beloved face. This was our best weapon, the one we shall never put away. But we know now that the weapons of happiness cannot be forged without considerable time and too much blood.
The moment people begin rejecting the mystifications on which nihilism is based, then hope is possible. The whole question is whether or not we shall develop faster than the rocket with a nuclear warhead. And unfortunately, the fruits of the spirit are slower to ripen than intercontinental missiles. But, after all, since atomic war would divest any future of its meaning, it gives us complete freedom of action. We have nothing to lose except everything. So let's go ahead. This is the wager of our generation. If we are to fail, it is better, in any case, to have stood on the side of those who choose life than on the side of those who are destroying.
The rebirth is in the hands of all of us. It is up to us if the West is to bring forth any anti-Alexanders to tie together the Gordian Knot of civilization cut by the sword. For this purpose, we must assume all the risks and labors of freedom. There is no need of knowing whether, by pursuing justice, we shall manage to preserve liberty. It is essential to know that without liberty, we shall achieve nothing and that we shall lose both future justice and ancient beauty. And art unites whereas tyranny separates.
Man is mortal. That may be, but let us die resisting; and if our lot is complete annihilation, let us not behave in such a way that it seems justice!
I chose justice in order to remain faithful to the world. I continue to believe that this world has no ultimate meaning. But I know that something in it has a meaning and that is man, because he is the only creature to insist on having one: hence he must be saved if we want to save the idea we have of life.
Despite the clamors and the violence, we tried to preserve in our hearts the memory of a happy sea, of a remembered hill, the smile of a beloved face. This was our best weapon, the one we shall never put away. But we know now that the weapons of happiness cannot be forged without considerable time and too much blood.
The moment people begin rejecting the mystifications on which nihilism is based, then hope is possible. The whole question is whether or not we shall develop faster than the rocket with a nuclear warhead. And unfortunately, the fruits of the spirit are slower to ripen than intercontinental missiles. But, after all, since atomic war would divest any future of its meaning, it gives us complete freedom of action. We have nothing to lose except everything. So let's go ahead. This is the wager of our generation. If we are to fail, it is better, in any case, to have stood on the side of those who choose life than on the side of those who are destroying.
The rebirth is in the hands of all of us. It is up to us if the West is to bring forth any anti-Alexanders to tie together the Gordian Knot of civilization cut by the sword. For this purpose, we must assume all the risks and labors of freedom. There is no need of knowing whether, by pursuing justice, we shall manage to preserve liberty. It is essential to know that without liberty, we shall achieve nothing and that we shall lose both future justice and ancient beauty. And art unites whereas tyranny separates.
August 16, 2014
I believe one of the descriptions of this book by the publisher state that this collection of writings is a masterful demonstration of Camus' "moral intelligence" and I simply couldn't agree more. The political writings of Camus range from his time in the French Resistance to the Algerian War (itself a personal struggle for Camus) and finally to the crushed revolt in Hungary and other discourses on the evils of totalitarianism. Throughout the works, one gets a understanding of the idea of justice and liberty that is in the forefront of Camus' political beliefs. It's not always flattering to Western Civilization but it provides the framework for an understanding of the drive to truth, justice, and liberty that used to motivate our political systems.
I think anyone that aspires to enter the political arena or simply to understand what politics should be about should definitely read this collection. It's particularly relevant given our time's delicate (and perhaps broken) balance between security and freedom. The passages on Hungary seem particularly relevant given recent events in Ukraine and elsewhere in the former Soviet Union. Perhaps if our public servants had taken a moment to reflect on Camus' take on the popular political "buzzwords" they like to use in their speeches while steadfastly refusing to act upon their concepts, there wouldn't been as much death and destruction in this world.
I think anyone that aspires to enter the political arena or simply to understand what politics should be about should definitely read this collection. It's particularly relevant given our time's delicate (and perhaps broken) balance between security and freedom. The passages on Hungary seem particularly relevant given recent events in Ukraine and elsewhere in the former Soviet Union. Perhaps if our public servants had taken a moment to reflect on Camus' take on the popular political "buzzwords" they like to use in their speeches while steadfastly refusing to act upon their concepts, there wouldn't been as much death and destruction in this world.
October 8, 2014
Albert Camus is an extremely talented writer and a great humanist. I loved the book, especially Letters to a German Friend, Algeria, Reflections on the Guillotine. Some of the quotes I loved from the essays:
“Today freedom has not many allies. I have been known to say that the real passion of the twentieth century was slavery”.
“Men like you and me who in the morning patted children on the head would a few hours later become meticulous executioners.”
“Perhaps we cannot prevent this world from being a world in which children are tortured. But we can reduce the number of tortured.”
“And forceful intellectuals announced to the worker that bread alone interested him rather than freedom, as if the worker didn’t know that his bread depends in part on his freedom.”
“A free press can of course be good or bad, but, most certainly, without freedom it will never be anything but bad.”
“To justify himself, each relies on the other’s crime.”
“When historical truth is involved, the more anyone claims to possess it the more he lies.”
“It is better for the intellectual not to talk all the time. To begin with, it would exhaust him, and, above all, it would keep him from thinking. He must create if he can, first and foremost, especially if his creation does not sidestep the problems of his time.”
“No great work has ever been based on hatred or contempt.”
“Today freedom has not many allies. I have been known to say that the real passion of the twentieth century was slavery”.
“Men like you and me who in the morning patted children on the head would a few hours later become meticulous executioners.”
“Perhaps we cannot prevent this world from being a world in which children are tortured. But we can reduce the number of tortured.”
“And forceful intellectuals announced to the worker that bread alone interested him rather than freedom, as if the worker didn’t know that his bread depends in part on his freedom.”
“A free press can of course be good or bad, but, most certainly, without freedom it will never be anything but bad.”
“To justify himself, each relies on the other’s crime.”
“When historical truth is involved, the more anyone claims to possess it the more he lies.”
“It is better for the intellectual not to talk all the time. To begin with, it would exhaust him, and, above all, it would keep him from thinking. He must create if he can, first and foremost, especially if his creation does not sidestep the problems of his time.”
“No great work has ever been based on hatred or contempt.”
October 12, 2016
Recommended to those looking to learn about Camus's political stance (that put him apart from Sartre).
This is not particularly easy or enjoyable to read, but I think Camus is more explicit than normal about his position in these many separate essays.
A crude summary might be: 'noone should die for an ideology, the loss of liberty imposed by any totalitarian government makes it have a net negative result, and nihilism is not the way forward for post-WWII societies'.
Camus is a charming militant pacifist, but I honestly don't know enough about the political situations to know whether he was being reasonable here, but at least in theory it seems so.
This is not particularly easy or enjoyable to read, but I think Camus is more explicit than normal about his position in these many separate essays.
A crude summary might be: 'noone should die for an ideology, the loss of liberty imposed by any totalitarian government makes it have a net negative result, and nihilism is not the way forward for post-WWII societies'.
Camus is a charming militant pacifist, but I honestly don't know enough about the political situations to know whether he was being reasonable here, but at least in theory it seems so.
February 1, 2017
It's a little remarkable how relevant some of these essays still are given their subject matter.
"If absolute truth belongs to anyone in this world, it certainly does not belong to the man or party that claims to possess it. When historical truth is involved, the more anyone claims to possess it the more he lies." p 165
"If absolute truth belongs to anyone in this world, it certainly does not belong to the man or party that claims to possess it. When historical truth is involved, the more anyone claims to possess it the more he lies." p 165
October 17, 2025
If i could ever wish for sth,i would have wished to have but a glimpse of Camus s fluency nd insight,how beautifuly the written and spoken words come to him,how easily they are put together,to convey meanings,to sound complaints to enrage and enlighten,to shput out whenever the human rights are spoiled,Camus acts as a beacon of humanity s concious,and what a herculean task it is to be such a person!im deeply impressed by Camus whilst reading this piece for once again it proves nd demonstrate that such artists,such writer could exist,to reach beyond their written words of philosophy nd literature into real life events as parties with no affiliations or hidden agenda to promote idealogies implicted by goverments or religions..parties concerned with nothing but the wellfare of human s short mortal life and tired concious!
August 20, 2025
RTC - another banger by papa 🫠
October 10, 2013
I read this while visiting Ed Erickson and other friends at the University of Illinois in Champaign/Urbana while on Xmas break from Grinnell College--one of many visits to the U of I made possible by the fact that they were on a quarter system while we were on a semester one.
The biggest impression made by this book was in terms of Camus' treatment of the Algerian independence movement (the most prominent topic in this collection) which was nearing success at the time of this book's publication and its author's death. On the one hand, I had an almost kneejerk approval of any and all anti-colonialist movements at the time. On the other hand, Camus' tortured attempts to justify a continued French presence in the land of his birth was poignant. The associations to Palestine were obvious and the emotions engendered in me were complex and confused.
The biggest impression made by this book was in terms of Camus' treatment of the Algerian independence movement (the most prominent topic in this collection) which was nearing success at the time of this book's publication and its author's death. On the one hand, I had an almost kneejerk approval of any and all anti-colonialist movements at the time. On the other hand, Camus' tortured attempts to justify a continued French presence in the land of his birth was poignant. The associations to Palestine were obvious and the emotions engendered in me were complex and confused.
June 7, 2019
The fact that these essays resonated with me so strongly today shows we haven’t yet emerged successfully from the ‘wager of our generation’ of liberty versus nihilism of which Camus speaks after World War Two.
I very nearly docked a star because the essays regarding Algeria were so hypocritical coming after his towering ‘Defense of Freedom’ essays, Camus was clearly far too close to the situation as a French-Algerian to see the situation without bias. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. It seems shocking that he could be so naïve in that regard, considering how clearly he saw other issues, but, who knows?
I very nearly docked a star because the essays regarding Algeria were so hypocritical coming after his towering ‘Defense of Freedom’ essays, Camus was clearly far too close to the situation as a French-Algerian to see the situation without bias. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. It seems shocking that he could be so naïve in that regard, considering how clearly he saw other issues, but, who knows?
October 11, 2020
Camus was such a powerful force of nature. Clear, precise, penetrating and brutally honest. His essays "Reflections on the Guillotine" and "Create Dangerously" were one of the most precise works I've come across on the subjects that I think about a lot - the futility of the death penalty and the work of an artist. Looking forward to read the rest of his bibliography.
March 29, 2010
This book gave me a unique perspective on America's upcoming War on Terror. Much of what the U.S. would inherit were problems originally sparked by British and French colonialism in Africa and the Middle East.
June 29, 2025
Just a quick review: this book contained a collection of essays and speeches from Camus’ life that revolve around liberty, life, resistance, a history of rebellion, and death. Many of the selections were political, discussing pressing conflicts of the time (Civil unrest in French Algeria, despotism in Hungary, Nazi occupation of France during WWII, etc.). My two favorite pieces were a collection of some of his publications for a French Resistance newspaper, as well as a longer essay arguing to eliminate the death penalty. The resistance newspaper collections, originally published under Nazi occupation, were written as “letters to a German friend,” and explored themes of guilt, rebellion, intellectualism vs. nationalism, and much more.
May 29, 2023
Would’ve been 5* if Camus wasn’t such a Francophile. Picked up this bad boi in Barnes and Noble so Pitbull isn’t the only driller who isMr Worldwide
May 7, 2021
As a Camus fan, this made me appreciate more his political side.
February 5, 2023
Notes to myself...
Letters to a German Friend
P.30
"But at the very moment when I am judging your horrible behavior, I shall remember that you and we started out from the same solitude, that you and we, with all Europe, are caught in the same tragedy of the intelligence. And, despite yourselves, I shall still apply to you the name of man. In order to keep faith with ourselves, we are obliged to respect in you what you do not respect in others."
I find this idea of preserving your humanity by remembering that even the worst enemy is still human extremely vital to progress.
The Unbeliever and Christians
P. 72
"By what right, moreover, could a Christian or a Marxist accuse me, for example, of pessimism? I was not the one to invent the misery of the human being or the ter r ifying formulas of divine malediction. I was not the one to shout Nemo bonus or the damnation of un baptized children. I was not the one who said that man was incapable of saving himself by his own means and that in the depths of his degradation his only hope was in the grace of God."
P.73
"If Christianity is pessimistic as to man, it is optimistic as to human destiny. Well, I can say that, pessimistic as to human destiny, I am optimistic as to man."
"But it is also true that I, and a few others, know what must be done, if not to reduce evil, at least not to add to it. Perhaps we cannot prevent this world from being a world in which children are tortured. But we can reduce the number of tortured children. And if you don't help us, who else in the world can help us do this?"
Why Spain?
P.83
"That is just what I cannot forgive contemporary political society: it is a mechanism for driving men to despair."
"The world I live in is loathsome to me, but I feel one with the men who suffer in it."
"But it seems to me th at there is another ambition that ought to belong to all writers: to bear witness and shout aloud, every time it is possible, insofar as our talent allows, for those who are enslaved as we are."
"I shall consistently refuse you the right to question it so long as the murder of a man angers you only when that man shares your ideas."
Defense of Freedom
P.89
"The society of money and exploitation has never been charged, so far as I kn ow, with assuring the triumph of freedom and justice. Police states have never been suspected of opening schools of law in the cellars where they interrogate their subjects. So, when they oppress and exploit, they are merely doing their job, and whoever blindly entrusts them with the care of freedom has no right to be surprised when she is immediately dishonored."
P.91
"From a justifiable and healthy distrust of the way that bourgeois society prostituted freedom, people came to distrust freedom itself. At best, it was postponed to the end of time, with the request that meanwhile it be not talked about. The contention was that we needed justice fi rst and that we would come to freedom later on, as if slaves could ever hope to achieve justice."
P.94
"If someone takes away your bread, he suppresses your freedom at the same time. But if someone takes away your freedom, you may be sure that your bread is threatened, for it de pends no longer on you and your struggle but on the whim of a master. Poverty increases insofar as freedom retreats throughout the world, and vice versa."
P. 96
"It is true that freedom, when it is made up principally of privileges, insults labor and separates it from culture.
But freedom is not made up principally of privileges; it is made up especially of duties. And the moment each of us tries to give freedom's duties precedence over its privileges, freedom joins together labor and culture and sets in motion the only force that can effectively serve justice."
P.102
"A free press can of course be good or bad, but, most certainly, without freedom it will never be anything but bad."
Algeria
P.116
"To justify himself, each relies on the other's crime."
P.120
"I believe in a policy of reparation in Algeria rather than in a policy of expiation.
Problems must be seen in relation to the future, without endlessly going back over the errors of the past."
P.122
"Our governments already want to make war without calling it by name."
P.124
"In this regard I have tried to define my position clearly. An Algeria made up of federated settlements and linked to France seems to me preferable (without any possible comparison on the plane of simple justice) to an Algeria linked to an empire of Islam which would bring the Arab peoples only increased poverty and suf fering and which would tear the Algerian-born French from their natural home."
P.125
"we shall all be responsible together, each of us must stand up and declare what he has done and what he has said. This is my declaration, to which I shall add nothing."
P.128
"The essential thing is to bring about an easing of the situation, however slight and temporary it may be.
And to achieve that, each of us must preach pacification to his people." -attitude we should have today in our polarized society.
P.129
"We Frenchmen must struggle to keep repression from becoming general so that French law will continue to have a generous and obvious meaning in our country; we must struggle to remind our people of their mistakes and of the obligations of a great nation, which cannot, without losing its prestige, answer a racial massacre with a similar outburst."
P. 136
"But we Arabs and French who reject mad, nihilistic destruction cannot let this happen without launching a final appeal to reason."
Hungary
P.157
"I AM not one of those who long for the Hungarian people to take up arms again in an uprising doomed to be crushed under the eyes of an international society that will spare neither applause nor virtuous tears before returning to their slippers like football enthusiasts on Saturday evening after a big game."
P 158
"Foreign tanks, police, twenty-year-old girls hanged, committees of workers decapitated and gagged, scaffolds, writers deported and imprisoned, the lying press, camps, censorship, judges arrested, criminals legislating, and the scaffold again-is this socialism, the great celebration of liberty and justice?
No, we have known, we still know this kind of thing; these are the bloody and monotonous rites of the totalitarian religion! Hungarian socialism is in prison or in exile today." - Camus sees that the so called socialist regimes in the East were just totalitarian regimes that have nothing to so with socialism.
P.160
"Contemptuous teachers, unaware that they were thereby insulting the working classes, had assured us that the masses could readily get along without liberty if only they were given bread."
P.168
"We have a right to think that truth with a capital letter is relative. But facts are facts. And whoever says that the sky is blue when it is gray is prostituting words and preparing the way for tyranny."
Reflections on the Guillotine
P.176
"In our well-policed society we recognize that an illness is serious from the fact that we don't dare speak of it directly."
P.198
"Whoever has done me harm must suffer harm;
whoever has put out my eye must lose an eye; and who ever has killed must die. This is an emotion, and a particularly violent one, not a principle. Retaliation is related to nature and instinct, not to law. Law, by definition, cannot obey the same rules as nature. If murder is in the nature of man, the law is not intended to imitate or reproduce that nature. It is intended to correct it."
P.217
"Compassion does not exclude punishment, but it suspends the final condemnation. Compassion loathes the definitive, irreparable measure that does an injustice to mankind as a whole because of failing to take into account the wretchedness of the common condition."
P.230
"But, let me repeat, I do not believe, nonetheless, that there is no responsibility in this world: and that we must give way to that modern tendency to absolve everything, victim and murderer, in the same confusion. Such purely sentimental confusion is made up of cowardice rather than of generosity and eventually justifies whatever is worst in this world. If you keep on excusing, you eventually give your blessing to the slave camp, to cowardly force, to organized executioners, to the cynicism of great political monsters; you finally hand over your brothers."
Create Dangerously
P.265
"There is no need of determining whether art must flee reality or defer to it, but rather what precise dose of reality the work must take on as ballast to keep from floating up among the clouds or from dragging along the ground with weighted boots."
P.266
"The aim of art, on the contrary, is not to legislate or to reign supreme, but rather to understand first of all."
P.269
"Liberty alone draws men from their isolation; but slavery dominates a crowd of solitudes."
Letters to a German Friend
P.30
"But at the very moment when I am judging your horrible behavior, I shall remember that you and we started out from the same solitude, that you and we, with all Europe, are caught in the same tragedy of the intelligence. And, despite yourselves, I shall still apply to you the name of man. In order to keep faith with ourselves, we are obliged to respect in you what you do not respect in others."
I find this idea of preserving your humanity by remembering that even the worst enemy is still human extremely vital to progress.
The Unbeliever and Christians
P. 72
"By what right, moreover, could a Christian or a Marxist accuse me, for example, of pessimism? I was not the one to invent the misery of the human being or the ter r ifying formulas of divine malediction. I was not the one to shout Nemo bonus or the damnation of un baptized children. I was not the one who said that man was incapable of saving himself by his own means and that in the depths of his degradation his only hope was in the grace of God."
P.73
"If Christianity is pessimistic as to man, it is optimistic as to human destiny. Well, I can say that, pessimistic as to human destiny, I am optimistic as to man."
"But it is also true that I, and a few others, know what must be done, if not to reduce evil, at least not to add to it. Perhaps we cannot prevent this world from being a world in which children are tortured. But we can reduce the number of tortured children. And if you don't help us, who else in the world can help us do this?"
Why Spain?
P.83
"That is just what I cannot forgive contemporary political society: it is a mechanism for driving men to despair."
"The world I live in is loathsome to me, but I feel one with the men who suffer in it."
"But it seems to me th at there is another ambition that ought to belong to all writers: to bear witness and shout aloud, every time it is possible, insofar as our talent allows, for those who are enslaved as we are."
"I shall consistently refuse you the right to question it so long as the murder of a man angers you only when that man shares your ideas."
Defense of Freedom
P.89
"The society of money and exploitation has never been charged, so far as I kn ow, with assuring the triumph of freedom and justice. Police states have never been suspected of opening schools of law in the cellars where they interrogate their subjects. So, when they oppress and exploit, they are merely doing their job, and whoever blindly entrusts them with the care of freedom has no right to be surprised when she is immediately dishonored."
P.91
"From a justifiable and healthy distrust of the way that bourgeois society prostituted freedom, people came to distrust freedom itself. At best, it was postponed to the end of time, with the request that meanwhile it be not talked about. The contention was that we needed justice fi rst and that we would come to freedom later on, as if slaves could ever hope to achieve justice."
P.94
"If someone takes away your bread, he suppresses your freedom at the same time. But if someone takes away your freedom, you may be sure that your bread is threatened, for it de pends no longer on you and your struggle but on the whim of a master. Poverty increases insofar as freedom retreats throughout the world, and vice versa."
P. 96
"It is true that freedom, when it is made up principally of privileges, insults labor and separates it from culture.
But freedom is not made up principally of privileges; it is made up especially of duties. And the moment each of us tries to give freedom's duties precedence over its privileges, freedom joins together labor and culture and sets in motion the only force that can effectively serve justice."
P.102
"A free press can of course be good or bad, but, most certainly, without freedom it will never be anything but bad."
Algeria
P.116
"To justify himself, each relies on the other's crime."
P.120
"I believe in a policy of reparation in Algeria rather than in a policy of expiation.
Problems must be seen in relation to the future, without endlessly going back over the errors of the past."
P.122
"Our governments already want to make war without calling it by name."
P.124
"In this regard I have tried to define my position clearly. An Algeria made up of federated settlements and linked to France seems to me preferable (without any possible comparison on the plane of simple justice) to an Algeria linked to an empire of Islam which would bring the Arab peoples only increased poverty and suf fering and which would tear the Algerian-born French from their natural home."
P.125
"we shall all be responsible together, each of us must stand up and declare what he has done and what he has said. This is my declaration, to which I shall add nothing."
P.128
"The essential thing is to bring about an easing of the situation, however slight and temporary it may be.
And to achieve that, each of us must preach pacification to his people." -attitude we should have today in our polarized society.
P.129
"We Frenchmen must struggle to keep repression from becoming general so that French law will continue to have a generous and obvious meaning in our country; we must struggle to remind our people of their mistakes and of the obligations of a great nation, which cannot, without losing its prestige, answer a racial massacre with a similar outburst."
P. 136
"But we Arabs and French who reject mad, nihilistic destruction cannot let this happen without launching a final appeal to reason."
Hungary
P.157
"I AM not one of those who long for the Hungarian people to take up arms again in an uprising doomed to be crushed under the eyes of an international society that will spare neither applause nor virtuous tears before returning to their slippers like football enthusiasts on Saturday evening after a big game."
P 158
"Foreign tanks, police, twenty-year-old girls hanged, committees of workers decapitated and gagged, scaffolds, writers deported and imprisoned, the lying press, camps, censorship, judges arrested, criminals legislating, and the scaffold again-is this socialism, the great celebration of liberty and justice?
No, we have known, we still know this kind of thing; these are the bloody and monotonous rites of the totalitarian religion! Hungarian socialism is in prison or in exile today." - Camus sees that the so called socialist regimes in the East were just totalitarian regimes that have nothing to so with socialism.
P.160
"Contemptuous teachers, unaware that they were thereby insulting the working classes, had assured us that the masses could readily get along without liberty if only they were given bread."
P.168
"We have a right to think that truth with a capital letter is relative. But facts are facts. And whoever says that the sky is blue when it is gray is prostituting words and preparing the way for tyranny."
Reflections on the Guillotine
P.176
"In our well-policed society we recognize that an illness is serious from the fact that we don't dare speak of it directly."
P.198
"Whoever has done me harm must suffer harm;
whoever has put out my eye must lose an eye; and who ever has killed must die. This is an emotion, and a particularly violent one, not a principle. Retaliation is related to nature and instinct, not to law. Law, by definition, cannot obey the same rules as nature. If murder is in the nature of man, the law is not intended to imitate or reproduce that nature. It is intended to correct it."
P.217
"Compassion does not exclude punishment, but it suspends the final condemnation. Compassion loathes the definitive, irreparable measure that does an injustice to mankind as a whole because of failing to take into account the wretchedness of the common condition."
P.230
"But, let me repeat, I do not believe, nonetheless, that there is no responsibility in this world: and that we must give way to that modern tendency to absolve everything, victim and murderer, in the same confusion. Such purely sentimental confusion is made up of cowardice rather than of generosity and eventually justifies whatever is worst in this world. If you keep on excusing, you eventually give your blessing to the slave camp, to cowardly force, to organized executioners, to the cynicism of great political monsters; you finally hand over your brothers."
Create Dangerously
P.265
"There is no need of determining whether art must flee reality or defer to it, but rather what precise dose of reality the work must take on as ballast to keep from floating up among the clouds or from dragging along the ground with weighted boots."
P.266
"The aim of art, on the contrary, is not to legislate or to reign supreme, but rather to understand first of all."
P.269
"Liberty alone draws men from their isolation; but slavery dominates a crowd of solitudes."
July 14, 2007
Camus chose twenty-three essays to comprise this collection a year before his death. Camus is a powerful writer and has a rousing crowd-pleasing style ("The doves of peace do not perch on gallows") suited to editorials, a style that must have been honed during his days as a writer in the French Resistance.
"The society of money and exploitation has never been charged, so far as I know, with assuring the triumph of freedom and justice. Police states have never been suspected of opening schools of law in the cellars where they interrogate their subjects. So, when they oppress and exploit, they are merely doing their job, and whoever blindly entrusts them with the care of freedom has no right to be surprised when she is immediately dishonored."
"The artist constantly lives in such a state of ambiguity, incapable of negating the real and yet eternally bound to question it in its eternally unfinished aspects."
The piece against capital punishment, "Reflections on the Guillotine" is strong. My personal views supporting the death penalty wobbles when I read Camus' arguments.
"The society of money and exploitation has never been charged, so far as I know, with assuring the triumph of freedom and justice. Police states have never been suspected of opening schools of law in the cellars where they interrogate their subjects. So, when they oppress and exploit, they are merely doing their job, and whoever blindly entrusts them with the care of freedom has no right to be surprised when she is immediately dishonored."
"The artist constantly lives in such a state of ambiguity, incapable of negating the real and yet eternally bound to question it in its eternally unfinished aspects."
The piece against capital punishment, "Reflections on the Guillotine" is strong. My personal views supporting the death penalty wobbles when I read Camus' arguments.
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