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The absurd does not liberate; it binds.
The only truth that might seem instructive to him is not formal: it comes to life and unfolds in men.
In the absurd world the value of a notion or of a life is measured by its sterility.
Why should it be essential to love rarely in order to love much?
melancholy people have two reasons for being so: they don’t know or they hope.
It is quite false to try to see in Don Juan a man brought up on Ecclesiastes.
But men who live on hope do not thrive in this universe where kindness yields to generosity, affection to virile silence, and communion to solitary courage.
Only in novels does one change condition or become better.
Not to believe in the profound meaning of things belongs to the absurd man.
there are several ways of committing suicide, one of which is the total gift and forgetfulness of self. Don Juan, as well as anyone else, knows that this can be stirring.
There is no noble love but that which recognizes itself to be both short-lived and exceptional.
To a conscious man old age and what it portends are not a surprise.
The ultimate end, awaited but never desired, the ultimate end is negligible.
Half a man’s life is spent in implying, in turning away, and in keeping silent.
“What matters,” said Nietzsche, “is not eternal life but eternal vivacity.” All drama is, in fact, in this choice.
Choosing between heaven and a ridiculous fidelity, preferring oneself to eternity or losing oneself in God is the age-old tragedy in which each must play his part.
Eternal values survive secular turmoils before their astonished eyes.
In the rebel’s universe, death exalts injustice. It is the supreme abuse.
This absurd, godless world is, then, peopled with men who think clearly and have ceased to hope.
His scorn of the gods, his hatred of death, and his passion for life won him that unspeakable penalty in which the whole being is exerted toward accomplishing nothing. This is the price that must be paid for the passions of this earth.
If this myth is tragic, that is because its hero is conscious. Where would his torture be, indeed, if at every step the hope of succeeding upheld him?
The lucidity that was to constitute his torture at the same time crowns his victory.
But crushing truths perish from being acknowledged.
“Despite so many ordeals, my advanced age and the nobility of my soul make me conclude that all is well.” Sophocles’
Ancient wisdom confirms modern heroism.
One always finds one’s burden again.
T HE WHOLE ART of Kafka consists in forcing the reader to reread.
