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ALBERT CAMUS AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Albert Camus lived in a period of remarkable turmoil in the world — two world wars were
fought, and colonized countries, notably India and Algeria, began independence struggles. Camus
was born in the latter, a French colony in North Africa, in Mon-dovi, on November 7, 1913.
When he was almost one, his father, Lucien Auguste Camus, was killed in the outbreak of World
War I. Left fatherless, Albert lived with his mother Catherine Stintes Camus, his older brother
Lucien, his Uncle Etienne Stintes, and his grandmother. They lived in a three-room apartment in
the working-class Belcourt district of Algiers.

Camus's mother was a silent woman who rarely showed her sons affection and who expected
Camus to work when he was old enough. Fortunately, there were two forces that helped Camus
despite his mother's silence — school and sports. Albert excelled in school with the assistance the
state provided him as a child of a fallen French soldier: he received free health care and money
for his education. In fifth grade, his teacher, Louis Germain, became Albert's patron. Germain
helped Camus to overcome the family's opposition to the pursuit of an education. He also assisted
Camus with scholarship applications. The other formative force in the making of Albert Camus
was soccer. Through team sports he developed social skills which his family life did not
encourage.

His athletic career ended when he was diagnosed with tuberculosis in 1930. The doctor suggested
that Camus move in with his Uncle Acault, who was a butcher. It was hoped that the access to red
meat would help his condition. Uncle Acault also had more money to lend Albert for books. He
withdrew his support, however, when Albert began seeing the scandalous Simone Hie.

Camus pursued a variety of activities throughout the 1930s. These included his studies, the
beginnings of a literary career, active involvement with the Communist party, and writing for a
theatrical troupe. Although Camus preferred drama to prose throughout his life, his plays are not
as well known as his fiction. In 1933, he entered the University of Algiers, and submitted his
thesis in 1936. From 1938 to 1940, he worked as a journalist with the Alger-Republicain. This
occupation, as well as the popularity of American authors (like Hemingway), is reflected in the
style of The Stranger, which Camus began at this time.

In 1940, Camus divorced his wife — they had been separated for some time — and married
Francine Faure. When France fell to Hitler, Camus joined the resistance in Paris. He became
editor of the daily newspaper Combat and became the "conscience of France" through his popular
editorials. Two years later, he published The Stranger and The Myth of Sisyphus. When France
was liberated, Camus returned to Algeria.

After the war, he published an enlarged edition of The Myth of Sisyphus, as well as his most
significant play, Caligula. In 1947, another literary classic, The Plague, was published. During
the rest of his life, Camus struggled with his health, critics, issues of the Algerian war, and the
strain on his marriage caused by his affair with the actress Maria Casarès. His best novel,
technically speaking, was The Fall, published in 1956. That novel was followed by a collection of
short stories, Exile and Kingdom. In 1957, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Three
years later, on January 4, 1960, he was killed in an auto accident.

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Historical Context: The Stranger

Algeria

Resuming a policy of imperialist expansion after the Napoleonic era, France invaded
Algeria in 1830. The French soon controlled the city of Algiers and some coastal areas,
but not until 1857 did they subdue the whole region. France sent settlers to colonize the
conquered region, but even as late as 1940 the French in Algeria were outnumbered 9 to
1. During World War II the Algerians fought on the side of Germany, which occupied
France. However, they were not too keen on resisting the Americans, and when General
Eisenhower landed in November of 1942, he met little resistance. That invasion
prevented Camus from leaving France and joining his wife in Algeria until the liberation
of France in 1944. Throughout the rest of the war, the Algerian independence movement
grew due to contact with other Westerners — British and American soldiers.

The independence movement continued to grow after the war but was violently put down
by French troops. The struggle escalated when the National Liberation Front (FLN) wrote
a new constitution in 1947. Unable to deliver on the promise of the new constitution, the
FLN began a war of independence with France in 1954. By 1962, Charles de Gaulle
agreed to grant the country independence.

WORLD WAR II

World War II was in full swing in 1942, since America had declared war on Japan and
Germany in response to the Pearl Harbor attack. However, the Allied cause did not look
good. France had fallen to the Germans, and British troops were pushed from their
holdings in the Pacific to India by the Japanese. On the Russian front, the Germans
seemed to be on the verge of capturing Stalingrad when they attacked in February. This
attack took the form of a gruesome siege. There was still hope, however, because both the
British and the Russians refused to give in. Geography aided the Russians and the
superiority of the Royal Air Force made the siege of Britain hazardous.

Summer began and the Allies started to gain against the Axis Powers. American troops
were more successful than not in flooding the Allies with needed supplies through their
base in Iceland. June brought real progress when the American Navy met the Japanese in
the Battle of Midway. This decisive victory ended Japanese expansion in the Pacific and
irreparably crippled their naval strength. In November, Eisenhower led a joint British-
U.S. force in a landing in Algeria. In Russia, the Germans were still unable to claim
victory since the Russian army was refusing to give way. In the end Russia lost 750,000
soldiers throughout the year. The Germans gained against the Russians only to lose all
but eighty thousand men, who survived by cannibalism, and surrendered by February of
1943. Slowly the tide was turning against the Germans.

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Modernist Period in English Literature: 1914-1965

Modern- a term applied to one of the main directions in writing this century. It is not a
chronological designation but suggestive of loosely defined characteristics. Much of
twentieth-century literature is not “modern” in the common sense of the term. Not all
characteristics appear in any one writer who merits the designation modern.
Characteristics:
-marked by a strong and conscious break with traditional forms and techniques of
expression
-employs a distinctive kind of imagination- one that insists on having its frame of
reference within itself
-it practices the solipsism of Allen Tate accused of the modern mind: it believes we
create the world in the act of perceiving it
-Modern implies a historical discontinuity, a sense of alienation, of loss, and of despair.
It not only rejects history, but rejects the society of whose fabrication history is a record
-rejects traditional values and assumptions.
-rejects the rhetoric which was used to communicate previously
-elevates the individual and inner being over the social human being
-prefers the unconscious to self-conscious
-psychologies of Freud and Jung were seminal
-attempts to deal with unconscious and the mythopoeic ( a creating of myth; giving rise to
myth)
-basically anti-intellectual, celebrating passion and will over reason and systematic
morality
-reaction against realism, naturalism, and the scientific postulates on which they rest
-writers can/may be termed philosophical existentialists
-revels in a dense and often unordered actuality as opposed to the practical and systematic
-in exploring that actuality, as it exists in the mind of the writer it has been richly
experimented with language form, symbol, and myth
Writers and Poets of the Period:
T.S. Eliot , Ezra Pound, Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, W.B. Yeats,
W. H. Auden, D. H. Lawrence, James Joyce, Marcel Proust, Albert Camus,
Jean-Paul Sarte, Thomas Mann, Eugene O’Neill, Tennesse Williams, etc.

Source: Holman, C. Hugh. A Handbook to Literature. Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill

Existentialism
What is Not Existential?
There is no one answer to what is existential, so I am going to present what is not in an attempt to
clarify things through the fog. (That is satire, if you read Camus.) By first understanding what
existentialism excludes, discussions of what might be included become possible.
Existentialism does not support any of the following:
 The good life is one of wealth, pleasure, or honor.
 Social approval and social structure trump the individual.
 Accept what is and that is enough in life.
 Science can and will make everything better.
 People are good by nature, ruined by society or external forces.

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Existentialism requires the active acceptance of our nature. Professor Robert Olson noted that we spend
our lives wanting more and more. Once we realize the futility of worldly desire, we try to accept what we
have. We turn to philosophy or religion to accept less. We want to detach from our worldly needs — but
we cannot do so. It is the human condition to desire. To want. To seek more, even when that “more” is
“more of less.” It is a desire to prove something to ourselves, as well as others.
The existentialists … mock the notion of a complete and fully satisfying life. The life of every man,
whether he explicitly recognizes it or not, is marked by irreparable losses. Man cannot help aspiring toward
the goods of this world, nor can he help aspiring toward the serene detachment from the things of this
world which the traditional philosopher sought; but it is not within his power to achieve either of these
ambitions, or having achieved them to find therein the satisfaction he had anticipated. (- Existentialism; Olson,
p. 14)
Existentialism assumes we are best when we struggle against our nature. Mankind is best challenging
itself to improve; yet knowing perfection is not possible. Religions present rules, yet the believers know
they cannot live by all of those rules. The “sin-free” life is beyond human nature. Is that any less reason to
try to be good, generous, caring, and compassionate? Perfectionism is considered unhealthy by
psychiatrists for a reason.
The Struggle
The word “existential” is used to describe so many people, fictional characters, choices, and situations
that it has been reduced to meaning any dilemma revealing the true nature of a person. The notion of
dilemma reduces “existential” to an adjective describing too many common choices. Existentialism
properly defines a broader philosophy, in which life itself is a choice.
Why is Buddhism Not Existential?
Siddhartha Gautama was appalled by suffering and chaos in the world. So much so, he left his wife and
son to meditate on the meaning of everything. Unfortunately, he didn’t find answers among the gurus.
There were no easy answers. In some ways, yes, Siddhartha experienced an “existential” discovery: life is
suffering.
But, Siddhartha did not follow the existential notion of rebelling or fighting to establish a meaning. He
did not openly challenge people and political leaders. Instead, he took a different approach:
When he met his first disciples at Benares after his enlightenment, the Buddha outlines his system,
which was based on one essential fact: all existence was dukkha. It consisted entirely of suffering; life was
wholly awry. Things come and go in meaningless flux. Nothing has permanent significance. Religion starts
with the perception that something is wrong. […] The Buddha taught that is was possible to gain release
from dukkha by living a life of compassion for all living beings, speaking and behaving gently, kindly and
accurately, and refraining from anything like drugs or intoxicants that cloud the mind. ( A History of God;
Armstrong, p. 32)
Unlike the existentialists, Siddhartha is a stoic in nature: accept things as they are, don’t try to change
them or control them. Curiously, this is rebellious in that it rejects social norms. Siddhartha was rejecting
the Hindu teachings of his time, much as Kierkegaard challenged the ritualized nature of Christianity. But,
Siddhartha was not an active rebel. He was, in many ways, teaching a passive resistance that the
existentialists would reject.
Questions to Ponder
Philosophy and religion exist to answer “why?” when we want an excuse for human nature. Maybe
science will explain away sociopaths and even mere anger someday. We can treat depression, anxiety,
mania, and numerous other “disorders” with pills. Alienation, despair, and anguish may vanish. If they do,

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what of existentialism? Do humans need their pain? Is suffering what makes us stronger, as Nietzsche
suspected?
 If something worth living for is worth dying for, what about something not worth dying for? (Camus)
 Did man create God to have a reason to live? (Dostoevsky)
 Does society make women and men different or do we choose our roles? (Beauvoir)
 Would living forever add meaning to life? (Heidegger)
 How do you really act in private? (Sartre)
 Without love, without people, what is a person? (Kafka)

Existentialism is Living
Mankind is the only known animal, according to earth-bound existentialists, that defines itself through
the act of living. In other words, first a man or woman exists, then the individual spends a lifetime changing
his or her essence. Without life there can be no meaning; the search for meaning in existentialism is the
search for self…which is why there is existential psychotherapy. (Imagine a therapist telling people life has
no meaning!) In other words, we define ourselves by living; suicide would indicate you have chosen to
have no meaning. Existentialism is about being a saint without God; being your own hero, without all the
sanction and support of religion or society. - Anita Brookner (b. 1938), British novelist, art historian. Interview in Writers
at Work, Eighth Series, ed. George Plimpton (1988).
Existentialism is not dark. It is not depressing. Existentialism is about life. Existentialists believe in
living — and in fighting for life. Camus, Sartre, and even Nietzsche were involved in various wars because
they believed passionately in fighting for the survival of their nations and peoples. The politics of
existentialists varies, but each seeks the most individual freedom for people within a society.
All too often people link a lack of faith or secular beliefs with existential ideals. Existentialism has little
to do with faith or the lack thereof. To quote Walter Kaufmann, one of the leading existential scholars:
“Certainly, existentialism is not a school of thought nor reducible to any set of tenets. The three writers who
appear invariably on every list of existentialists — Jaspers, Heidegger, and Sartre — are not in agreement on
essentials. By the time we consider adding Rilke, Kafka, and Camus, it becomes plain that one essential
feature shared by all these men is their perfervid individualism.” - Existentialism; Kaufmann, p. 11
In order to understand the current meaning of existentialism, one must first understand that the
American view of existentialism was derived from the writings of three political activists, not intellectual
purists. Americans learned the term existential after World War II. The term was coined by Jean-Paul
Sartre to describe his own philosophies. It was not until the late 1950s that the term was applied broadly to
several divergent schools of thought.
Despite encompassing a staggering range of philosophical, religious, and political ideologies, the
underlying concepts of existentialism are simple:
 Mankind has free will.
 Life is a series of choices, creating stress.
 Few decisions are without any negative consequences.
 Some things are irrational or absurd, without explanation.
 If one makes a decision, he or she must follow through.
Existentialism, broadly defined, is a set of philosophical systems concerned with free will, choice,
and personal responsibility. Because we make choices based on our experiences, beliefs, and biases,
those choices are unique to us — and made without an objective form of truth. There are no
“universal” guidelines for most decisions, existentialists believe. Instead, even trusting science is often
a “leap of faith.” The existentialists conclude that human choice is subjective, because individuals
finally must make their own choices without help from such external standards as laws, ethical rules,
or traditions. Because individuals make their own choices, they are free; but because they freely
choose, they are completely responsible for their choices. The existentialists emphasize that freedom is
necessarily accompanied by responsibility. Furthermore, since individuals are forced to choose for

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themselves, they have their freedom — and therefore their responsibility — thrust upon them. They are
“condemned to be free.”
For existentialism, responsibility is the dark side of freedom. When individuals realize that they
are completely responsible for their decisions, actions, and beliefs, they are overcome by anxiety. They
try to escape from this anxiety by ignoring or denying their freedom and their responsibility. But
because this amounts to ignoring or denying their actual situation, they succeed only in deceiving
themselves. The existentialists criticize this flight from freedom and responsibility into self-deception.
They insist that individuals must accept full responsibility for their behavior, no matter how difficult. If
an individual is to live meaningfully and authentically, he or she must become fully aware of the true
character of the human situation and bravely accept it.

THEMES IN THE STRANGER

 An Exploration of the Absurd

 The Irrationality of the Universe
 The Meaninglessness of Human Life
 The Primacy of the Physical World
 A Denial of God
 The Rejection of Middle Class Morality
 The Dangers of Detachment and Isolation
 Personal Responsibility versus Public Responsibility

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