Albert Camus Biography

Albert Camus Biography Roshini JayasankarJustine Enns Michelle Anthony Pooja Viswanath

Camus’s Birth

• Birthdate: November 7, 1913 • Birthplace: Mondavi, French Algeria

o Stranger takes place in Algeria • Mondavi was known for its sun and

Mediterranean sea. o Sea and sun are are used as

symbols throughout his books • He was born to a poor but

proletarian family

Camus- age 11Communion Day

Family Influences• His father died in the Battle of the Marne

(1914), one year after Camus’s birth• Camus was raised by his Hispanic mother

who was deaf and earned little• Lived with his brother, mother, maternal

grandmother and paralyzed uncle in a two-room apartment

Educational Influences• He attended the University of Algiers

o Played goalkeeper for the school’s football team “Philosophies” of football actually

strongly influenced his philosophical beliefs• Simplistic mortality:principles of

sticking up for your friends, of valuing bravery and fair-play

• Had to take on odd jobs in order to pay tuition

Key Educational Influences

• Louis Germaino Helped him win a scholarship to

the Algiers Lycee (high school) in 1923

o 34 years later, Camus dedicated his Nobel acceptance speech to Germain

• Jean Greniero Helped Camus develop literary and

philosophical ideas

Jean Grenier

Marriages and Love Life1934: Married Simone Hié• Morphine addict• Both sides -cheated on one another• Marriage deteriorated rapidly1940: Married Francine Faure• Pianist, mathematics teacher• He often spoke and wrote to her about his literary career• Gave birth to twins• Claimed he loved her but did not believe in marriage• Conducted numerous notorious affairs

o Believed to have triggered/escalated Francine’s depression

Albert Camus, Francine Faure and their two twin children

Role in Theatre • 1935: founded the Théâtre du Travail

o Renamed Théâtre de l’Equipe (1937)• Company intended to produce socialist plays for

the benefit of Algerian Workers • Served as:

o actor, director playwright, translator Theme: Humans want to comprehend the the absurd nature of existence

• Works: Stage of Siege( 1948) The Just Assassins( 1950)

Prior to World War Two Involvement

• Served as an an apprentice of journalism for the Alger-Republicaino Wrote documents analyzing conditions

among the Muslims of the Kabylie regionRelation to Stranger• Arabs make up a portion of the Muslim

community

World War Two Involvement • During Phoney War period: declared himself a pacifist and wrote

out against the war.• The right wing in Algeria saw him as a threat and exiled him

o Believed in ideologies of the left-wing• He moved to paris and joined the French Resistance against the

Nazi • He wrote for the Combat Paper (political journalism) • He also wrote to strongly oppose America’s decision to bomb

Japan• Irony: during the war he wrote against communism

o Was a member of the Algerian Communist Party in 1930• He retired from political journalism in 1947 and focused on

Theatre

Works Around War Themes

• His work during the war revolved around the doctrine of absurdity

• It stated: o Can't make sense of one's experience o Human life has no meaning o Alienated outsider( Essential theme in

Stranger)

Nobel Prize

• Awarded Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957 o Réflexions Sur la Guillotine o Influential work on behalf of human rights

• Second youngest recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature

Camus’s DeathDate of Death: January 4,1960 He died from a car accident • Had planned to travel by train with

his wife and children but decided to drive with his publisher

• In August 2011, a Milan newspaper claimed his death was a Soviet assassination

Camus’s car after the accident

Camus’s Political Ideology

Camus’s Political Ideology • At university: joined the Communist Party and then he

joined the Algerian People’s Party o Leaned left politically but he did not conform to

official Communist policyo Spoke out against Soviet Russiao Opposed totalitarianism in any form

• He believed in the rights of individuals o Human being as a highly symbolic creature who

must first rebel against the self (individual betterment before societal betterment)

• Opposed the French colonization in Algeria

Camus’s Philosophy “At 30 a man should know himself like the palm of his hand, know the exact number of his defects and qualities, know how far he can go, foretell his failures - be what he is. And, above all, accept these things.”-Albert Camus

Camus’s Philosophy• Camus denied being a philosopher

o Said in a 1945 interview: he did “not believe sufficiently in reason to believe in a system”

• Camus denied being an existentialisto Jean-Paul Sartre saw him as an existentialist

• Argues human beings cannot escape from the fundamental question: “What is the meaning of existence?”o Denies that there is an answer to this question

• While in wartime Paris, Camus developed his philosophy of the absurd. o life has no rational or redeeming meaning.

More on Camus View on Extensionalism

• Camus believed that extensionalism was misunderstood in the United States as revolving around the idea of hopelessness.

• Camus believes that life is absurd( illogical and irrational) but it is worth defending because it is valuable

• Americans believed that mortality did not exist but he believed in ethics

• Stranger: Seen through the foil of Raymond and Meursault

Overview on Absurdness• His work focuses on Absurdness • The Myth of Sisyphus heavily focuses on the concept of absurdness. • The concept focuses on the conflict between what humans want from the

universe and what they actually get. • Humans can never find what they want in life • result humans will create a meaningless life or the need to find god• This is why he is not atheist or religious. • Thus the world is absurd and confusing but humans make the world

absurd because it is not what they want.

Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre

• The philosophers Jean - Paul and Albert Camus were more known for their enmity than their friendship.

o At the time they met (1943), each had already read each other’s books

o Camus praised Sartre’s depiction of absurdityo Sartre likened Camus with Kafka and Hemingway

• Camus and Sartre were the intellectual stars of Paris during the postwar yearso Known as the existentialistso Became iconic figures of the ideological conflicts of the

second half of the 20th century. o Rivalry shaped intellectual debates in France and around the

world.

Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre:Differences in Philosophies

According to Camus, Sartre was a “writer who resisted” rather than a “resistor who wrote”Sartre had a more negative view on humanity• Camus was positive about the applications of absurdity

Central issue that divided them: Soviet labor camps

Each author focused on different forms of oppression • Camus: tyranny of totalitarianism that permits imperialism

o Camus detested that Sartre blindly accepted Soviet working camps

• Sartre: tyranny of French oppression

Camus’s Philosophy in The Stranger• Camus presents a philosophy of religious beliefs and middle-class morality,

where sentience and personal honesty become the bases of a happy and responsible life.

• In The Stranger Camus’s philosophy is portrayed by a young man, Meursault, who does not express his emotion towards his mom at her funeral. o does not believe in godo kills a man without a desirable motive.o deemed a threat to society and sentenced to death.

• Camus’s simplistic narrative technique and his own experience as a reporter, helps to convey the sense of immediacy that lies at the foundation of his philosophy.o Moral orders have no rational or natural basis. o Meursault is not a philosopher, but a thinker. Furthermore, he is not trying

to become someone more than himself throughout the novel.

Camus’s Beliefs on Religion

“Between this sky and the faces turned toward it there is nothing on which to hang a mythology, a literature, an ethic, or a religion—only stones, flesh, stars, and those truths the hand can touch”-Albert Camus

Camus’s Beliefs on Religion• Undergraduate thesis explored relationship between

Greek philosophy and Christianity o Philosophy essentially rejected religion as one of its

foundations Becomes even hostile towards it in The Stranger Centers his works on choosing to live without God Effort to explore the pitfalls and issues of a post-religious

world

• Self-evident fact: we must die and there is no heaven• Believed traditional religion has lost its force• Modern secularism stumbles because it is not

completely free of religion

Camus’s Religious Beliefs in The StrangerReligion is a human construction in order to create meaning in a senseless existence

• Accepting religion means hope in an afterlife

Meursault twice refuses to receive his final rites in order to receive God’s forgiveness

• Accepts death as his and everyone’s final endMagistrate brandishes the crucifix at Meursault as a weapon

A final thought from Camus

“ Dont Walk behind me: I may not lead. Dont walk in front of me;I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend”

-Albert Camus

Interactive Close Read Activity

Turn to Part Two, Chapter 5Begin with the passage that starts: “The chaplain looked at me with a kind of sadness...” and read until the end of the book

Things we want you to look for...

• Examples of Camus’s beliefso Hint: absurdism, religious beliefs

• Parallels between Camus’s experiences and Meursault’s experienceso Hint: love/relationships/family ties

• Imagery• Selection of details• Technique

Autobiographical Question 1

Meursault refers to the chaplain as “Monsieur” as opposed to the religiously correct title “Father.”

How does Meursault’s attitude towards the chaplain indicative of Camus’s position regarding the role of religion in general?

Find evidence in the text to support your claim.

Autobiographical Question 2“Salamano’s dog was worth just as much as his wife. The little robot woman was just as guilty as the Parisian woman Masson married, or as Marie, who had wanted to marry me.”

Trace the parallels between the romantic relationships in The Stranger and Camus’s own life and philosophies. What evidence can you find in the text to support this autobiographical critique?

Autobiographical Question 3

Trace Camus’s use of imagery in this passage.

How do certain images function as motifs throughout the novel? How can we parallel Camus’s use of imagery with what he experienced living in French Algeria?

Work Cited

"Albert Camus - Biography." Graduate and Post-Graduate Literary Studies. The European Graduate School, n.d. Web. 11 Nov.

2013.

"Albert Camus Biography." Albert Camus Society. Albert Camus Society, n.d. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.

Aronson, Ronald. "Albert Camus." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University, 27 Oct. 2011. Web. 11 Nov.

2013.

Aronson, Ronald. Camus and Sartre: The Story of a Friendship and the Quarrel That Ended It. Chicago, IL: University of

Chicago, 2005. Print.

Eubanks, Cecil L., and Peter A. Petrakis. "Reconstructing the World: Albert Camus and the Symbolization of Experience." The

Journal of Politics 61.2 (1999): 293. JSTOR. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.

Gallagher, Paul J. "Albert Camus vs. Jean-Paul Sartre | Albert Camus vs. Jean-Paul Sartre." Dangerous Minds. N.p., n.d. Web.

11 Nov. 2013.

Orme, Mark. The Development of Albert Camus's Concern for Social and Political Justice: "justice Pour Un Juste" Madison:

Fairleigh Dickinson UP, 2007. Print