Camus

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Camus

• The Stranger

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What are The Absurds

• When escaping the Nazi's in France, Camus carried
  with him three manuscripts, which he called "The
  Absurds

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The Absurds are

• Three of Camus works
• Novel L'Etranger (The Stranger)
• Essays Le Mythe de Sisyphe (The Myth of
  Sisyphus)
• Play Caligula (a cruel, sexually perverse, and
  insane ruler of island of Capri)

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For Camus

• the absurd was not negative, not a synonym for
  "ridiculous," but the true state of existence.
• Accepting the view that life is absurd is to
  embrace a "realistic" view of life the absence
  of universal logic.
• One might rephrase Camus' Absurdism as "G-d? No
  thanks I'm on my own."

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Camus and meaning

• Many mistakenly believe Camus saw no meaning in
  life even Camus and Nietzsche seek "meaning" in
  life, but not in manners familiar to most.
• For Camus, meaning was in the human experience.
• Absurdity does not render life meaningless --
  people have meaning because they interact with
  each other, while remaining in control of their
  own destinies.

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Existentialism

• group of attitudes that emphasizes existence
  rather than essence
• sees the inadequacy of human reason to explain
  the enigma of the universe
• Basically the existentialist ASSUMES that
  existence precedes essence

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Existentialism

• we and things in general exist, but that these
  things have no meaning for us except as we CREATE
  meaning through acting upon them
• It attempts to codify the irrational aspect of
  human nature, to objectify nonbeing or
  nothingness and see it as a universal source of
  fear, to distrust concepts, and to emphasize
  experiential concreteness.

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Meaninglessness

• produces discomfort, anxiety, loneliness in the
  face of limitations, and desire to invest
  experience with meaning by acting upon the world,
  although efforts to act in a meaningless,
  "absurd" world lead to anguish, greater
  loneliness, and despair

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Anxiety

• Human beings are totally free but are also wholly
  responsible for what we make of ourselves
• This freedom and responsibility are the sources
  for their most intense anxiety

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Jean Paul Sartre

• Sartre was largely responsible for the "trendy"
  nature of existentialism
• the lingering images of men and women wearing
  black, smoking Turkish cigarettes, drinking black
  coffee.

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Sartres Existentialism

• maintains that in man, and in man alone,
  existence (concrete) preceded essence (abstract).
• Man must create his own essence it is in
  throwing himself into the world, suffering there,
  struggling there, that he gradually defines
  himself.

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More on Sartre

• merely stating that man, as the only sentient
  being on earth, was forced to define who he was
  through living, while objects are what they are
  until destroyed.
• Take Sartre's notion that "in man, and in man
  alone" there is first the body, then an essence
  is defined through actions.

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Sartres view on all other objects

• Objects essence precedes existence they have
  meaning then form.
• Man exists, then his essence forms

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Nietzsche

• his approach to philosophy is more radical than
  Camus
• Nietzsche's view "G-d is dead."

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Nihilism

• the complete disregard for all things that cannot
  be scientifically proven or demonstrated (such as
  religion)

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Nietzsche's claims

• did not claim that nothing exists that cannot be
  proven, nor that those things should be
  disregarded.
• What Nietzsche did suggest was that many people
  used religion, especially Judeo-Christian
  teachings, as a crutch for avoiding decisive
  actions.

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Nietzsche

• His contribution to existentialism was the idea
  that men must accept that they are part of a
  material world, regardless of what else might
  exist.
• As part of this world, men must live as if there
  is nothing else beyond life.
• A failure to live, to take risks, is a failure to
  realize human potential.

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The Stranger

• French title l'Étranger
• Written 1938
• Published 1942 1946 English

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The title

• The U.S. title, The Stranger, implies the main
  character, Meursault, has been viewed as a
  "strange" or "odd" person for some time.

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Archetype

• Meursault is the archetype of a middle-class man.
  
• He works as a clerk, rents an apartment, and
  draws no attention to himself. He is, if
  anything, ordinary.
• Meursault might even be boring.
• He lacks deep convictions and passion.
• If he is estranged from any aspect of French
  society, it is religion.

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Meursault

• He is not a stranger, but rather an observer
  without an emotional connection to the world.
• Meursault's name is symbolic of the
  Mediterranean.
• Mer means "sea" and
• Soliel is French for "sun."

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Arabs at the time

• Arabs were traditionally the targets of racism in
  Algiers.
• The culture and religion of Arabs were deemed
  simple and barbaric.