Camus, you have a Beautiful Soul!

“Camus, you have a Beautiful Soul!”

So conceded Albert Camus’ longtime friend, confidante, and fellow agent provocateur, Jean-Paul Sartre, at the time of the much-publicized rift that ended their felicitous comradeship.

Well, and you know what? Camus always had something Sartre didn’t - a warm, caring HUMANNESS.

THAT’s why everyone who reads this book admires it. Camus was for REAL.

Camus, like so many mid-century existentialists, was alienated from traditional societal roles and structures.

But, unlike them - and so many of us - he WASN’T alienated from his Real SELF!

That’s because, unlike Sartre, he didn’t live in his Head. He lived in his Soul, which, in becoming a persona non grata, knew positive LIBERATION from his Self.

Because he knew the phony Self to be only the Origin of Darkness.

But like Sartre and Beckett, though himself Algerian, he learned his lessons under the Vichy French. “Et les soldats faisent la haie?” Then throw sand in their faces! Liberté, fraternité, égalité all the way...

But politics divides, as our essential humanity unifies, and it is on the latter quality that I’ll focus, for Camus was essentially a voice for Unification.

This novel is about one man’s reentry into his Humanity. Much MORE than about Life’s meaninglessness.

And for Camus, too, I think, who might just have said:

That is not what I mean to say at all...
(for) It is IMPOSSIBLE to say just what I mean!

But though it is notoriously difficult to communicate it, Camus had found his Answer in the end:

That the clear and calm Eye of the Storm is right at the centre of its fury.

Once you see that, it is enough.

Just look at the old B&W stills of him at the height of his fame - surrounded by cooing coeds! Doesn’t seem much to me like he wasn’t loving his life...

But I guess maybe - just maybe - before his own, much like Merseault’s, existential somersault (his hero’s takes place in the blinding glare of the dry sun that hot day on the beach), he was just an automaton.

Look at that devilish grimace on his young face, cigarette dangling rebelliously from his scowling lips, in that infamous early mug shot!

Going vaguely through the motions. Like so many of us, if we are still in the workforce. Not much giving a darn. About anything.

I too was a robot - till the day I retired. That was the day all my chickens came home to roost.

You know, someone who is still working said to my wife that it’s best to keep busy when you retire - so your mind won’t wander.

I got news for that person.

It wanders willy-nilly - all by itself. Stop it, and you’ll slowly shrivel up and die.

But there’s one thing you can do.

You can always try to connect the dots, slowly and patiently. Remember E.M Forster’s Howards End? “Only connect!” Recover your Lost Humanity.

Well, that’s what I did - and what happened to Merseault that day on the beach, happened to me, sitting on my rocking chair. A huge prise de conscience.

All at once, it fell into place.

I wasn’t mad, most Noble Festus, no - but my two feet were back on the ground for the first time in ages. I was free.

And alive.

For we are all part of a Huge and Vibrant Human Reality in the midst of whose ceaseless action is the only Peace that’s real.

And that’s what happened to Merseault, and so what did he do?

He “sang in his chains like the Sea!”

For -

Imprisoned, he is now Human..

Condemned, he’s now Alive.

He has the inestimable freedom of the Eternal Present Moment of his Life...

And NOBODY can take it away from him.

A book review of "The Stranger" by Albert Camus done by a student of 11-4chi-19group Madina Khudoiberdieva