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Camus

Original nameAlbert Camus

French Philosopher and Writer, Representative Figure of the Philosophy of the Absurd

Those Who Reanswered "How Should We Live" · Modern & Contemporary Thinkers

The Philosophy of the AbsurdThe Theory of RevoltExistentialist Literature

Who they are

Albert Camus (1913–1960) was a French philosopher and writer who, though he himself repeatedly refused to be filed under the "existentialist" label, is still often discussed within the lineage of existentialist philosophy. In the philosophical essay The Myth of Sisyphus he proposed the core concept of the "absurd": human beings by nature long for the world to have clear meaning and order, while the universe itself keeps silent before this longing, and this unbridgeable fundamental gap between "humanity’s craving for meaning" and "the world’s indifferent silence" makes up what he called the "absurd" condition. Facing this condition, he opposed both escapist suicide and the forced imposition of a false meaning on the world through religious faith (which he called "philosophical suicide"), holding instead that one should soberly face the absurd itself and, in a situation known to be futile, still persist in revolt and creation — just as Sisyphus in ancient Greek myth, condemned to push a stone up a hill forever, "one must imagine Sisyphus happy."

Primary sourcesCamus, The Myth of Sisyphus, The Rebel

Key stories

"One Must Imagine Sisyphus Happy"

At the end of The Myth of Sisyphus Camus reinterpreted the figure of Sisyphus from ancient Greek myth, punished by the gods to push a boulder up a hill forever only to watch it roll back down, holding that Sisyphus, knowing full well this labor is endless and without ultimate meaning, still chooses soberly to bear and repeat the act itself, and that this "sober revolt" constitutes precisely the most thorough contempt for and transcendence of an absurd fate — "the struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart; one must imagine Sisyphus happy."

The Open Break With Sartre

Camus and Sartre were once close intellectual comrades, but over Camus’s critique in The Rebel of political violence under the Soviet system, and his refusal to justify sacrificing individual freedom and life for the ends of revolution, he came into fundamental conflict with Sartre, who leaned more toward supporting Marxist revolutionary practice; the two broke openly in 1952 and ended contact — this debate one of the most famous intellectual affairs of twentieth-century French intellectual life.

Version differences

Camus himself repeatedly publicly opposed being simply classified as an "existentialist," though his thought is often discussed within the lineage of existentialist philosophy.

Relationships

Nemesis

🚬Sartre　The two broke openly over their different stances on Soviet political violence and revolutionary practice

Echoes today

Below are how modern works borrow or reinterpret this name or story — not the original material. The two differ, so keep them apart.

"One must imagine Sisyphus happy"This line is still among the most frequently quoted philosophical maxims in discussing "how to find meaning in a situation known to be futile."

Appears in

The Twentieth Century: Existence, Deconstruction, and JusticeCamus’s "Absurd" and the Happiness of Sisyphus

⏳ Who lived at the same time as Camus? →🚬 Existentialism →🔗 Who taught whom →

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