The First Man

Book Description

In The First Man Albert Camus tells the story of Jacques Cormery, a boy who lived a life much like his own. Camus summons up the sights, sounds, and textures of a childhood circumscribed by poverty and a father's death yet redeemed by the austere beauty of Algeria and the boy's attachment to his nearly deaf-mute mother. The result is a moving journey through the lost landscape of youth that also discloses the wellspring of Camus' aesthetic powers and moral vision.

Customer Reviews:

An Unfinished Novel Not As Good As His Other Works.......2007-08-27

As a point of reference, I have read most of Camus's major works. The present novel is a straightforward story and it is supposed to be partially biographical. It was published decades after Camus's death by his daughter. The work was unfinished and it was never edited by Camus. As such, it has a bit of a raw feel to the story and I thought it was not as good as his other works, all of which are all excellent.

It could have been a much better novel if he had finished the work. The work does not contain Camus's famous irony and references to the absurd that are found in other works, i.e.: unlike his other works, he does not delve into his ideas on the absurd, and the revolt against a world of the absurd and of injustice.

Albert Camus (1913 - 1960) was a French writer and philosopher. He is often associated with existentialism, but Camus rejected any ideological classification. Camus was a young recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature when he became the first African-born writer to receive the award in 1957. He died in a car crash only three years after receiving the award. He was a social activist and Communist, and fought with the French resistance in WWII. Later he rejected Communism. The present book is his last work and was never finished.

On January 4, 1960, at the age of forty-six, Camus was killed in a car accident outside Paris and the manuscript of The First Man was found at the crash scene. The protagonist is a man similar to Camus himself, Jacques Cormery, who grew up in Algiers. It is a novel about a young boy growing up and his interaction with his mother and grandmother. It is a story being told by an older Cormery, now 40 years old, who is visiting his older mother, now 72. Camus's technique is to use flashbacks of Cormery's childhood injected into the story during the visit by the 40 year old Cormery. In addition to the story of his youth from the era of WWI and post WWI, there are a number of comments on the struggle for power in Algeria and the attacks on the French in the 1950s.

This novel has just a neutral recommendation and it is not a good example of his work. It is different and perhaps Camus was taking a new path with his work, but as a novel as it stands it is flawed. The reader is left to wonder what Camus could have accomplished if he had lived. Having said that, the novel was unfinished, so The Stranger and perhaps The Fall remain as his best novels, followed by The Plague. Those works include his irony and philosophical views. Also, Camus has written some good drama and non-fiction. This leaves the present unfinished novel down near the bottom of his body of work.

Incomplete autobiographical novel lacking a mythic dimension .......2007-03-14

The manuscript of this book was in the car with Camus when he had his fatal crash. His family held back publication for over thirty years. One reason was the incompleteness of the manuscript. A second was the hostile political atmosphere which had emerged in relation to Camus. Unlike Sartre Camus had refused to justify Soviet crimes. His position on Algeria which was a nuanced one , angered both sides.
The novel itself is closer to a memoir than anything else Camus has written. It lacks the kind of mythic and philosophical dimension of Camus most well- known works, "The Stranger" " The Plague " " The Fall" "The Myth of Sisyphus". it tells the story of a child whose father has been killed in the First World War, and who is raised by his mother and grandmother. It tells of a world of Algerian poverty .And it to tells of how the child finds a way out of this world through having been guided and helped by a beloved teacher. The teacher who Camus honored and remembered throughout his life saw the great ability in young Camus and developed this.
There are some outstanding passages in the book in which Camus shows the reflectiveness so central to his major works
" To begin with poor people's memory is less nourished than that of the rich : it has fewer landmarks in space because they seldom leave the place where they live, and fewer reference points in time throughout lives that are grey and featureles. Of course there is the memory of the heart that they say is the surest kind, but the heart wears out with sorrow and labour, it forgets sooner under the weight of fatigue. Remembrance of things past is just for the rich.For the poor it only marks faint trances on the path to death"

This work it seems does not rank with Camus' best work but does have importance in throwing additional light on the details of the life of one of the great writers and moralists of the twentieth century.

For addicts only.......2005-12-10

This incomplete last novel by Camus tells the story of Jacques Cormery who, by visiting his father's war grave, opens up memories of his childhood in Algeria. He recalls the poverty of his family, his intellectual development, his impressions of the country and the various characters who lived there. The growth of Jacques's self-identity is charted.

As stated above, this novel is incomplete and indeed reads very much as "work in progress". There are footnotes indicating where Camus made marginal notes on his manuscript, and gaps where sentences and paragraphs end in mid-air or where a word in the manuscript was illegible.

This being Camus, there is writing of great descriptive and reflective strength, but clearly there are many other parts he must have wanted either to cut or to develop further (sometimes this is indicated in the notes). As a whole, it really required reworking and editing. To state the obvious, it also needed finishing. The narrative flow is not what it might have been had the author had the chance to complete his task. Ultimately, it's an unfulfilling work.

G Rodgers

incomplete, but great work.......2005-06-08

It is reallly not fair to rate a work that is not complete. As an artist, I know how horrifying it is to show unfinished works to anybody. It really is a violation. However, whether this is Camus's first draft or 2nd draft, the evidence is everywhere what kind of great book it would have been had he had a chance to edit it, re-structure and re-write it. It was a great learning experience for me to study what a potential masterpiece looks like in the early stage of its creation.

In this draft, it seems that he was just writing down everything that had come to his mind, the things that he remembered and thought could be part of the story. It's not edited or organized well, so there are some inconsistency, unfinished sentences, and confusions. The plot is not clear, you don't know where the story is going, and the structure is not solid. There are some parts that can be eliminated as well.
But the writing itself is still very strong and beautiful, and there is a lot of wisdom in it. I especially enjoyed the chapter "the school." In this chapter he talks about the school life of the protagonist and how the teacher M. Bernard taught the children with love and discipline, and how the children loved and adored him, despite the corporal punishment they received from him for misbehaving. It's the kind of teacher-student relationship you rarely see in today's society. Each episode is vivid, detailed, heart-warming, full of wisdom and love, and beautifully written.

At the end of the book, after the story ceases, there is a section called "Interleaves." It's a collection of notes and memos of Camus, bits and pieces of scenes or dialogues, thoughts and ideas, which didn't have a chance to take parts of the book. Obviously Camus was planning to use them. They suggest that had he lived to finish the work, it would have been a totally different story, or that the story would have developed and ended much differently.

While it is disrespectful to read an incompleted work, it would have been a great loss if I didn't read it.
Thus I shall give him bright shining 5 stars, and thank him for having written this story.

Albert Camus' The First Man - we have no right to read this.......2004-09-12

I was going to read this book. I bought it for a graduate class I'm taking in the English department at the university where I am attaining my Master's. Then I looked into the history a bit and decided that to read this book would be to engage in ideological rape. Albert Camus did not give his CONSENT to publish this book in this version. Period. Posthumous publishing of a dead author's UNCOMPLETED work or works is immoral and unethical. I don't need to quench my voyeuristic thirst by reading something the author never intended me to read. Some might argue otherwise, but I just don't see how peeking at your sibling's diary is EVER justified. It is someone else's private property, we don't have a right to read it without their permission.

Sincerely,

Sean Hooks

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The Algerian Destiny of Albert Camus
Mohamed-lakhdar Maougal
Manufacturer: Academica Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1930901585

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A double value
An existentialist in the process
Albert Camus, writer.
Great insight to his work
A book of wise sayings

Notebooks 1935-1951
Albert Camus , Philip Malcolm Waller Thody , and Justin O'Brien
Manufacturer: Marlowe & Company
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ASIN: 1569246661

Customer Reviews:

A double value .......2005-01-30

The notebooks are valuable as the record of a life, and also as a kind of preliminary sketchbook to the works. Here one can see Camus groping toward the chrystallization of his most significant works. The aphoristic and descriptive beauty of some of the passages also add to the value of the work.

An existentialist in the process.......2004-09-28

After reading all of Camus' works I read his notebooks, and all of it sudden his track of mind made sense. You can clearly see the train of thoughts before The Stranger and The Fall. This book is essential for anyone who is into existentialism, absurdism and their derivatives.

I would like to say this is more of a philosophical book, but Albert's desire was always to be recognized as a writer more than a thinker. His entries are of an artist expressing his lassitude towards meaning and some paragraphs are harsh while criticizing war, love and human nature. If you are overly religious, this book may not be for you.

Great collection of entries from writer who should've won more Nobel Prizes and who is the father of modern existentialism.. still.

Albert Camus, writer........2004-07-13

For too many decades and by too many college instructors, Albert Camus has been clumped together with Jean-Paul Sartre and others under the heading of "Existentialist". This collection of Camus' notebooks indicates that there were many other things going on in his thinking, and Existentialism was hardly one of them. In fact, several revealing excerpts show us a man who disagreed with it fundamentally.

That aside, what it really presents to the reader is that Camus is first and foremost a writer. Whether it's creative writing, critical writing, reflective writing, etc., he was accomplished at all of them. His description of a sunset, quaint as it might sound, is so beautiful it's almost heartbreaking. Meanwhile, his political observations are keen, with a strong sense of urgency.

Equally fascinating is to observe his literary works taking shape: to see the mind of a writer putting a major opus together. To me, this is the major contribution of the book. I highly recommend this book to aspiring writers, diarists, or to anyone interested in the mid-20th century thought. That goes for Existentialists too.

Great insight to his work.......2001-01-09

This novel , more like a autobiography is great because in it he tells of certain unforgetable conversations and ideas that his mind has come up with. It just makes me want to read more of his work because now i know how he gets some of his ideas and the process he goes through in creating a grea novel. Although the notes are written in a form that is different then usual , they are great to read. I recomend it.

A book of wise sayings.......2000-08-10

This book...a rather large one...is wonderful and incredibly special since it is a peek into Camus' thoughts. He wrote everything down, afraid he would not remember his thoughts. This book is especially interesting since it has some powerful sayings in it...if you are searching for a good quote to write an essay about, I recommend this book.

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An admirable effort misses the forest for the trees
reiterating what has already been said
This is the Single Best Camus Biography
Very thorough, but gets bogged down with detail

Albert Camus: A Biography
Herbert R. Lottman
Manufacturer: Gingko Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 3927258067

Book Description

When Albert Camus died in a car crash in January 1960 he was only 46 years old - already a winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature and a world figure - author of the enigmatic The Stranger, the fable called The Plague, but also of the combative The Rebel - which attacked the 'politically correct' among his contemporaries.

Thanks to his early literary achievement, his work for the underground newspaper Combat and his editorship of that daily in its Post-Liberation incarnation, Camus' voice seemed the conscience of postwar France. But it was a very personal voice that rejected the conventional wisdom, rejected ideologies that called for killing in the cause of justice. His call for personal responsibility will seem equally applicable today, when Camus' voice is silent and has not been replaced. The secrecy which surrounded Algerian-born Camus' own life, public and private - a function of illness and psychological self-defense in a Paris in which he still felt himself a stranger - seemed to make the biographer's job impossible.

Lottman's Albert Camus was the first and remains the definitive biography - even in France. On publication it was hailed by New York Times reviewer John Leonard: "What emerges from Mr. Lottman's tireless devotions is a portrait of the artist, the outsider, the humanist and skeptic, that breaks the heart." In The New York Times Book Review British critic John Sturrock said: Herbert Lottman's life (of Camus) is the first to be written, either in French or English, and it is exhaustive, a labor of love and of wonderful industry." When the book appeared in London Christopher Hitchens in New Statesman told British readers: "Lottman has written a brilliant and absorbing book... The detail and the care are extraordinary... Now at last we have a clear voice about the importance of liberty and the importance of being concrete." The new edition by Gingko Press includes a specially written preface by the author revealing the challenges of a biographer, of some of the problems that had to be dealt with while writing the book and after it appeared.

Customer Reviews:

An admirable effort misses the forest for the trees.......2006-05-14

A long time ago, I started trying to think somewhat seriously about whether life without God had any meaning. A friend pointed me to Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus. So I read it - twice actually. And I went on to read The Stranger, The Plague and even The Rebel. I found in those books some powerful passages (and in the case of The Plague, a pretty good story) and considerable evidence that their author was a decent man, writing in indecent times. But to be honest, Camus' underlying message eluded me. I found his philosophical musings needlessly complicated. Why, for example, does he start The Myth of Sisyphus by asking whether life's absurdity demands suicide? Surely, the survival instinct alone renders the question meaningless; not to mention the possibility of experiencing earthly pleasure. Isn't a better question - the one I wanted answered anyway - how, not whether, to live in a world with no God watching over us? But I wasn't ready to give up on Camus. So I picked up this biography in search of clarity. I didn't get it. Lottman is no better at explaining Camus' philosophy (to me) than Camus himself. Take this Camus line, transcribed as if it were self-evident: "There is only one case in which despair is pure. It is that of a man sentenced to die.'' Huh? What about a parent who loses a child? What about a man or woman betrayed by someone they love? Is their despair somehow different from "pure despair"? And if so, does it matter? Lottman does do a valuable service in compiling the details of Camus' life. He is a relentless searcher of truth, separating fact from myth, getting the dates right, admitting when the evidence is unclear. It's yeoman's work, and deserves praise. And he makes a long story readable. His feisty preface to this new edition is a wonderful rebuke to those who supported Stalin's butchery and condemned Camus (who, as an earlier Amazon review nicely put it, had the good fortune to be "hated by idiots.") But Lottman sometimes doesn't see the forest for the trees and doesn't always put Camus' activities in a context that gives them meaning - assuming, apparently, that the reader already understands the backdrop. For example, I still don't totally understand the Camus-Sartre split, though Lottman tells us the names of the cafes and magazines in which it played out. In summary, this is a valuable book for Camus scholars and those already grounded in his philosophy. For the rest of us, the search continues.

reiterating what has already been said.......2005-11-05

i agree with both comments below. lottman did an excellent job in his research. and ,at times, he seems to hesitate to cut out all the extra detail that makes it an unnecessarily long read. but i really have to commend him for the work he did. you can find any information you need if you're doing research on camus, all you have to do is look a little.

what i most enjoyed, however, was the feel of lottman's writing. you can just tell that lottman knows his subject and has the right kind of passionate drive to deliver the biography.

This is the Single Best Camus Biography.......2000-12-20

I think I most love this magnificent book because the chilly reception it has received mirrors the deeply ironic incivility the French elite reserved for Camus himself. One can love Camus for his words, his insight, and his passion, but I think I love him most for the fact that he was hated by idiots. It is this theme that runs throughout Lottman's wonderful biography, and it also seems to describe to an extent Lottman's own experience.

For nearly the last quarter of Camus's short life, he lived in disfavor amongst the Paris literati. And for what? Because he, virtually alone amongst French intellectuals, recognized early on the horror that was the true nature of the regime of Joseph Stalin(socialism being virtually an article of faith with the likes of Sartre and others in France at the time).

Lottman himself seems to have had a rather similar experience in his publication of this book. As he points out in his preface to this second edition, a cottage industry has evolved in France and elsewhere in Camus scholarship and criticism. However, though that body of work is deeply indebted to Lottman's research, his preeminent role is rarely acknowledged. I think this is probably because, like Camus, Lottman is an outsider. Neither man was a French native (Camus was an Algerian of mixed French-Spanish descent, Lottman is an American expatriate living in Paris) and neither is an academic by trade (Camus was a newspaper editor, novelist and a man of the theatre, while Lottman is a journalist). Thus, Lottman has seemed at times as unwelcome amongst the French elite as Camus did himself. Again the irony is too much; Lottman has received comparatively little recognition even though he himself is an extremely important cornerstone of current Camus research.

Anyway, this book for whatever reason has received little more attention here in the United States than it has gotten anywhere else, and I think that is a shame. It is a wonderful, readable book. Most importantly, it is non-judgmental and it is very deferential. By that I mean that Lottman nowehere preaches to us how we should understand Camus; as he himself says, the essence of an artist is not in his biography, but in his works. It is long, but has only that level of detail befitting an intellectual biography of this caliber.

For anyone who really wants to understand Camus's literature, a thorough understanding of his life--like Lottman's--is priceless.

Very thorough, but gets bogged down with detail.......1999-05-02

Although an accomplished and thorough book, it sometimes get bogged down in detail. However, it is a very carefully compiled and analytical book. Good selection of pictures and details of others artists in Camus' life. I enjoyed it greatly.

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more than jottings
A Treasure for American Camus-philes
insightful

American Journals
Albert Camus
Manufacturer: Paragon House Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 091372968X

Customer Reviews:

more than jottings.......2003-06-26

this book has value beyond furnishing tidbits for Camus scholars, providing his take on North and South America, notably New York City and cities of Brazil, along with Buenos Aires and Santiago. He seems to have met only a few people he liked, and maybe two or three sites impressed him. He reflects on suicide. No it is not a cheerful work, but it is vivid. Hard to imagine this was the tour of a man at his most successful. For Americans, this work if valuable for he describes our homeland; if you have read the major works, this is worth a gander.

A Treasure for American Camus-philes.......2001-01-03

Educated Americans share a self-consciousness, a painful awareness that we descendants of mere colonists are probably at best nouveau-riche; in short, that we are not Europeans. Indeed, we struggle to hide our secret gratitude when a European friend--particularly a Frenchman--even shows interest in us. Thus it is a great joy to open these pages and find that one of the greatest products of French letters took the time to set down his thoughts about us and our country. Camus wrote these notes during a lecture tour to this country while he was in his thirties, a time when he was first coming to international attention and when he was deep in preparation of some of his most important literary works. Camus reveals a critical but endearingly tender fascination with our country, with its often crass culture, with its sometimes seemingly naive optimism, and with its lack of awareness of its own inestimable riches. At the same time, serious students of his work will discover the first inklings of insights and ideas that would work their way into his major writings.

Camus kept an extensive literary journal during his life, a very large portion of which (including this small piece) is available in English translation. His journal is deeply insightful and often tender and personal, but written in an elegant and well organized narrative (suggesting his anticipation that his journal would someday be read by the masses). Anyone who loves Camus will be interested in this book, and any American Camus-phile will be enraptured and gratified by it.

insightful.......2000-08-13

This book is a peek into how Camus really feels about The United States and South America, when he was here. He was also very specific, right down to what he did in the morning, how he prepared for each day, what he said to his fellow passengers, as well as how many people snored in his train cabin. I suggest this to anyone who is interested in Camus, as well as to anyone who enjoys reading a diary-style novel.

Camus and Sartre: The Story of a Friendship and the Quarrel that Ended It

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Useful and Informative
Sartre is fairly repulsive (I'm more of a Gabriel Marcel....
Reflections in a Cold War mirror
The review right above this one ...
More academic leftst revisionism

Camus and Sartre: The Story of a Friendship and the Quarrel that Ended It
Ronald Aronson
Manufacturer: University Of Chicago Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0226027961

Book Description

Until now it has been impossible to read the full story of the relationship between Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre. Their dramatic rupture at the height of the Cold War, like that conflict itself, demanded those caught in its wake to take sides rather than to appreciate its tragic complexity. Now, using newly available sources, Ronald Aronson offers the first book-length account of the twentieth century's most famous friendship and its end.

Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre first met in 1943, during the German occupation of France. The two became fast friends. Intellectual as well as political allies, they grew famous overnight after Paris was liberated. As playwrights, novelists, philosophers, journalists, and editors, the two seemed to be everywhere and in command of every medium in post-war France. East-West tensions would put a strain on their friendship, however, as they evolved in opposing directions and began to disagree over philosophy, the responsibilities of intellectuals, and what sorts of political changes were necessary or possible.

As Camus, then Sartre adopted the mantle of public spokesperson for his side, a historic showdown seemed inevitable. Sartre embraced violence as a path to change and Camus sharply opposed it, leading to a bitter and very public falling out in 1952. They never spoke again, although they continued to disagree, in code, until Camus's death in 1960.

In a remarkably nuanced and balanced account, Aronson chronicles this riveting story while demonstrating how Camus and Sartre developed first in connection with and then against each other, each keeping the other in his sights long after their break. Combining biography and intellectual history, philosophical and political passion, Camus and Sartre will fascinate anyone interested in these great writers or the world-historical issues that tore them apart.

Customer Reviews:

Useful and Informative.......2006-02-04

I read this to learn about the relationship between the two protagonists, Camus and Sartre. Both authors were previously familiar to me through their writings and also via some incidental biographical material; what was not familiar was the story of their collaboration during WWII and thereafter, and the specific nature of their philosophical difference, blossoming as it did into a very public and influential break.

This book was entirely successful in providing the information and analysis necessary to understand how two close collaborators, both very gifted and politically committed men, could come to be outspoken mutual antagonists. Especially interesting was Aronson's elucidation of the view of history each man held, and how the two activist intellectuals treated the tension between freedom and the seeming constraints of material reality.

While it is helpful to have some familiarity with the work of Sartre and Camus, a prior technical reading of their philosophical outlook is not necessary. Aronson does a good job of presenting the subject matter as a stand-alone volume geared to what is sometimes called "the informed layman." This text is well worth reading, both for historical interest and presentation of the transcendent issues it addresses.

Sartre is fairly repulsive (I'm more of a Gabriel Marcel...........2005-05-07

man myself)and it's difficult to stomach an "even-handed" (i.e., non-judgemental) account of his behavior during and after WWII, but, solely from the perspective of this work being a window into the relationship of, arguably, the two foremost French thinkers of the twentith century (and please don't throw-up Foucault, Derrida and crew against C & S) - it has considerable value and is worth the read.

Reflections in a Cold War mirror.......2005-01-03

The friendship and then the falling out between Sartre and Camus is more than biography and tells the story of the Cold War in story book dialectical form. This account brings this self-reflective history to light, beginning with the period of the War, the Vichy regime and the Resistance, then the postwar euphorias of both authors as they become public intellectuals par excellence. Their friendship and vanguard solidarity conceals hidden differences, and as the Cold War gets into gear the divergence of 'lefts' finds its exemplars. It would seem sad in one way, and yet this encounter and division produced the dialectic needed to confront the legacy of Communism and capitalism in collision, as if a fated broil. Within a few years all the issues, later the stuff of endless discourse, were tabled, and the stakes clear til the end in 1989.

The review right above this one ..........2004-05-06

is way off the mark. There's more to say about this book, but for now, let me just say that the guy above doesn't have any idea what he's talking about.

More academic leftst revisionism.......2004-03-29

While this book is supposedly meant to be a "balance" between the "fundamental legitimacy" of the philosophies of these two men, it is more an apology for Sartre than any kind of a balanced introspective of two men who shaped much of French intellectual debate after WWII.
Sartre essentially sat out WWII and offered up "Being and Nothingness" in 1943 while Camus not only wrote "The Stranger" and "The Myth of Sisyphus" in 1942, but was an active resistance fighter who fought the Nazi occupation of France. Sartre seems to have been quite envious of Camus' courage, but could never seem to be able to do anything but convert his loathsome cowardice during WWII into attacks (in the safety of salons of Paris) on Camus after publishing the venomous review of Camus' "The Rebel".
Aronson's greatest failure in this book is to try to find a moral equivalency between Sartre, who supported violence in overthrowing colonial regimes except the colonialism of the Soviet Union which he supported, and Camus, whose virulent anti-communism was way out of the "mainstream" of much of European thought after WWII. While Sartre found every reason he could to support communist regimes around the globe, he ignored the fact that the Soviet system was really an evil empire far worse than any created by the West. Stalin's forceful death by starvation of over 20 million citizens of the Soviet Union went un-noticed by Sartre as he condemned the "Imperialists" of the West. Only after the Hungarian uprising of 1956 did Sartre abandon his blind allegiance to the Soviet Union, while still supporting communist hegemony elsewhere.
Camus, on the other hand is condemned for not supporting the overthrow of regimes installed by Western European nations, even though none of them came close to the brutal nature of Soviet imperialism in the Ukraine, Chechnya, and the other conquered satellites.
Aronson's book however is really just another attempt by admitted academic leftists in the USA and other Western universities to hang onto a discredited economic system which has failed in every country it has been tried. This book is essentially not about Sartre vs Camus, but about how Marxism and its supporters have been given a bum rap. It isn't the system that is bad, but it was only implemented improperly. If only someone would just do it "the right way" then the utopia promised by Marx and his followers would be able to blossom and relieve us of the ills of capitalism. By offering a theory which places Camus and Sartre as moral equivalents, where a supporter of freedom of thought like Camus is equal to an opponent of freedom like Sartre, the left tries to level the playing field of history where the lessons to be learned are ignored or dismissed as an aberration. Only tenured professors who have never worked for a living or experienced the ravages of the philosophy he espouses could possibly write such a book. If you are looking for a book that deals with the issues that divided Camus and Sartre, you would be far better off reading "In Denial" or one of Jean Francois Revel's books.

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Brilliant Thoughts Leading Everywhere
through the looking glass
A Little Gem
don't bother

Notebooks 1935-1942
Albert Camus
Manufacturer: Marlowe & Co
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1569249938

Customer Reviews:

Brilliant Thoughts Leading Everywhere.......2006-10-31

Most of the kernels in Camus's notebooks could be the seeds for short stories or even novels. He was brilliant and far less sombre in these notes than in the great novels and essays. For those who think Camus merely a son of Kafka, these errant thoughts provide showers of sparks for the mind.

through the looking glass.......2005-06-18

This book is definately reserved for the true Camus lover. It's mostly just a collection of jumbled thoughts, not for anyone looking to be entertained. It gives great insight into his everyday life and if imagining how Camus lived is as fascinating to you as it is to me then you will love this book.

A Little Gem.......2003-02-19

A wonderful collection of the random thoughts of a brilliant writer..he later used these notes to create his masterpieces, unforgettable and poignant, a treasure to have in one's library.

don't bother.......2002-03-12

Larry McMurtry once wrote that one should never set out to read everything written by a particular author. Of course that was Larry McMurtry and I have come to realize that he was right about himself and many other authors. "Notebooks 1935-1942" is evidence that it is true even about Albert Camus. Enthralled by "The Stranger" and "The Plague", I set out to read everything by this author. I blamed myself for not enjoying his complicated essays. I also blame myself for thinking that this collection of random thoughts, scenarios, and quotes would be worth the time it took to read it. There are occassional observations of note but they are lost in the lack of continuity of thought. The art of literature lies not in having great ideas. The art of literature lies in creating stories and scenarios that enable the reader to discover the truths the author would like discovered.

For students of Camus there could be some benefits in reading this "book". The first part of the notebook generally focuses on material used in "A Happy Death" while the very latter part of the notebook generally focuses on material used in "The Plague".

Amazon.com

Olivier Todd's biography of Albert Camus matches its subject's depth by portraying the man as well as the moralist. Born in Algeria and raised in poverty by an illiterate mother, Camus never forgot where he came from. He made his name in Nazi-occupied Paris--publicly as the author of The Stranger and The Myth of Sisyphus, covertly as a member of the Resistance and editor of its newspaper, Combat--but he longed for the North African sun of his youth. During the years of crisis when Algeria struggled to break free from France, Camus alienated both colonialists and revolutionaries by supporting full equality for Arabs but denouncing terrorism. "I believe in justice," he told an Algerian heckler at a 1957 meeting he addressed in Stockholm after winning the Nobel Prize. "But I will defend my mother before justice." It is this preference for the concrete over the abstract that makes Camus such an appealing thinker. Todd's biography, which offers the most fully human depiction yet, is equally engaging.

Book Description

In this vibrant, engaging biography of Albert Camus, the internationally acclaimed author of The Stranger, The Plague, and The Fall, French writer and journalist Olivier Todd has richly tapped resources never before available—personal correspondence, notebooks, public records, as well as exclusive interviews with Camus's family, friends, fellow workers, mentors, and lovers. What emerges is the study of a man caught in conflicts between family loyalties and his own passionate nature, between the call to political action and devotion to his art, between his support of the native Algerians and his identification with the forgotten poor whites. Exploring Camus's impoverished childhood in the Algerian city of Belcourt, his underground activities during the Occupation in Paris, the intrigues of the French literati who embraced him after the publication of his first novel, L'Etranger, Todd uncovers the solitary private man behind the mask of his celebrity. He shows us a writer isolated by his own success, crippled by the charms of women he could not resist, debilitated by the tuberculosis that did not kill him. The auto accident that did adds only to the ironies in the life of this international giant of twentieth-century literature.

Customer Reviews:

Terrible.......2004-12-24

One hopes that the French edition, which is 400 hundred, not 100, pages longer, is considerably better, but I find that hard to believe. The writing is unacceptably choppy and awkward, with paragraphs springing from nowhere and sentences shifting from one grand topic to another without stopping. It's almost laughable. Chock full of details and totally lacking in style or spirit, this book will only be useful to those seeking a blow by blow chronology of Camus' life - and the chronology is uneven at best (many times Todd goes back several months without clear indication).

Poor writing wouldn't be a problem if there was at least a point of view, but Todd offers us none, preferring instead to recounting facts and quoting at length from Camus' letters. The fact that Camus was such a crystalline writer only makes this book seem like more of an insult.

I was hugely disappointed by this book. (...)

Read the French Edition of this book........2003-05-25

The only real problem I have with this book was that the American edition has been abridged. Over 150 pages have been cut. As a result much of the portrait of Camus as a philosopher has been deleted. So I would recomend reading the French edition if at all possible

a biography of a biographer.......2000-08-26

If you want camus' angle on his life, read the first man, if you want an outsiders opinion, oliver todd is as good as it gets. Todd is a stickler for detail which is what anyone reading a biography really wants, so it's a must read on my list

An excellent job of capturing Camus...........2000-08-21

This book provides an interesting portrait of someone whom most would now qualify as one of the more interesting (if not most important) authors of the twentieth century. This book documents his early life (somewhat disappointingly for anyone who has read 'The First Man'-- Camus' own account) through his dallainces with careers and women to his litery triumphs.

This is a well-written and researched book, with the only negative from me that Camus comes out a lot less heroic and a lot more bitter and stereotypically hepcat and existentialist, which was a disappointment for I, who had raised him toward being a god....

A must read for anyone interested in Camus....

An outstanding and important piece of work.......1999-02-04

If you ever wanted to know anything about Albert Camus, this is the book to read. An exceptional job of research and writing. I hated to see it end. Oliver Todd is an excellent writer and his book a joy to read.

Albert Camus: The Thinker, the Artist, the Man (Impact Biography)

Average customer rating:

Albert Camus: The Thinker, the Artist, the Man (Impact Biography)
Stephen Eric Bronner
Manufacturer: Franklin Watts
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: School & Library Binding

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ASIN: 0531113051

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very, very suspect
Flawed and Beautiful
biased
Mumma makes me angry!
Mixed Feelings

Albert Camus and the Minister
Howard E. Mumma
Manufacturer: Paraclete Press (MA)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1557252467

Book Description

In the early 1950's, Albert Camus, the renowned existentialist and Nobel prize-winner, visited the American Church in Paris to hear the music of the famous organist Marcel Dupre. What he found was an unexpected friend--Howard Mumma, a Methodist minister from Ohio who was serving as a guest preacher. Intrigued by Mumma's philosophy and theology based on a living faith in a higher power, Camus invited Mumma to lunch and thus a surprising friendship was formed.

Over the next several years, through a series of profound conversations with Howard Mumma, Camus explored the Christian faith. These discussions, as recalled by Mumma in the first part of this book, offer a deeply personal side of Camus not seen by the public eye. In the second part, Mumma shares personal glimpses of the people and experiences that had a profound influence on his own life enabling him to understand what Camus was facing in his personal life.

Customer Reviews:

very, very suspect.......2007-09-17

i am not quite an encyclopedia entry on Camus, but I am very VERY suspicious of this account by Howard Mumma. this man basically claims that Camus had most decidedly chosen to become a Christian just prior to his death. he also asserts that Camus committed suicide. as an interested reader, does this not strike you as odd? if this is one man's attempt to disgrace the reputation of Camus - a "man and a thinker" - for the sake of political gain...shame shame SHAME ON YOU! if not, well, i apologize for calling you a filthy liar.

Flawed and Beautiful.......2007-08-27

Mumma in the foreword acknowledges his bias and inaccuracy (he wrote the book almost 40 years after Camus' death, and was around 90 at its publishing). One cannot take the book in a 100% literal fashion - there are clear victims of inaccuracy in the text. However, the story as a whole is an excellent narrative of the existential struggle between the two extremes of Jean-Paul Sartre's thoughts and Mumma's Christianity, with Albert Camus' frustration with the universe straddling the chasm.

On another note, it is impossible to verify the book, Mumma notes that Camus did not want to be identified with a Methodist "priest". In the text, when speaking over dinner, Camus shuns any and all publicity. It is clear that these conversations were never intended to be public - and Camus and his biographers did not mention it.

biased.......2007-07-29

While interesting for anecdotal pieces on Camus himself, Mr. Mumma is, however, biased & blinded by his religious beliefs and misunderstands Camus (not to mention that one wonders if some of the memories themselves are not... biased...). Certainly not a major addition to the body of intellectual studies related to Camus...

Mumma makes me angry!.......2006-10-14

Whether Mumma has accurately portrayed Camus, I don't know, but I am sure that Mumma knew what he said to Camus.

When Camus requested adult Christian baptism, Mumma completely twisted the scriptures regarding the reason and purpose and urgent importance of being baptized (immersed). He told Camus that salvation came not upon baptism, but when he was sprinkled as a baby, and he would not baptise him.

When one reads about the nine conversions in the book of Acts in the Bible, it was always the same day or the same hour that people believed, that they were baptized. There wasn't any such thing as waiting until the next week or for spring or summer or whatever. They were always immersed in water right away.

Why is baptism so important? In the New Testament, salvation, and those things that accompany salvation, always occurs upon being baptized.

Look at the following scriptures that give a reason or purpose for being baptized.

Mar 16:16 He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned.

Acts 2:37-38 Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, "Brethren, what shall we do?" 38 Peter said to them, "Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."

Acts 22:16 'Now why do you delay? Get up and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.'

Romans 6:3-4 Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? 4 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.

Colossians 2:12-13 having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. 13 When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions,

1 Peter 3:20-21 who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through the water. 21 Corresponding to that, baptism now saves you, not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,

Mammu is a false teacher in the worst way. Not only did he keep Camus from becoming a Christian, he spreads his doctrines(teachings) of men though this book. There will be people who do not know the Bible and read Mammu's theory on how to become a Christian and believe it.

By the way, Mammu also showed he knew little about baptism, for in the Bible, baptism was always by immersion in water (John 3:23 and Acts 8:38-39).

I liked the book as it shows that even a soul like Camus searches for the truth and was not satisfied with what he had found earlier in his life.

Mixed Feelings.......2006-09-09

I'm no stranger to reviewing books. I normally find it easy to write a brief one or two assesment of a book. But my feelings about "Albert Camus and the Minister" by Howard Mumma are very complex and I struggle to write a descent review of this book.

The first 90 pages which cover a growing friendship between Camus and Mumma is clearly the most interesting part of the book. The rest is a collection of life experiences that were meaningful to Mumma. These experiences are not dull, but I found them to be a bit disconnected from the first 90 pages. One of the most entertaining points of this book is where Camus asks for baptism, but Mumma rejects it on the grounds that (A) Camus had already been baptised as an infant and (B) he wasn't willing to join the church or make it a public event. He ends up regreting that stand a bit, especially on reflecting on the fact that it was his final meeting with Camus. It was also neat to read about Camus' enthusiasm in studying the Bible.

Mumma holds a view of the Bible which relegates The Fall to allegorical tale and he certainly doesn't have an evangelical view of the inspiration of scripture. While coming from that platform might have made agreement with Camus a bit easier, I believe Mumma would have had some more meaningful answers to Camus' questions if he actually had a view of the Bible which validates using it as an authorative source. In some senses, from a thoroughly evangelical Christian prespective, Mumma wasn't offering Camus something much better than he already had. Sure, Mumma presented some God talk, but did he present the gospel to Camus as something that is "true truth" not just "religious truth"?

I sympathise with the views other reviewers who are quite critical of this book. While I hope and trust Mumma has recorded things accurately, there are a few things which make me wonder. First, some of his recollections (he admits plainly that they are recollections and may not be 100% accurate) portray the conversations as rather simplistic--with most of the dialogs turning out to be more "gentle" and successful from Mumma's perspective than one would expect when an Existentialist and a Christian minister would get together. Second, I don't know enough about Camus to verify it, but some other reviewers bring up interesting comments that Mumma seems to have gotten some of Camus' biographical details wrong. Third, Camus seeking truth is quite believable, but requesting adult baptism? That seems a bit far fetched. As another reviewer noted, it is notable that the accuracy of first 90 pages of the books can not be verified. This problem is further compounded by the fact that Mumma shares that Camus was secretive about it--he requested specifically that his inquiries be kept secret (this make this book a betrayal of sorts).

I will not go to the length to say I think Mumma invented the dialogs (as some reviewers have suggested), but I think I reader should approach it with some caution and be prepared to accept that at the very least some of the dialogs may not have been recorded completely accurately.

So, if you have been following me so far, you should find that my response to this book is both positive and negative. I don't regret having read it, though. The first 90 pages are interesting even if we are to suppose that they are totally fictional. This book might be worth getting if the reviews so far intruige you. I'll just advise you that you shouldn't expect Mumma to be an evangelical nor should you expect any of the recollections in this book to be easily verifiable.

I'm left wondering what would be the outcome if Camus had spent this time with an evangelical (such as Francis Schaeffer or OS Guinness) instead of one who has accepted most of the doctrinal positions of the "liberal" movement.

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