A Happy Death (original title La mort heureuse) is a novel by absurdist French writer-philosopher Albert Camus. The absurdist topic of the book is the "will to happiness", the conscious creation of one's happiness, and the need of time (and money) to do so. It draws on memories of the author including his job at the maritime commission in Algiers, his suffering from tuberculosis, and his travels in Europe.
Camus composed and reworked the novel between 1936 and 1938 but then decided not to publish it. It was eventually published in 1971, over 11 years after the author's death. The English translation by Richard Howard appeared in 1972.
A Happy Death was Camus' first novel and was clearly the precursor to his most famous work, The Stranger, published in 1942. The main character in A Happy Death is named "Patrice Mersault", similar to The Stranger's "Meursault"; both are French Algerian clerks who kill another man. A Happy Death is written in the third person, whereas The Stranger is written in the first person.
Summary
The novel has just over 100 pages and consists of two parts.
Part 1, titled "Natural death", describes the monotone and empty life of Patrice Mersault with his boring office job and a meaningless relationship with his girlfriend Marthe. Mersault gets to know the rich invalid Roland Zagreus (Zagreus is a character of Greek mythology) who shows Mersault a way out: "Only it takes time to be happy. A lot of time. Happiness, too, is a long patience. And in almost every case, we use up our lives making money, when we should be using our money to gain time." Zagreus implies that his life is a meaningless waste, and so Meursault decides to kill him in order to create his own happiness with the rich man's money.
Part 2, titled "Conscious death", follows Mersault's subsequent trip to Europe. Traveling by train from city to city, he is unable to find peace and decides to return to Algiers, to live in a house high above the sea with three young female friends. Everybody here has only one goal: the pursuit of happiness by abandoning the world. Yet Mersault needs solitude. He marries a pleasant woman named Lucienne whom he does not love, buys a house in a village by the sea, and moves in alone. "At this hour of night, his life seemed so remote to him, he was so solitary and indifferent to everything and to himself as well, that Mersault felt he had at last attained what he was seeking, that the peace which filled him now was born of that patient self-abandonment he had pursued and achieved with the help of this warm world so willing to deny him without anger." Severely ill, he dies a happy death: "And stone among the stones, he returned in the joy of his heart to the truth of the motionless worlds."
Albert Camus was a French philosopher, author, dramatist, journalist, world federalist, and political activist. He was the recipient of the 1957 Nobel Prize in Literature at the age of 44, the second-youngest recipient in history. His works include The Stranger, The Plague, The Myth of Sisyphus, The Fall and The Rebel.
The Plague is a 1947 absurdist novel by Albert Camus. It tells the story from the point of view of a narrator in the midst of a plague sweeping the French Algerian city of Oran. The narrator remains unknown until the beginning of the last chapter. The novel presents a snapshot into life in Oran as seen through the author's distinctive absurdist point of view.
Existentialism is a family of views and forms of philosophical inquiry that explore the meaning, purpose, and value of the existence of the human individual. Common concepts in existentialist thought include existential crises, dread, and anxiety in the face of an absurd world; living with authenticity and courage; and understanding one's own freedom and responsibility.
The Myth of Sisyphus is a 1942 philosophical essay by Albert Camus. Influenced by philosophers such as Søren Kierkegaard, Arthur Schopenhauer, and Friedrich Nietzsche, Camus introduces his philosophy of the absurd. The absurd lies in the juxtaposition between the fundamental human need to attribute meaning to life and the "unreasonable silence" of the universe in response. Camus claims that the realization of the absurd does not justify suicide, and instead requires "revolt". He then outlines several approaches to the absurd life. In the final chapter, Camus compares the absurdity of man's life with the situation of Sisyphus, a figure of Greek mythology who was condemned to repeat forever the same meaningless task of pushing a boulder up a mountain, only to see it roll down again just as it nears the top. The essay concludes, "The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy."
The Stranger, also published in English as The Outsider, is a 1942 novella written by French author Albert Camus. The first of Camus's novels published in his lifetime, the story follows Meursault, an indifferent settler in French Algeria, who, weeks after his mother's funeral, kills an unnamed Arab man in Algiers. The story is divided into two parts, presenting Meursault's first-person narrative before and after the killing.
Absurdist fiction is a genre of novels, plays, poems, films, or other media that focuses on the experiences of characters in situations where they cannot find any inherent purpose in life, most often represented by ultimately meaningless actions and events that call into question the certainty of existential concepts such as truth or value. In some cases, it may overlap with literary nonsense.
The Fall is a philosophical novel by Albert Camus. First published in 1956, it is his last complete work of fiction. Set in Amsterdam, The Fall consists of a series of dramatic monologues by the self-proclaimed "judge-penitent" Jean-Baptiste Clamence, as he reflects upon his life to a stranger. In what amounts to a confession, Clamence tells of his success as a wealthy Parisian defense lawyer who was highly respected by his colleagues. His crisis, and his ultimate "fall" from grace, was meant to invoke, in secular terms, the fall of man from the Garden of Eden. The Fall explores themes of innocence, imprisonment, non-existence, and truth. In a eulogy to Albert Camus, existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre described the novel as "perhaps the most beautiful and the least understood" of Camus' books.
Absurdism is the philosophical theory that the universe is irrational and meaningless. It states that trying to find meaning leads people into conflict with a seemingly meaningless world. This conflict can be between rational man and an irrational universe, between intention and outcome, or between subjective assessment and objective worth, but the precise definition of the term is disputed. Absurdism claims that, due to one or more of these conflicts, existence as a whole is absurd. It differs in this regard from the less global thesis that some particular situations, persons, or phases in life are absurd.
"Killing an Arab" is the first single by the Cure. It was recorded at the same time as their first album Three Imaginary Boys (1979), but not included on the album. However, it was included on the band's first US album, Boys Don't Cry (1980).
The Stranger is a 1967 film by Italian film director Luchino Visconti, based on Albert Camus's 1942 novel The Stranger, with Marcello Mastroianni.
In ethics and other branches of philosophy, suicide poses difficult questions, answered differently by various philosophers. The French Algerian essayist, novelist, and playwright Albert Camus (1913–1960) began his philosophical essay The Myth of Sisyphus with the famous line "There is but one truly serious philosophical problem and that is suicide.".
Cross Damon was a fictional character from Richard Wright's 1953 novel The Outsider. Cross Damon was viewed as an "outsider" who did not attempt to become a product of the established culture of American society. Cross was considered a complete opposite to Bigger Thomas, another character created by Richard Wright in his novel Native Son. He also ridicules Communist techniques and lives according to the principles of free choice. Cross Damon committed murder in a completely different spirit than Bigger Thomas. He acts as an individual who is free to do whatever his habits and desires lead him to do. His is not a victim of social and environmental pressures outside his control. In many ways, Cross Damon resembles Meursault, the hero of Albert Camus novel The Stranger. Both men lived outside of any involvement with common humanity and paid no attention to social mores.
Caligula is a play written by Albert Camus, begun in 1938 and published for the first time in May 1944 by Éditions Gallimard. It premiered on 26 September 1945 at the Théâtre Hébertot in Paris, starring Gérard Philipe (Caligula), Michel Bouquet and Georges Vitaly and was directed by Paul Œttly. The play was later the subject of numerous revisions. It is part of what Camus called the "Cycle of the Absurd", together with the novel The Stranger (1942) and the essay The Myth of Sisyphus (1942). A number of critics have reported the piece to be existentialist, though Camus always denied belonging to this philosophy. Its plot revolves around the historical figure of Caligula, a Roman Emperor famed for his cruelty and seemingly insane behavior.
Matthew Ward was an American English/French translator noted for his 1989 rendition of Albert Camus' The Stranger. He made several important alterations from the more British-toned translation by Stuart Gilbert. Most notably he altered the quite well known opening line "Mother died today" to "Maman died today". Ward defended the alteration by noting that the more juvenile "Maman" reflects the "curious feeling he (Meursault) has for her". Other examples of Ward altering Gilbert's version include the line, "Il était avec son chien" from, "As usual, he had his dog with him" to "He was with his dog". Once again Ward felt this better reflected Meursault's character. Indeed, later in the novel Meursault notes Salamano's dog is worth no more or less than his wife.
The Misunderstanding, sometimes published as Cross Purpose, is a play written in 1943 in occupied France by Albert Camus. It focuses on Camus’ idea of The Absurd.
Atheistic existentialism is a kind of existentialism which strongly diverged from the Christian existential works of Søren Kierkegaard and developed within the context of an atheistic world view. The philosophies of Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche provided existentialism's theoretical foundation in the 19th century, although their differing views on religion proved essential to the development of alternate types of existentialism. Atheistic existentialism was formally recognized after the 1943 publication of Being and Nothingness by Jean-Paul Sartre and Sartre later explicitly alluded to it in Existentialism is a Humanism in 1946.
Man with a Glove is an oil-on-canvas portrait by the Italian Renaissance artist Titian, painted c. 1520. It is part of the collections of the Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Kamel Daoud is an Algerian writer and journalist. He currently edits the French-language daily Le quotidien d’Oran, for which he writes a popular column, "Raïna Raïkoum". The column often includes commentary on the news.
I Am Not Sidney Poitier (2009) is a novel by American writer Percival Everett. Originally published by Graywolf Press, in 2020 it was published by Influx Press in the UK. It explores the tumultuous life of a character named Not Sidney Poitier as the social hierarchy scrambles to balance his skin color with his wealth.
The Meursault Investigation is the first novel by Algerian writer and journalist Kamel Daoud. It is a retelling of Albert Camus' 1942 novel, The Stranger. First published in Algeria by Barzakh Editions in October 2013, it was reissued in France by Actes Sud. Its publication in France was followed by nominations for many prizes and awards.
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