Resistance, Rebellion, and Death · Essays (Vintage International)

Biographically speaking, there's nothing as definitive concerning one's life as the asides he speaks to himself or while facing an audience. Letters speeches written at the moment not organized into a timeless work reveal more of a person's life thought than any rote biography by an admirer. This is precisely what this book is. It doesn't explain Albert Camus. It reveals him. This is its 1st value. Here we find letters written during the war to a German friend, attempting to sift his love for his country despite its weaknesses insanities. For himself France he's tried to judge his own land culture, to tap its vital bloodstream, discover its worth thus "absurdly" enter the larger human family. For Americans, the book has an added value. Here's a man who speaks our own language, the traditional language of America in constant criticism of itself. Perhaps this explains the reading public's affinity for this European. Finally the collected asides give us a greater insight into his thinking. He details his war effort distinguishes his support of killing from that of murdering. He etches his homeland, Algeria, attempting to preserve the familiar relationship of the past the independence required of the present. Thru his love of justice he exerts a forceful resistance against Xianity Communism, tho he respects both. Yet his passionate love of justice becomes quicksand unveils his deep religious feeling. After all, as he says, "The only real artist then is God...all other artists are, ipso facto, unfaithful to reality". A statement in which he included himself. Certainly this is the most important book written about Camus, by one who knows best.--Kirkus (edited)