Every time a man (myself) gives way to vanity, every time he thinks and lives in order to show off, this is a betrayal. Every time, it has always been the great misfortune of wanting to show off which has lessened me in the presence of the truth. We need to reveal ourselves to others, but only to those we love. For then we are no longer revealing ourselves in order to seem but in order to give. There is much more strength in a man who reveals himself only when it is necessary. I have suffered from being alone, but because I have been able to keep my secret I have overcome the suffering of loneliness. To go right to the end implies knowing how to keep one's secret. And, today, there is no greater joy than to live alone and unknown. My deepest joy is to write. To accept the world and to accept pleasure — but only when I am stripped bare of everything. I should not be worthy to love the bare and empty beaches if I could not remain naked in the presence of myself. For the first time I can understand the meaning of the word happiness without any ambiquity. It is a little different from what men normally mean when they say: "I am happy."
A certain persistence in despair finally gives birth to joy....
— Albert Camus, Notebooks 1935-1942, from the entry for September 15, 1937 (while in Italy), pp. 58-59.
I ought not to have writen: if the world were clear, art would not exist — but if the world seemed to me to have a meaning I should not write at all. There are cases when one must be personal, out of modesty. In addition, the remark would have forced me to think it over and, in the end, I should not have written it. It is a brilliant truth, without basis.
— Albert Camus, Notebooks 1942-1951, p. 39.
Living with one's passions amounts to living with one's sufferings, which are the counterpoise, the corrective, the balance, and the price. When a man has learned and not on paper — how to remain alone with his suffering, how to overcome his longing to flee, the illusion that others may share, then he has little left to learn.
— Albert Camus, Ibid., p. 41.
Do not forget: illness and decrepitude. There's not a minute to be wasted — which is perhaps the contrary of "one must hurry."
— Albert Camus, Ibid., p. 79.
It requires bucketsful of blood and centuries of history to lead to an imperceptible modification in the human condition. Such is the law. For years heads fall like hail, Terror reigns, Revolution is touted, and one ends up by substituting constitutional monarchy for legitimate monarchy.
....
I am not made for politics because I am inescapable of wanting or accepting the death of the adversary.
— Albert Camus, Ibid., p. 119.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Camus wrote, "I have suffered from being alone, but because I have been able to keep my secret I have overcome the suffering of loneliness. To go right to the end implies knowing how to keep one's secret. And, today, there is no greater joy than to live alone and unknown" as cited above.
ReplyDelete[Albert Camus, _Notebooks 1942-1951_ (New York: Alfred A.Knofp, 1965), 41.]
I suppose Camus was writing this to himself; otherwise, this passage is a bit disingenuous. To write for others the keeping of one's suffering of loneliness is not to keep one's secret. In any case, I find it interesting that the psychiatrist Irvin Yalom writes in this regard:
"The joy of being observed ran so deep that ...the real pain of old age, bereavement, outliving one's friends, was the absence of scrutiny -- the horror of living an unobserved life."
[Irvin D. Yalom, _When Nietzsche Wept_ (New York: Harper Perennial, 1992), 55.]