Albert Camus Quotes

Biography

Type: French philosopher, Author, and Journalist.

Born: 7 November 1913 Dréan (then Mondovi), E

Died: 4 January 1960 (aged 46), Villeblevin, Yon

Albert Camus became known for his political journalism, novels and essays during the 1940s. His best-known works, including The Stranger (1942) and The Plague (1947), are exemplars of absurdism. Camus won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957 and died on January 4, 1960, in Burgundy, France.

Albert Camus Quotes

To stay or to go, it amounted to the same thing.. Albert Camus
To stay or to go, it amounted to the same thing.

A man devoid of hope and conscious of being so has ceased to belong to the
A man devoid of hope and conscious of being so has ceased to belong to the future.

The purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.. Albert Camus
The purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.

One of the only coherent philosophical positions is thus revolt. It is a constant confrontation between
One of the only coherent philosophical positions is thus revolt. It is a constant confrontation between man and his own obscurity.

How unbearable, for women, is the tenderness which a man can give them without love. For
How unbearable, for women, is the tenderness which a man can give them without love. For men, how bittersweet this is.

Nothing in life is worth, turning your back on, if you love it.. Albert Camus
Nothing in life is worth,
turning your back on,
if you love it.

What made me run away was doubtless not so much the fear of settling down, but
What made me run away was doubtless not so much the fear of settling down, but of settling down permanently in something ugly.

If something is going to happen to me, I want to be there.. Albert Camus
If something is going to happen to me, I want to be there.

Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.. Albert Camus
Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.

Live to the point of tears.. Albert Camus
Live to the point of tears.

What is called a reason for living is also an excellent reason for dying.. Albert Camus
What is called a reason for living is also an excellent reason for dying.

Man is always prey to his truths. Once he has admitted them, he cannot free himself
Man is always prey to his truths. Once he has admitted them, he cannot free himself from them.

Seeking what is true is not seeking what is desirable.. Albert Camus
Seeking what is true is not seeking what is desirable.

In order to be created, a work of art must first make use of the dark
In order to be created, a work of art must first make use of the dark forces of the soul

Perhaps the easiest way of making a town's acquaintance is to ascertain how the people in
Perhaps the easiest way of making a town's acquaintance is to ascertain how the people in it work, how they love, and how they die.

Human relationships always help us to carry on because they always presuppose further developments, a future
Human relationships always help us to carry on because they always presuppose further developments, a future - and also because we live as if our only task was precisely to have relationships with other people.

I would like to be able to breathe - to be able to love her by
I would like to be able to breathe - to be able to love her by memory or fidelity. But my heart aches. I love you continuously, intensely.

I feel like getting married, or committing suicide, or subscribing to L'Illustration. Something desperate, you know..
I feel like getting married, or committing suicide, or subscribing to L'Illustration. Something desperate, you know.

Do not wait for the last judgment. It comes every day.. Albert Camus
Do not wait for the last judgment. It comes every day.

I have no idea what's awaiting me, or what will happen when this all ends. For
I have no idea what's awaiting me, or what will happen when this all ends. For the moment I know this: there are sick people and they need curing.

A man's work is nothing but this slow trek to rediscover, through the detours of art, those two or three great and simple images in whose presence his heart first opened.

Mostly, I could tell, I made him feel uncomfortable. He didn't understand me, and he was sort of holding it against me. I felt the urge to reassure him that I was like everybody else, just like everybody else. But really there wasn't much point, and I gave up the idea out of laziness.

All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning. Great works are often born on a street corner or in a restaurant's revolving door.

Lying is not only saying what isn't true. It is also, in fact especially, saying more than is true, and, in the case of the human heart, saying more than one feels.

False judges are held up in the world’s admiration and I alone know the true ones.

What I believe to be true I must therefore preserve. What seems to me so obvious, even against me, I must support.

What we call fundamental truths are simply the ones we discover after all the others.

Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.

An intellectual? Yes. And never deny it. An intellectual is someone whose mind watches itself. I like this, because I am happy to be both halves, the watcher and the watched. "Can they be brought together?" This is a practical question. We must get down to it. "I despise intelligence" really means: "I cannot bear my doubts.

Some people talk in their sleep. Lecturers talk while other people sleep

Au milieu de l'hiver, j'ai découvert en moi un invincible été.

The evil that is in the world almost always comes from ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence if they lack understanding.

If there were a party of those who aren't sure they're right, I'd belong to it.
~(Camus, as quoted by Tony Judt)

Mother used to say that however miserable one is, there’s always something to be thankful for. And each morning, when the sky brightened and light began to flood my cell, I agreed with her.

No code of ethics and no effort are justifiable a priori in the face of the cruel mathematics that command our condition.

There is no fate which cannot be surmounted by scorn.

Those who lack the courage will always find a philosophy to justify it.

There is but one true philosophical problem and that is suicide.

Beginning to think is beginning to be undermined. Society has but little connection with such beginnings. The worm is in man's heart. That is where it must be sought. One must follow and understand this fatal game that leads from lucidity in the face of existence to flight from light.

Do you believe in God, doctor?"

No - but what does that really mean? I'm fumbling in the dark, struggling to make something out. But I've long ceased finding that original.

I don’t know whether this world has a meaning that transcends it. But I know that I cannot know that meaning and that it is impossible for me just now to know it.

A novel is never anything but a philosophy expressed in images. And in a good novel the philosophy has disappeared into the images.

You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.

Happiness and the absurd are two sons of the same earth. They are inseparable.

A man wants to earn money in order to be happy, and his whole effort and the best of a life are devoted to the earning of that money. Happiness is forgotten; the means are taken for the end.

It is a kind of spiritual snobbery that makes people think they can be happy without money.

Your success and happiness are forgiven you only if you generously consent to share them. But to be happy it is essential not to be too concerned with others. Consequently, there is no escape. Happy and judged, or absolved and wretched.

For who would dare to assert that eternal happiness can compensate for a single moment's human suffering

You are forgiven for your happiness and your successes only if you generously consent to share them.

There's the risk of being loved...and that would keep me from being happy.

What did it matter if he existed for two or for twenty years? Happiness was the fact that he had existed.

You know what charm is: a way of getting the answer yes without having asked any clear question.

… I suppose that it is not so easy to go home and it takes a bit of time to make a son out of a stranger.

It is the job of thinking people not to be on the side of the executioners.

He had been bored, that's all, bored like most people. Hence he had made himself out of whole cloth a life full of complications and drama. Something must happen - and that explains most human commitments. Something must happen, even loveless slavery, even war or death. Hurray then for funerals!

Because there is nothing here than invites us to cherish unhappy lovers. Nothing is more vain than to die for love. What we ought to do is live.

Remembrance of things past is just for the rich. For the poor it only marks the faint traces on the path to death.

J'écoutais mon cœur. Je ne pouvais imaginer que ce bruit qui m'accompagnait depuis si longtemps pût jamais cesser.

It seems that the people of Oran are like that friend of Flaubert who, on the point of death, casting a last glance at the irreplaceable earth, exclaimed: "Close the window, it's too beautiful.

I do not believe in God and I am not an atheist.

The reasoning is classic in its clarity. If God does not exist, Kirilov is god. If God does not exist, Kirilov must kill himself. Kirilov must therefore kill himself to become god. That logic is absurd, but it is what is needed.

...he said firmly, "God can help you. All the men I’ve seen in your position turned to Him in their time of trouble." "Obviously," I replied, "they were at liberty to do so, if they felt like it." I, however, didn’t want to be helped, and I hadn’t time to work up interest for something that didn’t interest me.

In vain a zealous evangelist with a fely hat and flowing tie threads his way through the crowd, crying without cease: 'God is great and good. Come unto Him.' On the contrary, they all make haste toward some trivial objective that seems of more immediate interest than God.

Il n'y a qu'une seule liberté, se mettre en règle avec la mort. Après quoi, tout est possible. Je ne puis te forcer à croire en Dieu. Croire en Dieu, c'est accepter la mort. Quand tu auras accepté la mort, le problème de Dieu sera résolu - et non pas l'inverse

Where there is no hope, it is incumbent on us to invent it.

And indeed it could be said that once the faintest stirring of hope became possible, the dominion of plague was ended.

From the moment that man submits God to moral judgment, he kills Him his own heart.

The love of God is a hard love. It demands total self-surrender, disdain of our human personality. And yet it alone can reconcile us to suffering and the deaths of children, it alone can justify them, since we cannot understand them, and we can only make God's will ours.

Moreover, most people, assuming they had not altogether abandoned religious observances, or did not combine them naively with a thoroughly immoral way of living, had replaced normal religious practice by more or less extravagant superstitions.

...since the order of the world is shaped by death, mightn't it be better for God if we refuse to believe in Him and struggle with all our might against death, without raising our eyes towards the heaven where He sits in silence?

Je puis nier une chose sans me croire obligé de la salir ou de retirer aux autres le droit d'y croire.

The greatness of man lies in his decision to be stronger than his condition.

որևէ քաղաք ճանաչելու ամենաճիշտ ձևերից մեկն էլ իմանալն է, թե ինչպե՞ս են այնտեղ աշխատում%2

I used to advertise my loyalty and I don't believe there is a single person I loved that I didn't eventually betray.

Where would his torture be, indeed, if at every step the hope of succeeding upheld him?

Every achievement is a servitude. It compels us to a higher achievement.

I don't want to be a genius-I have enough problems just trying to be a man.

He knew now that it was his own will to happiness which must make the next move. But if he was to do so, he realized that he must come to terms with time, that to have time was at once the most magnificent and the most dangerous of experiments. Idleness is fatal only to the mediocre.

Indeed the Here and Now had come to mean everything to them. For there is no denying that the plague had gradually killed off in all of us the faculty not of love only but eve of friendship. Naturally enough, since love asks something of the future, and nothing was left but a series of present moments.

Don't let them tell us stories

Every time I hear a political speech or I read those of our leaders, I am horrified at having, for years, heard nothing which sounded human. It is always the same words telling the same lies.

Beauty is unbearable, drives us to despair, offering us for a minute the glimpse of an eternity that we should like to stretch out over the whole of time.

Man cannot do without beauty, and this is what our era pretends to want to disregard.

There is something divine in mindless beauty.

Ahimè, dopo una certa età ognuno è responsabile della sua faccia.

But a man's beauty represents inner, functional truths: his face shows what he can do. And what is that compared to the magnificent uselessness of a woman's face? Mersault was aware of this now, delighting in his vanity and smiling at his secret demons.

The only deep emotion I occasionally felt in these affairs was gratitude, when all was going well and I was left, not only peace, but freedom to come and go-never kinder and gayer with one woman than when I had just left another's bed, as if I extended to all others the debt I had just contracted toward one of them.

Non, ce n'était pas moi qui comptais, ni le monde, mais seulement l'accord et le silence qui de lui à moi faisait naître l'amour.

But the heart has its own memory and I have forgotten nothing.

It was in Spain that [my generation] learned that one can be right and yet be beaten, that force can vanquish spirit, that there are times when courage is not its own recompense. It is this, doubtless, which explains why so many, the world over, feel the Spanish drama as a personal tragedy.

But what are a hundred million deaths? When one has served in a war, one hardly knows what a dead man is, after a while. And since a dead man has no substance unless one has actually seen him dead, a hundred million corpses broadcast through history are no more than a puff of smoke in the imagination.

To be born to create, to love, to win at games is to be born to live in time of peace. But war teaches us to lose everything and become what we were not. It all becomes a question of style.

A guilty conscience needs to confess. A work of art is a confession.

Without culture, and the relative freedom it implies, society, even when perfect, is but a jungle. This is why any authentic creation is a gift to the future.

Creating is living doubly. The groping, anxious quest of a Proust, his meticulous collecting of flowers, of wallpapers, and of anxieties, signifies nothing else.

If the only significant history of human thought were to be written, it would have to be the history of its successive regrets and its impotences.

You see, Mersualt, all the misery and cruelty of our civilisation can be measured by this one stupid axiom: happy nations have no history.

Peace is the only battle worth waging.

He who despairs of the human condition is a coward, but he who has hope for it is a fool.

Il faudrait vivre en spectateur de sa propre vie. Pour y ajouter le rêve qui l'achèverait. Mais on vit, et les autres rêvent votre vie.

To hold two ideas that contradict each other is to flirt with absurdity, and humans are creatures who spend their lives trying to convince themselves that their existence is not absurd.

They fancied
themselves free, and no one will ever be free so long as there are pestilences.

The welfare of the people in particular has always been the alibi of tyrants, and it provides the further advantage of giving the servants of tyranny a good conscience.

And I should like to be able to love my country and still love justice. I don't want any greatness for it, particularly a greatness born of blood and falsehood. I want to keep it alive by keeping justice alive.

Actual freedom has not increased in proportion to man's awareness of it.

He marveled at the strange blindness by which men, though they are so alert to what changes in themselves, impose on their friends an image chosen for them once and for all. He was being judged by what he had been. Just as dogs don't change character, men are dogs to one another.

Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend.

Don't walk in front of me I may not follow:Don't behind me I may not lead:Just walk beside me a be my friend.

I cannot stand the company of men. They flatter or they judge. I can stand neither of the two.

Their pleasures are fierce and their sleep impenetrable. And they know that the body has a soul in which the soul has no part.

She was waiting, but she didn't know for what. She was aware only of her solitude, and of the penetrating cold, and of a greater weight in the region of her heart.

Having money is a way of being free of money

On veut gagner de l'argent pour vivre heureux et tout l'effort et le meilleur d'une vie se concentrent pour le gain de cet argent. le bonheur est oublié, le moyen pris pour la fin.

He was one
of those rare people, rare in our town as elsewhere, who have the courage of their good
feelings. What little he told of his personal life vouched for acts of kindness and a
capacity for affection that no one in our times dares own to.

في بدء توقيفي كانت لدي أفكار رجل حر من ذلك أن الرغبة كانت تأخذني في أكون على شاطئ ...وبعد ذلك %

I know of only one duty, and that is to love.

I was assailed by memories of a life that wasn't mine anymore, but one in which I'd found the simplest and most lasting joys: the smells of summer, the part of town I loved, a certain evening sky, Marie's dresses and the way she laughed.

There is scarcely any passion without struggle.

There are crimes of passion and crimes of logic. The boundary between them is not clearly defined.

I like these people swarming on the sidewalks, wedged into a little space of houses and canals, hemmed in by fogs, cold lands, and the sea streaming like a wet wash. I like them, for they are double. They are here and elsewhere.

Believe me, for certain men at least, not taking what one doesn't desire is the hardest thing in the world.

Real generosity towards the future lies in giving all to the present.

Créer, c'est vivre deux fois.

It is better for the intellectual not to talk all the time. To begin with, it would exhaust him, and, above all, it would keep him from thinking. He must create if he can, first and foremost, especially if his creation does not side-step the problems of his time.

To create today is to create dangerously. Any publication is an act, and that act exposes one to the passions of an age that forgives nothing.

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