I agree with another reviewer in that one has got to be prepared for Camus. I have only read The Stranger and The Plague in addition to this one, but found A Happy Death much better than The Plague. Also note that A Happy Death was not published by Camus during his lifetime and likely not intended to be, since much of A Happy Death is taken and used in The Stranger. For fans existentialism (which I am one) this book is a pretty fun and easy read, due to its very short length. I recommended it to a cousin I was vacationing with who had almost no philosophical background, and he read it in one day and enjoyed it well enough. But again, as I have written in my review of The Plague, one cannot help but wonder what gets lost in each translation. Giving the benefit of the doubt to Camus, this translator (Richard Howard) appears to have a better grip on the English side of the ball than does the translator of The Plague (Stuart Gilbert). Since this is (unofficially) Camus' first work, A Happy Death is a logical place to start, although note another reviewer's remarks that The Stranger and The Fall are both more enjoyable (but not The Plague according to me). A first-timer to Camus may be better served by trying The Stranger first - I'm positive Camus would prefer that starting point as well.

In "A Happy Death", Camus took a different approach to writing what later became "The Stranger". The latter work is famous (and sometimes despised) for it terse, efficient prose, its brutal frankness, and its avoidance of moral consideration. As a result, many readers do not know what to make of Merseault and often mistake him for a psychopath. In "A Happy Death", Camus writes in the third person and adds considerably more elements to the story. The ending also differs from "The Stranger".

In "The Stranger", Merseault kills an Arab for no apparent reason other than caprice or irritability. Merseault is then put on trial and condemned more for his flagrant aversion to bourgeois hypocrisy than for the crime he committed.

But in "A Happy Death", Merseault's crime had a clearer motive and a deeper symbolism. Merseault kills his crippled friend Zagreus in order to obtain his wealth and use it to transform his otherwise mundane life. In Greek mythology, Zagreus was torn apart by the Titans but Zeus was able to give his still beating heart to his daughter who later fathered Dinoysis, the god of wine. Zagreus literally means "torn apart" in Greek. The myth of Zagreaus is comparable to the role of Christ in the Christian tradition because Zagreus was mocked, tortured, and executed. But unlike Christ, Zagreaus escaped the final humiliation by having a substitute take his place.

Camus re-appropriates this legend in "A Happy Death". The wheelchair bound Zagreaus essentially prompts Merseault to murder him so that he can escape the humiliation of his infirmity and pass his wealth on to Merseault. There are subtle indications that the two men are inextricably bound to each other. Both men experience the same lover at different times and both share the same cynical view that she is only an image of what they want to see in her. Each man also has what the other needs. Merseault has the physical capability to enjoy life, but he is hampered by routine and by his work. Zagreus has wealth but lacks the physical capability to enjoy it.

The re-appropriation of the Zagreus myth asks the question "what does it mean to truly be alive"? Is it better that only one of the two men live as long as he lives his life to the fullest rather than both living unhappy, restricted lives? After killing Zagreaus, Merseault leads a life of travel, hedonism, and leisure. When he is subsequently stricken ill, he dies a happy dignified death.

In this sense I would disagree with the reviewer who characterized "A Happy Death" as a primer for "The Stranger". Instead, it is a story with a completely different emphasis. Where the stranger depicts the fate society metes out to an honest individual, "A Happy Death" asks what it truly means to be alive.

This book is concentrating on the subject of which is the right way to live your life so your death would be worth it. I think it is completely stunning, like every other book from Camus so read it now, it will change YOUR life for sure!

Originally titled "Camus for Beginners", this concise biography combines personal information, short excerpts, and vivid cartoons to illuminate the man behind the modern literary myth.

Although I had read The Fall, The Plague, The Stranger, and a few collections of essays a decade earlier, I had only a vague memory of Camus' actual life and conflicts. This fine book, which I read in less than two hours, remains a solid primer. Both longtime admirers of Camus and undergraduate students forced to read his celebrated novels should find this brief work a valuable investment of time.

It's also worth noting that cartoons are often read by adults in Europe. The format provides readers with a superficial, yet accessible and non-threathening, way to enter into academic and philosophical discussions. College and high school teachers of French, literature, and philosophy would benefit from adding this book to their students while assigning any novel by Camus.

"Los Justos" is such a wonderful book. It is filled with emotions that bring out the passion that exists in each of us. It tells the story of a group of revolutionaries that try to make Mother Russia a better nation by killing one of its most prestigious figures. The obstacles they must face, the planning the must take, and the feelings they must overcome are all part of a passionate tale that will bring the best of emotions in you.

A long time student of Camus' works, I thought I knew everything there was to know about this man. However, this book along with "Albert Camus and the Minister" have left me with a fresh perspective on Camus. Not to say that it destroys the image of the man that other works personify, but it does work to fill in the gaps and in some cases bring to light new things about a well known man, of whom little is truely known.

Well, here I am again with Albert Camus. This is the third review of one of his works that I've written. I thought The Stranger was a great work and so I went on to The Fall and found it lacking. I've found that Camus is at his best when he concentrates on a story instead of preaching to his audience. Yeah, you can put philosophical ideas in fiction but you have to clothe it deeply enough in story. In Exile and the Kingdom (1958), a book of 6 short stories comes closer to the storytelling brillance of The Stranger but doesn't quite pull it off.

Most of the stories in the book are about people that are being repressed by society in one form or another. They have gotten sick of their lives and are on the cusp of breaking down or screaming out or surrendering to their fate. Some of them escape and some of the characters don't.

The first story, "The Adulterous Woman" is about a woman who has been married too long and while visiting an Arab town begins to awaken her physical being to the sights and sounds of the desert and of other men.

"The Renegade" shows what happens when a missionary priest is captured by a tribe of savages and is forced to worship a pagan idol. This is one of the more effective stories and reminds me of the first person style of The Fall.

"The Silent Men" concerns us with one of the favorite pasttimes of Europeans, namely the labor dispute. It is about the relations between some barrelmakers and their boss. Not exactly high drama.

In "The Guest", a schoolteacher on a remote mountain, isolated from civilization, is given the responsibility of escorting a murderer to the civil authorities.

"The Artist at Work" is the greatest story in the book. It is about the continual conflict between an artist's desire to be a part of society and the need he has for solitude. The painter in this story gets married, has kids, tries to be a celebrity, and almost destroys his very reason for being. Almost everyone, even his disciples, are unknowingly killing him because they never allow him time to work.

The last story in the book, "The Growing Stone" was almost completely a waste of time. I know it was about a French engineer going to a rainforest village to construct a flood prevention system but beyond that it got shaky. I know he went to one of their celebrations and saw something like a voodoo ceremony but beyond that I didn't have a clue as to what was going on. I'm sure it was one of those Heart of Darkness things where civilized European confronts dark forces of the jungle and loses.

This book as a whole was OK. Nothing bad. Just Ok. The artist story was quite good even though it was a bit melodramatic and romantic. "The Renegade" I'll have to read again but I believe it to be quite masterful too. As for the other stories, I don't see that you would miss anything if you didn't read them. There just doesn't seem to be a lot going on in them. The characters aren't given enough to make us interested in them. In fact, I don't think any of these stories are essential to Camus' work or French literature. They were just average to me. Read The Stranger instead.

A riveting and utterly haunting book, this anthology of Camus's short stories is not only my favorite of all his works, but it is one of the best books I have ever read.

The underlying theme in each of his stories is exile, whether it be spiritual, physical, or mental. From the tale of the school teacher put in care of an Arab prisoner to the missionary who finds himself worshipping a cruel graven image, each tale pits man in a pivotal moment in time which defines his future. This is at the very heart of existentialism, a predominant literary vehicle of contemporary authors.

The tales are simple in style, yet vividly written and rich in detail. You'll find youself shocked by the tragic irony in each of the characters, and haunted by the stories for years to come.

I find "Exile and the Kingdom" to be Camus' best book, and here's why. Here, towards the end of his life, he finally seemed to be sifting his philosophies from his characters; making real people turn up in unrealistic situations, hence making a point about either that character or society. What results is very strong fiction, be it the adultress in the desert, the teacher who cannot ignore a revolution, the artist locked up in his loft trying to find the perfect idea, or the islanders who must carry a stone to show their faith. Camus is blunt about what he feels are our shortcomings; but he lets his characters make their mistakes as people. Thus, years later, you find yourself still pondering these stories and seeing them reflected in the world around you. Profound, and uplifting in their own downbeat way. Considering that the novel he never finished, the recently published _The First Man_ is autobiography, it seems Camus felt he had said what he came to say about existentialism and society

I was shocked to read the author's statement that Camus was raised by his mother and his aunt. This is totally inconsistent with even Camus' autobiological notes. Camus was raised by his mother and maternal grandmother. If the author was such a great friend of Camus, how could he be so mistaken on this point ? Since little else in the book can be verified, this misstatement raises serious concerns about the veracity of the entire book.

Mr. Mumma's work is exceptionally rich in presenting us with "Camus the Man" and the demons he struggled with. However, though I found the exchange between Mumma and Camus interesting on certain points, his implication that Camus'1960 tragic death was a "suicide" turned what could have been an otherwise warm tale of friendship into a let-down. Tell me, how does a man who was in the passenger seat of a car along with three other friends decide that this is the perfect moment for suicide and then influences the driver in such a manner as to cause him to swerve into a tree? Talk about the Absurd!

Albert Camus and the Minister is a remarkable book. Though the drama of ideas has great pageantry, the drama of souls has life. This is what is happening in this book. For philosophical problems are altered with the various philosophical tools in one's philosophical tool kit. This book reminds us that real people are using these tools. Camus and Mumma do not struggle as much as they walk through the elements of life. This book reminded me of much. Read it for yourself.

Among the many pearls of insight offered by Alfred Kazin is one to which this author should pay much more respect: "What brings us closer to a work of art is not instruction, but another work of art."

Bronner begins his book with a lengthy apologia that explains in detail why every single other thing written about Camus is inadequate. I think such an introduction betrays the sort of scholar who would merrily have joined the pompous Parisian literati of the 1950s that banded *against* Camus, denouncing him as a traitor to the Left, and thereby proving forever their own hollow lack of substance. Therein lies the irony of tone with which this book is laced. Bronner is a man who purports to love Camus, but had he been writing fifty years ago, at the time when Camus most needed friends, I can easily see him being Camus' worst enemy.

As for substance, Bronner appears quite confident that his contribution is entirely original and more significant than anything heretofore written about Camus. I think in fact it is not particularly insightful, or at least no more so than what any intelligent layperson could get by reading Camus' works and the already existing biographical material.

Most insulting is Bronner's brusque disrespect for the Camus biography written by Herbert Lottman. Bronner first explains that the two major English-language Camus biographies in print -- one by Lottman and one by the Frenchman Olivier Todd -- are both inadequate because they are basically factual and not critical. However, the thing I found most frustrating about Bronner's book is that he commits exactly the sin from which Lottman mercifully spared us. Lottman writes in the preface to the second edition of his wonderful book that he will not deign to preach to us about how we should understand Camus. He so refuses because, as he explains, the essence of an artist is not in his biography (or, by extension, in secondary scholarship by university professors like Bronner), but in his works.

Notwithstanding Bronner's lengthly explanation of his own importance, I think his book will very quickly be relegated to the obscurity it deserves.

"Camus" Portrait of a Moralist" is a splendid book. I came across it after just finishing a 400+ biography of the subject that bulged with facts and quotes but lacked insight and analysis. These later two virtues Stephen Bronner provides in abundance. His remarkable achievement is to offer in 150 pages a persuasive interpretation of Camus that brings together his life events, artistic achievements and activities, and his philosophical and political thinking.

Bronner argues that Camus' career evolved in three stages. During his early period he developed his concept of the absurd. The Second World War and Camus' involvement in the resistance heralded a focus on rebellion and the human solidarity that grows out of a shared struggle against a powerful and demonic foe. In the post-war era, however, this solidarity splintered over issues such as communism and the French-Algerian War. During the last 10 years of his life Camus was distinguished by his refusal to embrace ideologies and fanatical devotion to causes regardless the cost in human life and dignity.

Bronner discusses Camus' artistic, philosophical and journalistic works to both demonstrate and illustrate Camus' development until his death at age 47. Within this framework, Bronner draws welcome attention to neglected aspects of Camus' outlook such as his almost contemplative atheism.

In sum, Bronner's stellar accomplishment if to write an interpretation of Camus that is both clear and concise for the uninitiated, and subtle and nuanced for those already acquainted with his subject.

Galen Tinder galen@blast.net

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".

So many Books, so little time. Don't waste your time on this one.

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.