Albert Camus The Plague
Humanities IV
5/5/14
Life Albert Camus once said that “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” (Camus). Albert Camus won the Nobel Prize and whose views contributed to the rise of absurdism. What Camus is saying is that life has plenty of value and to live in the moment with the things that make us happy even if they are absurd. In The Plague Camus shows us the absurdity of life, the struggle of life, and also the value of life through the people in Oran and the main characters that he portrays. Throughout The Plague Camus displays humans violating logic, which can be defined as absurdity. Albert also said that “Accepting the absurdity …show more content…
An example of absurdity is the old man who enjoyed spitting on cats. This had no significant meaning but it made him happy which made it absurd. Another example of absurdity is that innocent people died like the kid while people like the man with asthma was most likely portrayed to die, and the people who were criminals like Cottard survived through the plague despite his past and current criminal activity. Some of the targets that were criticized were the government officials such as the Prefect who take forever to realize the threat of the plague. The town tries to provide reasonable explanations but nothing makes sense of death, and for this reason Camus denounces those who rely on their own logic and think they know the reason, and prefers those who are honest of not knowing the reason for the deaths. Throughout Camus takes a couple shots at religion by placing father Paneloux and Rieux in The Plague. Rieux is an atheist and believes that …show more content…
You bring the meaning to it. The meaning of life is whatever you ascribe it to be. Being alive is the meaning” (Campbell). The choices that one makes are what adds meaning to our lifes. In Oran they are seen as filling their life’s with meaningless tasks. Only after they’ve seen that death is near and possible did they start living and enjoying life. Life is shown as valuable because the plague brought people together, and some went as far as moving out of the hotel to stay with their friends. Before they indulged their thirst for materialism while doing nothing to help save or comfort the sick around them. The poor decisions of others is ignorance and once they realize their responsibility they come together and add meaning to their lifes by working together to stop the
5/5/14
Life Albert Camus once said that “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” (Camus). Albert Camus won the Nobel Prize and whose views contributed to the rise of absurdism. What Camus is saying is that life has plenty of value and to live in the moment with the things that make us happy even if they are absurd. In The Plague Camus shows us the absurdity of life, the struggle of life, and also the value of life through the people in Oran and the main characters that he portrays. Throughout The Plague Camus displays humans violating logic, which can be defined as absurdity. Albert also said that “Accepting the absurdity …show more content…
An example of absurdity is the old man who enjoyed spitting on cats. This had no significant meaning but it made him happy which made it absurd. Another example of absurdity is that innocent people died like the kid while people like the man with asthma was most likely portrayed to die, and the people who were criminals like Cottard survived through the plague despite his past and current criminal activity. Some of the targets that were criticized were the government officials such as the Prefect who take forever to realize the threat of the plague. The town tries to provide reasonable explanations but nothing makes sense of death, and for this reason Camus denounces those who rely on their own logic and think they know the reason, and prefers those who are honest of not knowing the reason for the deaths. Throughout Camus takes a couple shots at religion by placing father Paneloux and Rieux in The Plague. Rieux is an atheist and believes that …show more content…
You bring the meaning to it. The meaning of life is whatever you ascribe it to be. Being alive is the meaning” (Campbell). The choices that one makes are what adds meaning to our lifes. In Oran they are seen as filling their life’s with meaningless tasks. Only after they’ve seen that death is near and possible did they start living and enjoying life. Life is shown as valuable because the plague brought people together, and some went as far as moving out of the hotel to stay with their friends. Before they indulged their thirst for materialism while doing nothing to help save or comfort the sick around them. The poor decisions of others is ignorance and once they realize their responsibility they come together and add meaning to their lifes by working together to stop the