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magmaa's review against another edition
5.0
10/10
ill have to reread it again soon but its already so great
ill have to reread it again soon but its already so great
sidharthvardhan's review against another edition
4.0
"Life is worth living is the most necessary of assumptions and were it not assumed, the most impossible of conclusions"
- Santayana
In his essay 'Myth of Sisyphus', Campus undertakes to do this impossible. He begins by discussing how various philosophers approach the problem. (there is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide.) Life, according to him is full of absurdity - and one who can accept this absurdity will not try to find meaning of life. An absurd man fears nothing:
"He would consider it normal to be chastised. That is the rule of the game. And, indeed, it is typical of his nobility to have accepted all the rules of the game. Yet he knows he is right and that there can be no question of punishment. A fate is not a punishment."
He uses examples from Greek legends as well as some great artists (Shakespeare, Goethe, Dostoevsky, Kafka) to make his case:
"From Pandora’s box, where all the ills of humanity swarmed, the Greeks drew out hope after all the others, as the most dreadful of all."
"There was in Athens a temple dedicated to old age. Children were taken there."
"You know the story of the crazy man who was fishing in a bathtub. A doctor with ideas as to psychiatric treatments asked him “if they were biting,” to which he received the harsh reply: “Of course not, you fool, since this is a bathtub.” That story belongs to the baroque type. But in it can be grasped quite clearly to what a degree the absurd effect is linked to an excess of logic. Kafka’s world is in truth an in describable universe in which man allows himself the tormenting luxury of fishing in a bathtub, knowing that nothing will come of it."
He sums it up by saying cursed life of Sisyphus was worth living and that he would have enjoyed it.
I'm not sure whether he solves the problem. I don't think it can ever be solved philosophically. Suicides have a reasoning of their own. Reason is a slave to passion. Campus' passion moves him against suicide and he formulates a philosophy accordingly. A suicide wants to commit suicide and so his reason would tell him it is the best thing to do. Telling oneself it doesn't, won't make it matter. To reason with feelings is like saying 'I don't care' to a bully who would keep punching you either way. Completely useless.
This belief though takes nothing from fact that I loved the book. I love Campus' writing style:
"We get into the habit of living before acquiring the habit of thinking."
"Like great works, deep feelings always mean more than they are conscious of saying. "
"All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning."
'
"Why should it be essential to love rarely in order to love much."
"There was in Athens a temple dedicated to old age. Children were taken there."
"If it were sufficient to love, things would be too easy."
"Goethe on his death bed calls for light and this is a historic remark."
"There are no frontiers between the disciplines that man sets himself for understanding and loving. They interlock, and the same anxiety merges them."
"Art can never be so well served as by a negative thought."
"In order to understand the world, one has to turn away from it on occasion; in order to serve men better, one has to hold them at a distance for a time."
"Silence is no longer possible except in noisy cities. From Amsterdam Descartes writes to the aged Guezde Balzac:“I go out walking everyday amid the confusion of a great crowd, with as much freedom and tranquillity as you could do on your garden paths.”"
"In the Algerian summer I learn that one thing only is more tragic than suffering, and that is the life of a happy man."
“Art and nothing but art,” said Nietzsche; “we have art in order not to die of the truth.”
'
- Santayana
In his essay 'Myth of Sisyphus', Campus undertakes to do this impossible. He begins by discussing how various philosophers approach the problem. (there is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide.) Life, according to him is full of absurdity - and one who can accept this absurdity will not try to find meaning of life. An absurd man fears nothing:
"He would consider it normal to be chastised. That is the rule of the game. And, indeed, it is typical of his nobility to have accepted all the rules of the game. Yet he knows he is right and that there can be no question of punishment. A fate is not a punishment."
He uses examples from Greek legends as well as some great artists (Shakespeare, Goethe, Dostoevsky, Kafka) to make his case:
"From Pandora’s box, where all the ills of humanity swarmed, the Greeks drew out hope after all the others, as the most dreadful of all."
"There was in Athens a temple dedicated to old age. Children were taken there."
"You know the story of the crazy man who was fishing in a bathtub. A doctor with ideas as to psychiatric treatments asked him “if they were biting,” to which he received the harsh reply: “Of course not, you fool, since this is a bathtub.” That story belongs to the baroque type. But in it can be grasped quite clearly to what a degree the absurd effect is linked to an excess of logic. Kafka’s world is in truth an in describable universe in which man allows himself the tormenting luxury of fishing in a bathtub, knowing that nothing will come of it."
He sums it up by saying cursed life of Sisyphus was worth living and that he would have enjoyed it.
I'm not sure whether he solves the problem. I don't think it can ever be solved philosophically. Suicides have a reasoning of their own. Reason is a slave to passion. Campus' passion moves him against suicide and he formulates a philosophy accordingly. A suicide wants to commit suicide and so his reason would tell him it is the best thing to do. Telling oneself it doesn't, won't make it matter. To reason with feelings is like saying 'I don't care' to a bully who would keep punching you either way. Completely useless.
This belief though takes nothing from fact that I loved the book. I love Campus' writing style:
"We get into the habit of living before acquiring the habit of thinking."
"Like great works, deep feelings always mean more than they are conscious of saying. "
"All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning."
'
"Why should it be essential to love rarely in order to love much."
"There was in Athens a temple dedicated to old age. Children were taken there."
"If it were sufficient to love, things would be too easy."
"Goethe on his death bed calls for light and this is a historic remark."
"There are no frontiers between the disciplines that man sets himself for understanding and loving. They interlock, and the same anxiety merges them."
"Art can never be so well served as by a negative thought."
"In order to understand the world, one has to turn away from it on occasion; in order to serve men better, one has to hold them at a distance for a time."
"Silence is no longer possible except in noisy cities. From Amsterdam Descartes writes to the aged Guezde Balzac:“I go out walking everyday amid the confusion of a great crowd, with as much freedom and tranquillity as you could do on your garden paths.”"
"In the Algerian summer I learn that one thing only is more tragic than suffering, and that is the life of a happy man."
“Art and nothing but art,” said Nietzsche; “we have art in order not to die of the truth.”
'
notaturnip's review against another edition
5.0
The ultimate user's guide to caring about everything, and justifying your life's work, while acknowledging nothing will ever matter.
anders_holbaek's review against another edition
"I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain. One always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He, too, concluded that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile not futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night-filled mountain, in itself a form of world. The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man's heart."