Albert Camus Accomplishments

Humanities purpose and logic is often questions due to seemingly never ending evils in the world causing terrible catastrophes. Albert Camus grew up and lived in times of global terror. He often wrote about absurdity and influenced people to see the real reason of life. Camus’s career was so influential, he was awarded a Nobel Prize in Literature. He was honored with the award because his work was enlightened the world on the problems with the human’s moral sense. The educated Nobel Prize winner, Albert Camus, with an extensive literature and activist career, often voiced his opinion on controversial issues of the world, during a time of World War.

Lucien Auguste Camus and Catherine Hélène Sintés gave birth to Albert Camus in Mondovi, Algeria

One of his first jobs was being a reporter and reviewer in the Alger Republicain Newspaper (Sachs). Although due to censorship, the newspaper was ended because of Camus’s strong political views against both Hitler and Stalin which being an open pacifist was politically dangerous. Camus continued to write politically in newspapers for the French Resistance movement which fought against the Nazis (Albert Camus). Camus was also writing plays and wanted to write more independently, he was offered a substitute teaching job but turned it down so he could focus on writing. Turning down a teaching job was a long shot because he was turning down a more stable income than an author’s unstable income (Lea). However, Camus experienced writer’s block and societal pressures while writing (Sachs). He overcame his writer’s block and wrote many plays and novels, novels became highly successful and he gained major popularity. Camus’s The Stranger became the highest selling paper in French publishing history at the time, selling around ten million copies. Another novel called The Plague was a bestseller after World War, selling around twelve million copies ("Looking for “The"). His works were so popular and influential to many because he showed the world how evil it was and almost meaningless that he was nominated three times for the Nobel Prize in Literature and was awarded it in 1957

Camus had joined the Communist party for a short time but left it, although he could not continue his theater career because no one wanted anyone that had relations with the party (Lea). He was anti-Fascist, Hitler, and Stalin which made him very odd compared to others (Albert Camus). He was a known pacifist which was not generally accepted by many people because violence was being used as the only solution for problems during his time (Albert Camus). He tried to influence his home of Algeria to be pacifist too during the violent Algerian Revolutionary War but many Algerians disapproved of Camus for not wanting to showing nationalism by revolting against the French(Sachs). Even though some disagreed with his political beliefs, he was still able to be a successful writer.

Albert Camus was influenced by many but one of his most successful books, The Stranger, was inspired by his hometown and his father. Camus never knew much of his father but he knew that his father hated public executions and found them sickening. His father’s beliefs fueled Camus’s hate for the death penalty. In The Stranger, Camus makes a point on how the death penalty can be corrupt and wrong ("Looking for