Camus
1970
First Published
3.76
Average Rating
109
Number of Pages
Forty years ago Conor Cruise O'Brien wrote a small but brilliantly argued critique of Camus' work. In The Outsider, for example, amongst many things O'Brien notes is that a European in Algeria would not face the death penalty for the murder of an Arab. More fundamentally O'Brien takes issue with the allegorical value of the plague in La Peste. It is of course generally accepted that the disease is a metaphor for the Nazi occupation of France & Western Europe, however the impact of this metaphor collapses when one considers that Oran itself was occupied by the French colonialists—an irony which Camus seems blissfully unaware. In passing there is not a named Arab who is the victim of the plague. It's as if these deaths are of little value compared to the French occupiers.
Avg Rating
3.76
Number of Ratings
105
5 STARS
22%
4 STARS
42%
3 STARS
27%
2 STARS
10%
1 STARS
0%
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Author
Conor Cruise O'Brien
Author · 11 books
Irish politician, writer, historian and academic. Member of the Irish Parliament for the socialist Labour Party. Member of the Northern Ireland Forum for the United Kingdom Unionist Party, which advocated direct rule of Northern Ireland from London. Virulently anti-IRA.
