Thanks for this. Anyone who says Camus is not a philosopher is not a philosopher. The sentence which resonated the most for me: "I have never been able to believe, deep inside, that human affairs are serious matters".
Sarah I mean I think Celis meant it has a similar ‘voice’, as conceptually the idea of a character talking at a character that is essentially the reader, though not a unique concept, was one that both books had in common. That’s one of only a few things they had in common though so i think I agree with both of you.
Beautiful book. I kept it my coat pocket for months on end, just to read the sentences while riding the subway. It is my favorite Camus book. Bravo on your review.
Sublime. Having just finished this book, it is now in the hands of another. Thanks for elucidating this gem to a wider audience Regards from Manchester, United Kingdom.
I always had a secret desire to live being nobody... Sometimes I enjoy just being alone in tiny confide space ...so I can metaphorically feel safe that no one is aware about my existence... Normally I read books or watch movie (any normal activity that can be done in that small space) ... to say ..I am very normal person...I have a healthy happy life...But still thought of alone forgotten is beautiful .
Like I how camus makes a interesting narrative device like the fall where the narrator is anonymous and is narrated like an impartial observer who just wants to state the facts , only using other characters views and duary entries .
I read the fall at the age of 19, 34 years ago. Thanks for reminding me of it, and In consequence I can almost see how it influenced me. I was an art student back then. I found a man who had attempted suicide a while after that, but in contrast I phoned for help and he didn’t die, even so it haunted me for a while.
Awesome review, and thanks for the video. I just got done reading this for the first time today. I made a connection, at least stylistically, between 'The Fall' and 'Notes from Underground'. In both, you have a highly intelligent, articulate, arrogant nihilist confessing in the first person the darkest depths of his soul, making excuses for his own inadequacies and then justifying them in a way that makes him feel superior for having done so. Both books also take that character in all of his reprehensible self loathing, and, like Jean-Baptiste describes at the end of this book, turn him on the reader and reflect it back like a mirror. They illustrate what might be considered a very poor assimilation of the Jungian shadow, the darkest parts of our psyche that hide away in the recesses or our mind, that we are too afraid to bring forward and deal with. Who hasn't at some point felt proud and powerful in their own exaggerated sense of victimization, as if they had the right to judge the entire world by virtue of their own imagined oppression and hyperbolic self pity? Who hasn't felt the sting of unfairness and incomprehensibility of a situation, or life in general; felt the bitter resentment rise up; and the subsequent urge to do everything possible to make the situation infinitely worse? Who hasn't suffered the agonizing, endless discomfort of the little-ease of life, where we with our individual sovereignty, freedom and free will stand in isolated opposition to everyone else, crushed under the weight of their judgement until we can neither stand, sit, or stretch and are left to die in darkness? Though over a century apart, I think these two books pair wonderfully and the 'The Fall' is immediately one of my new favorite books.
We had an all-weekend celebration commemorating Lost Cross, (debatably) the oldest punk house in America over Labor Day weekend in my town. It was also a celebration of a local musician named Tim who was shot in his bedroom earlier this year, accidentally, by angry kids at a party next door. I can't think of a better way to nurse a three day hangover than going back to Camus, with pancakes.
Haven't read this one but your description of the narrative setup sounds similar to The Reluctant Fundamentalist, where you're just a passive listener to a narrator talking directly to you in a bar/cafe. Nice review! I didn't enjoy The Stranger but may give this a blast :)
Such an intriguing book; It sparks a certain kind of strange hunger, and its sentences trail like the will-o'-the-wisps. You'll find what we had to say about it most fascinating.
I've read The Fall three times so far, and this review makes me want to read it again. By far, the best Camus has ever written... speaking of which, Camus employed this 2nd person narration in a short story called "The Renegade." It's a priest who had his tongue cut out by infidels that tells the story this time. Dostoevsky also used the 2nd person in his novella, "Notes from the Underground." Anyhow, thanks. I enjoyed the review.
Heeeey Cliff. Great fuckin' review. Just had a birthday a couple days ago, and with Camus being one of the favorite authors, this helped make it an even better celebration. I tend to try and push Camus on friends and relatives, when they're looking at introspective work from someone whose ramblings I consider to be proof the crazy aren't so much. You've done a hell of a job summing that up here. Hope you had a great labor day weekend. I know I did.
Not sure if you check comments on old videos but I thought I'd suggest a book to you that is somewhat similar in structure to this one. Wittgenstein's Mistress is a special little book that I think you'd highly enjoy.
'No man is a hypocrite in his pleasures' was my high school yearbook quote. Glad I had that in my back pocket from reading this book in one week a few years before graduating. Recognized many people in this one narrator...
Whatcha think about reviewing Grendel? Lit bit of Gardener never hurt nobody. Plus I think he did something ballsy/perfect with the almost unreadable Beowulf.
great book and great review, kudos et viva, what to do if he we hear that splash?! ;-) ps how about something linking another great post punk band and another gem? 'shooting an arab' perhaps? :-)
To my knowledge it wasn't Camus last book. Not even the last one published ante mortem. His last book is The First Man, which is awesome until you reach the chapters that he didn't have the time to rewrite. But you gave me an idea of what to read next, mate.
Well, he kind of died with it on him unfinished, so not exactly his fault those chapters weren't awesome... Re-reading it at the moment, bc it had been a while
I would suggest we wouldn't be able to save her but we would have the courage to try, mainly because of how cold the water is and the speed of the current, that and it would be my first time having the capacity to trying to save anyone.
Consider reading The Reluctant Fundamentalist if you'd like to read a similar narrative voice. However, you'll find yourself sipping tea in Karachi instead of drinking wine in Amsterdam ;)
I've been waiting from your first review (which was Cioran after I had read a couple of his books for the first time) for Bukowski and Camus. Recently read Notes of a dirty old man and was thinking about recommending it to you, but I figured that you'd read it already^^ Well, one recommendation I have for you that you might not have heard about or read already is: Osamu Dazai. His novels No longer human and The setting sun are very great; since you liked Mishima, I figured you might like this guy too, and the books are more or less "Watakushi shōsetsu" - same the style as Confessions of a Mask and at least as disturbing but also hilarious (in a disturbed kind of suicidal and nihilistic way... You catch my drift, I'm sure).
"now I can remember! now I can remember!" The Classical, what a funky racket! You should review The Friends of Eddie Coyle one of MES's favourite novels.
I read The Fall 30 years ago (10 times). Due to vandalism by my children I lost the book. I am now coming out The Fall and into Winter, Then April (Spring) Is the cruelest month, breeding Lilacs from the dead Land. 😇
Hmm... Some of Ligotti's short stories have done something vaguely similar to this, sometimes. Not as effectively, I suppose, but hey. Fuckin' Ligotti.
This sounds right up my street. I loved 'The Stranger' and 'The Plague', but then read 'A Happy Death' a drag to read (not the subject but everything feels directionless after the murder), so I've been a little apprehensive picking up another Camus book, but I'm definitely giving this a go.
I want to point out to fascinating Riku Sayuj review on Goodreads. It is only about 500 words: www.goodreads.com/review/show/1074045075?book_show_action=false&from_review_page=1 tl;dr In The Fall you see the anti-thesis that you should use as your anti-model, as the one point which gives meaning to your picture by not being painted. You root for him to fall and fall - to Fall as horribly and as deep into the abyss as possible. Because that is the only way to root for yourself. Because the more he falls, the more you can see of what consists the abyss, and the further away you get from it. His Fall will save you. Mon cher, he is your personal Christ. (Read the whole thing. It's good.)
