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works. They have a very marginal place. But femininity,
yes, effectively there is more in The First Man,
not only in terms of women but stylistically, in its
elements, the notes he wrote. You can see a real love
story in it, a childhood love story, Camus’ first. Meursault
[protagonist of The Outsider] and Marie were
never up to much really. There is Dora in The Just and
others in his plays, but they aren’t so well known. I
think for Camus his mother was more than just that.
She’s love, absolute love. That’s why it’s written for
her, dedicated to ‘you who will never be able to read
this book’. And love is very important in The First
Man, in that Camus loves these things he never chose,
he loves his childhood experience in a very real way.
Their poverty meant that there was nothing else they
could think about but what they would eat, how they
would clothe themselves. There’s just no room for
other things in his family. It’s difficult for others to
imagine the position in which he found himself. There
is no imaginary existence in their lives.
French intellectuals are mostly petit bourgeois, and
it’s hard to say whether that makes Camus’ work more
valuable. I’d rather say that it’s different. Necessarily.
His positions are sensed. So, naturally, those intellectuals
who don’t have that experience have difficulty in
comprehending it. But I think it made Camus more tolerant
because he had already seen both sides of things
when the others had only ever seen one. They imagine
BUY Albert Camus books online from and
poverty, but they don’t know what it is. In fact they’ve
got a sort of bad conscience about the working classes.
It’s the perspective they could never adopt, not in the
way Sartre wants to, because they weren’t familiar
with them. They could never address themselves to the
working classes. They don’t know what it means, and
that gives them a bad conscience about it. Camus has a
greater proximity to those in poverty.
RW: And does this proximity result from his humility,
which can been seen in the letters at the end of The First
Man to Monsieur Germain, his old schoolteacher?
CC: It’s because his teacher in The First Man has a
primary place. Camus shows us this teacher exactly how
he was. The First Man is completely autobiographical.
The mother he describes is the woman I knew, and she
was exactly as he describes her. And this teacher really
existed. But it’s also to show that people attach so much
importance to celebrity, and Camus writes his acceptance
speech for the Nobel Prize in thanks to his teacher.
Recognition, gratefulness exist. It’s to show that this is
what has come from what his teacher did for him. And
also throughout the world there are Monsieur Germains
everywhere. That’s why I published the letters, so that he
could have a place in the work. But I couldn’t ever act
or think on behalf of what my father would have said or
done. He’s an artist, he considers himself an artist, and so
he takes on the responsibility of speaking for those who
are not given the means or the opportunity. �
146
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