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Death Is Too Simple For Me
"Yes, everything is simple. It's men who complicate things. Don't let them tell us any stories. Don't let them say about the man condemned to death: 'He is going to pay his debt to society.' but: 'They're going to chop his head off.' It may seem like nothing. But it does make a little difference," wrote Albert Camus in 'Between Yes and No.'
Camus' simplicity critically influenced me at critical a juncture in my life. No, I am not your typical Camus fan. I don't rave about his novels. I don't even like them. They are too simple and down-to-earth. For me his novels are deserts without oases, deserts so glaringly clear my vision soon becomes blurred. The simplicity is stupefying. There are strange gaps between many of his little sentences, gaps that reek of hard drinking and falling down stairs. But dig as I may in the sand, I find nothing to drink. Then the gaps blur and blend into the sand. Maybe I did not bring enough to the novel to appreciate it. So I put the novel down and read the critics. Yes, indeed, now I believe Camus is a brilliant genius! I am pleasantly astonished by the eloquent criticism, and I exclaim to myself, "This critic is amazing! Critics are worth feeding after all! But why doesn't he write a novel of his own instead of criticising Camus?" Because he doesn't have a novel in him, I suppose. But Camus did, and he and his critic could see what I was too blind and bored to see. His ardent fans will disagree with my conclusion that we must tell stories about Camus' stories in order to really appreciate them, otherwise they are too flat.
I appreciate Camus' philosophical work even more than the criticism of his novels. He was a student of philosophy at first, then took up writing novels. He wrote in his diary that anyone who wants to become a real philosopher should write a novel. But philosophy in novels, like technique in art, is not something to be flaunted. Now that I think of it, his characters represent the death of character. No wonder they seem blurred against an almost blank background. One must be lucid to see the shadows in broad daylight or under cover of darkness. And one must be courageous too. The viewer may see the face of evil if he remains lucid for long. But again, I prefer Camus' philosophy. It is much denser than his sands. Bring a pick-axe and a sharp shovel. Many of the graves have yet to robbed of their treasure. I dig his philosophy. But most of all I love his lyrical essays. My favorite is 'Between Yes and No.'
Lucidity. Camus often mentioned lucidity. To understand his lucidity we must know more about his mother. His lucidity was as mute as his mother was - yet her nothing said everything. In 'Between Yes and No', Camus explained, "Sometimes people would ask her: 'What are you thinking about?' And she would answer: 'Nothing.' And it was quite true. Everything was there, so she thought about nothing...As the night thickened around her, her muteness would seem irredeemably desolate." And later, "The indifference of this strange mother! Only the immense solitude of the world can be the measure of it."
They loved each other simply because they were mother and son. Camus recounted that his mother was assaulted and lay sick in her room where he attended her most attentively - nobody else cared. The "absurd simplicity" of the room kept him there. "The world had melted away,' Camus reminisced, "taking away with it the illusion that life begins again each morning. Nothing was left, his studies, ambitions, things he might choose in a restaurant, favorite colors. Nothing but the sickness and death he felt surrounded by...And yet, at the very moment the world was crumbling, he was alive."
People today speak of the virtues of the simplicity they wish for. Sometimes I think they miss the principle of their wish, the so-called death instinct Freud raised beyond his pleasure principle, then quietly dropped it, leaving us to reflect on the dull thud in the dark. Camus wondered about that night he was with his mother in her room: "How far will it go, this night in which I cease to belong to myself? There is a dangerous virtue in the word simplicity. And tonight I can understand a man wanting to die because nothing matters any more when one sees through life completely. A man suffers and endures misfortune after misfortune. He bears them, settles into his destiny. People think well of him. And then, one evening, he meets a friend he has been very fond of, who speaks to him absent-mindedly. Returning home, the man kills himself. Afterwards, there is talk of private sorrows and secret dramas. No, if a reason must really be found, he killed himself because a friend spoke to him carelessly. In the same way, every time it seems to me that I've grasped the deep meaning of the world, it is its simplicity that always overwhelms me."
Indeed. And what complicated fabrications I weave to feed the avoidance of my fate, the unseemly end of my world as the world careens onward in its meaningless career without my complications. However, sometimes I am drawn to the window. I strip and peer over the edge at the concrete nineteen floors below. Very hard concrete, plain and simple, wanting only a dull thud, then no more worries about a place to live or anything else for that matter. Why not be free? But that is much too simple for my taste, such a "freedom at last" by my own act. Hence I am moved to ask, Why should I? And philosophy does not budge to answer. But my absurd life makes all the sense in the world to me. If someone asked me then what I was thinking, I would have to answer, "Nothing." No forced faith or false hope is required of me. I am hopelessly happy after I peer at the concrete below. The complicated blur 'Between Yes and No' vanishes with my hope and despair, and my issue is resolved for the time being.
"When we are stripped down to a certain point," Camus said, " nothing leads anywhere any more, hope and despair are equally groundless, and the whole of life can be summed up in an image. But why stop there? Simple, everything is simple."
