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Algerian Chronicles
More than fifty years after Algerian independence, Albert Camus "Algerian Chronicles" appears here in English for the first time. Published in France in 1958, the same year the Algerian War brought about the collapse of the Fourth French Republic, it is one of Camus most political works an exploration of his commitments to Algeria. Dismissed or disdained at publication, today "Algerian Chronicles, " with its prescient analysis of the dead end of terrorism, enjoys a new life in Arthur Goldhammer s elegant translation.
Believe me when I tell you that Algeria is where I hurt at this moment, Camus, who was the most visible symbol of France s troubled relationship with Algeria, writes, as others feel pain in their lungs. Gathered here are Camus strongest statements on Algeria from the 1930s through the 1950s, revised and supplemented by the author for publication in book form.
In her introduction, Alice Kaplan illuminates the dilemma faced by Camus: he was committed to the defense of those who suffered colonial injustices, yet was unable to support Algerian national sovereignty apart from France. An appendix of lesser-known texts that did not appear in the French edition complements the picture of a moralist who posed questions about violence and counter-violence, national identity, terrorism, and justice that continue to illuminate our contemporary world.
Believe me when I tell you that Algeria is where I hurt at this moment, Camus, who was the most visible symbol of France s troubled relationship with Algeria, writes, as others feel pain in their lungs. Gathered here are Camus strongest statements on Algeria from the 1930s through the 1950s, revised and supplemented by the author for publication in book form.
In her introduction, Alice Kaplan illuminates the dilemma faced by Camus: he was committed to the defense of those who suffered colonial injustices, yet was unable to support Algerian national sovereignty apart from France. An appendix of lesser-known texts that did not appear in the French edition complements the picture of a moralist who posed questions about violence and counter-violence, national identity, terrorism, and justice that continue to illuminate our contemporary world.
240 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1958
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1140 people want to read
About the author
Albert Camus
1,079 books37.9k followersWorks, such as the novels
The Stranger
(1942) and
The Plague
(1947), of Algerian-born French writer and philosopher Albert Camus concern the absurdity of the human condition; he won the Nobel Prize of 1957 for literature.
Origin and his experiences of this representative of non-metropolitan literature in the 1930s dominated influences in his thought and work.
He also adapted plays of Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Lope de Vega, Dino Buzzati, and Requiem for a Nun of William Faulkner. One may trace his enjoyment of the theater back to his membership in l'Equipe, an Algerian group, whose "collective creation" Révolte dans les Asturies (1934) was banned for political reasons.
Of semi-proletarian parents, early attached to intellectual circles of strongly revolutionary tendencies, with a deep interest, he came at the age of 25 years in 1938; only chance prevented him from pursuing a university career in that field. The man and the times met: Camus joined the resistance movement during the occupation and after the liberation served as a columnist for the newspaper Combat.
The essay Le Mythe de Sisyphe (The Myth of Sisyphus), 1942, expounds notion of acceptance of the absurd of Camus with "the total absence of hope, which has nothing to do with despair, a continual refusal, which must not be confused with renouncement - and a conscious dissatisfaction."
Meursault, central character of L'Étranger (The Stranger), 1942, illustrates much of this essay: man as the nauseated victim of the absurd orthodoxy of habit, later - when the young killer faces execution - tempted by despair, hope, and salvation.
Besides his fiction and essays, Camus very actively produced plays in the theater (e.g., Caligula, 1944).
The time demanded his response, chiefly in his activities, but in 1947, Camus retired from political journalism.
Doctor Rieux of La Peste (The Plague), 1947, who tirelessly attends the plague-stricken citizens of Oran, enacts the revolt against a world of the absurd and of injustice, and confirms words: "We refuse to despair of mankind. Without having the unreasonable ambition to save men, we still want to serve them."
People also well know La Chute (The Fall), work of Camus in 1956.
Camus authored L'Exil et le royaume (Exile and the Kingdom) in 1957. His austere search for moral order found its aesthetic correlative in the classicism of his art. He styled of great purity, intense concentration, and rationality.
Camus died at the age of 46 years in a car accident near Sens in le Grand Fossard in the small town of Villeblevin.
Chinese 阿尔贝·加缪
Origin and his experiences of this representative of non-metropolitan literature in the 1930s dominated influences in his thought and work.
He also adapted plays of Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Lope de Vega, Dino Buzzati, and Requiem for a Nun of William Faulkner. One may trace his enjoyment of the theater back to his membership in l'Equipe, an Algerian group, whose "collective creation" Révolte dans les Asturies (1934) was banned for political reasons.
Of semi-proletarian parents, early attached to intellectual circles of strongly revolutionary tendencies, with a deep interest, he came at the age of 25 years in 1938; only chance prevented him from pursuing a university career in that field. The man and the times met: Camus joined the resistance movement during the occupation and after the liberation served as a columnist for the newspaper Combat.
The essay Le Mythe de Sisyphe (The Myth of Sisyphus), 1942, expounds notion of acceptance of the absurd of Camus with "the total absence of hope, which has nothing to do with despair, a continual refusal, which must not be confused with renouncement - and a conscious dissatisfaction."
Meursault, central character of L'Étranger (The Stranger), 1942, illustrates much of this essay: man as the nauseated victim of the absurd orthodoxy of habit, later - when the young killer faces execution - tempted by despair, hope, and salvation.
Besides his fiction and essays, Camus very actively produced plays in the theater (e.g., Caligula, 1944).
The time demanded his response, chiefly in his activities, but in 1947, Camus retired from political journalism.
Doctor Rieux of La Peste (The Plague), 1947, who tirelessly attends the plague-stricken citizens of Oran, enacts the revolt against a world of the absurd and of injustice, and confirms words: "We refuse to despair of mankind. Without having the unreasonable ambition to save men, we still want to serve them."
People also well know La Chute (The Fall), work of Camus in 1956.
Camus authored L'Exil et le royaume (Exile and the Kingdom) in 1957. His austere search for moral order found its aesthetic correlative in the classicism of his art. He styled of great purity, intense concentration, and rationality.
Camus died at the age of 46 years in a car accident near Sens in le Grand Fossard in the small town of Villeblevin.
Chinese 阿尔贝·加缪
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December 22, 2015
LIVE FAST, DIE YOUNG, HAVE A GOOD-LOOKING CORPSE EVERY TIME
It's hard to get over how cool Camus was. He had the good looks, the unfiltered Gauloise, the Bogart trenchcoat, the philosophy fangirls: his romantic early death behind the wheel of a sports car seems almost inevitable.
The other thing about Camus is that he got it right. He was one of the very few European intellectuals (the other being George Orwell) to recognise that the excesses of fascism did not justify the excesses of Communism, and he said so. Former friends like Sartre and de Beauvoir called him bourgeois. A better word would be ‘accurate’, and this collection of essays and articles makes you wonder how crucial the Algeria question was in forming his clearsightedness.
L'Algérie française was of course Camus's homeland, and he had been ringing alarm bells over the situation there for longer than anyone else – the pieces in this collection cover, as he says, ‘a period of twenty years, from 1939, when almost no one in France was interested in this country, to 1958, when everyone was talking about it.’ On one side of the argument you had the right-wing hawks and colonial interests, determined to protect France's territory at any cost; on the other, you had a growing Arab nationalist movement determined to have an Algeria free from Europeans. In the middle, on his own, cigarette dangling from his lip, was Albert Camus, frantically waving his arms and trying to tell both sides to calm down and get along.
THE LONE STRANGER
This collection has the air of a classical tragedy: there is an impending disaster which no one seems able to avert, despite plentiful opportunities. Cassandra-like, Camus makes predictions year after year after year which come true, and still no one seems to be listening to him. ‘One day, a choice needs to be made,’ he says in 1945.
France needs to say clearly whether it considers Algeria to be conquered territory whose subjects, deprived of all rights and burdened with a few extra duties, should live on our absolute dependance, or whether we consider our democratic principles universal enough to be extended to the populations that are in our charge.
La France devait dire clairement si elle considérait l'Algérie comme une terre conquise dont les sujets, privés de tous droits et gratifiés de quelques devoirs supplémentaires, devaient vivre dans notre dépendance absolue, ou si elle attribuait à ses principes démocratiques une valeur assez universelle pour qu'elle pût les étendre aux populations dont elle avait la charge.
Ten years later, when the war he tried so hard to prevent had finally started in earnest, he still found himself caught in the middle. He did not support French colonial interests, but neither could he support Algeria's Front de Libération Nationale, whose tactics involved widespread targeting of civilians.
Algeria is not France; it is not even Algeria. It is that unknown land, lost out of sight, with its incomprehensible natives, its annoying soldiers and exotic Frenchmen, in a fog of blood.
L'Algérie n'est pas la France, elle n'est même pas l'Algérie, elle est cette terre ignorée, perdue au loin, avec ses indigènes incompréhensibles, ses soldats gênants et ses Français exotiques, dans un brouillard de sang.
This outbreak of irony is the closest he comes to resignation. In general, as the years go by, his sentences just get shorter, clearer, and more desperate. He never stopped believing that a third way might be possible, suggesting even in the late 50s that both sides could at least agree to stop going after civilian targets (which disgusted former left-wing friends – Camus ‘had never sounded hollower than when he demanded pity for the civilians,’ said Simone de Beauvoir. ‘The humanist in him had given way to the pied noir’).
CERTAIN INJUSTICES
He is such a lucid writer. He's the opposite of the obscurantist, postmodern French thinkers of the following generation, who cannot say what they mean and probably don't know. Camus knows exactly what he thinks and he explains it directly, and not without an ear for the nicely-weighted phrase.
When the oppressed takes up arms in the name of justice, he is taking a step on to the territory of injustice.
Quand l'opprimé prend les armes au nom de la justice, il fait un pas sur la terre de l'injustice.
He is very strong on torture, which was such a crucial issue in the Algerian War.
Those who no longer wish to hear about morals must understand in any case that, even to win wars, it is better to suffer certain injustices than to commit them.
Ceux qui ne veulent plus entendre parler de morale devraient comprendre en tout cas que, même pour gagner les guerres, il vaut mieux souffrir certaines injustices que les commettre […].
Ultimately his efforts to appeal to the combatants' better instincts seem a bit naïve now, but with Camus's principles there was little other option. In reality too much had happened for Europeans and Arabs to live peacefully side-by-side in Algeria; one or both sides were going to get screwed. Camus knew it, but he felt he had to try all the same.
French and Arab friends, do not fail to reply to one of the last calls for a truly free and peaceful Algeria, so rich and creative! There is no other solution, no other solution at all than the one we are speaking of. Beyond that, there is just death and destruction.
Amis français et arabes, ne laissez pas sans réponse un des derniers appels pour une Algérie vraiment libre et pacifique, bientôt riche et créatrice! Il n'y a pas d'autre solution, il n'y a aucune autre solution que celle dont nous parlons. Au-delà d'elle, il n'y a que mort et destruction.
He was right. A year after he wrote these words, the war reached its grisly peak with the guerrilla warfare of the Battle of Algiers. Camus never wrote on Algeria again; he died in 1960 without ever seeing the war end. Perhaps that's just as well: after the peace accords were signed, almost all the pieds noirs left Algeria practically overnight, over a million refugees uprooted from their home country – yet another thing Camus saw coming, hoping all the time, against his better judgment, that he would be wrong.
(Jun 2013)
Read
August 19, 2015These chronicles illustrate Camus' liberal politics. He is most concerned with French colonial settlers in Algeria and attempts to define them as natives.
He strongly lacks any sense of context and existing power relations; which makes me wonder what his thoughts were of Fanon's writings. But this work is helpful, describing the daily impact of French colonialism and institutionalization in the colonies.
Camus wanted an algeria that "preserved the right of [colonial settlers] to survive and be more just." Once again, the natives are silent and nameless in these papers too, as in his fiction. He was annoyed how the French in France blamed colonial settlers, I quote "the idea of acknowledging guilt as our judges-penitent do, by beating the breasts of others, revolts me."
He also brings valuable observations on France introducing regulated education to males before/over females and how this created a division even in the social relations. OR how France enforced Arabic on berber, making arab/ic into a monolithic label of what algeria is. Even as these chronicles narrate, published in newspapers at different times, you can notice how Camus uses Berbers, Arabo-Berbers, Muslims interchangeably and with no pausing.
But Camus was certainly deep into that rhetoric of France as a liberator and believer of justice and liberty and equality. He thought France, with the threat of Algerian resistance, is "in need of conquering Algeria once again."
His positions regarding equality or against torture and capital punishment are, as Kateb Yacine pointed out once, moralistic but not humanist or truthful. They are meant to address his settler's anxieties and useless feelings of guilt. In the 90's, there were attempts to revisit his political writings and positions after the civil war in Algeria as if to say "he was right, colonialism is better." So his ideas are weaponized against armed resistance and for the usual liberal discourse on non-violence and coexistence as ultimate means of salvation.
But I agree with Camus on one point (which his failed politics illustrate) that "people expect too much of writers in these [political] matters." French intellectuals who have "beaten his breast" instead of theirs, had enough reasons to do so!
He strongly lacks any sense of context and existing power relations; which makes me wonder what his thoughts were of Fanon's writings. But this work is helpful, describing the daily impact of French colonialism and institutionalization in the colonies.
Camus wanted an algeria that "preserved the right of [colonial settlers] to survive and be more just." Once again, the natives are silent and nameless in these papers too, as in his fiction. He was annoyed how the French in France blamed colonial settlers, I quote "the idea of acknowledging guilt as our judges-penitent do, by beating the breasts of others, revolts me."
He also brings valuable observations on France introducing regulated education to males before/over females and how this created a division even in the social relations. OR how France enforced Arabic on berber, making arab/ic into a monolithic label of what algeria is. Even as these chronicles narrate, published in newspapers at different times, you can notice how Camus uses Berbers, Arabo-Berbers, Muslims interchangeably and with no pausing.
But Camus was certainly deep into that rhetoric of France as a liberator and believer of justice and liberty and equality. He thought France, with the threat of Algerian resistance, is "in need of conquering Algeria once again."
His positions regarding equality or against torture and capital punishment are, as Kateb Yacine pointed out once, moralistic but not humanist or truthful. They are meant to address his settler's anxieties and useless feelings of guilt. In the 90's, there were attempts to revisit his political writings and positions after the civil war in Algeria as if to say "he was right, colonialism is better." So his ideas are weaponized against armed resistance and for the usual liberal discourse on non-violence and coexistence as ultimate means of salvation.
But I agree with Camus on one point (which his failed politics illustrate) that "people expect too much of writers in these [political] matters." French intellectuals who have "beaten his breast" instead of theirs, had enough reasons to do so!
April 25, 2021
به ظاهر کتاب برای نشان دادن توانمندی قدرت نویسندگی و خبرنگاری کامو ویراست و چاپ شده ، اما نکاتی درش هست که برای من خیلی جالب بود .
اول کتاب که از فقر صحبت می کنه بسیار آدم را یاد سیستان و بلوچستان میندازه ، فقری که چاره کوتاه مدتی براش نیست جز کمککردن و راه حلی براش نیز جز اشتغال ایجاد کردن . فقری که در امتداد بی توجهی حکومت تبدیل به خشونت میشه ، خشونتی که برای احقاق حقوق اولیه هر انسانی صورت میگیره ولی هرگز و هرگز قابل توجیه نیست .
پیشنهاد کامو برای خروج از بحران درخواست اجتناب از کشتن افراد غیر نظامی از هر دو طرف در گیری هست ، خواسته حداقلی که اجابت نمیشه
دو طرف برای توجیه وحشی گری و جنایت فقط رفتار طرف مقابل را بهونه می کنن
اینها برای من مفاهیم بسیار آشنایی هست، چیزی که تو اتفاقات داخلی و خارجی کشورمون میبینیم .
این کتاب از پیشنهادات اوباما برای خوندن بوده و به نظرم برای هر سیاستمداری و هر مذاکره کننده ای خوندنش خالی از لطف نیست
اول کتاب که از فقر صحبت می کنه بسیار آدم را یاد سیستان و بلوچستان میندازه ، فقری که چاره کوتاه مدتی براش نیست جز کمککردن و راه حلی براش نیز جز اشتغال ایجاد کردن . فقری که در امتداد بی توجهی حکومت تبدیل به خشونت میشه ، خشونتی که برای احقاق حقوق اولیه هر انسانی صورت میگیره ولی هرگز و هرگز قابل توجیه نیست .
پیشنهاد کامو برای خروج از بحران درخواست اجتناب از کشتن افراد غیر نظامی از هر دو طرف در گیری هست ، خواسته حداقلی که اجابت نمیشه
دو طرف برای توجیه وحشی گری و جنایت فقط رفتار طرف مقابل را بهونه می کنن
اینها برای من مفاهیم بسیار آشنایی هست، چیزی که تو اتفاقات داخلی و خارجی کشورمون میبینیم .
این کتاب از پیشنهادات اوباما برای خوندن بوده و به نظرم برای هر سیاستمداری و هر مذاکره کننده ای خوندنش خالی از لطف نیست
August 12, 2021
“The reader will have seen at least that misery here is not just a word or a theme for meditation. It exists. It cries out in desperation What have we done about it, and do we have the right to avert our eyes?”
“Imagine the lives of hopelessness and desperation that lie behind them. If you find this normal, then say so. But if you find it repellent, take action. And if yo I find it unbelievable, then please, go and see for yourself”
Albert Camus before, during, and after the Algerian war, found himself the subject of intense criticism on all sides.
Some criticized him for not speaking enough. Algerians criticized him for not supporting complete and total Algerian independence while the French were critical of him for condemning their brutality and saying that the Algerians had a right to govern themselves.
In short, his nuanced views on a conflict in which two entrenched sides saw only black and white were unpopular at best and at worst dangerous to himself.
Yet I find something infinitely admirable in Camus’s essays on the conflict in that no war is ever solely black and white. Camus recognized his limitations as an author “people expect too much of writers” and instead of trying to resolve an intractable situation, focused his energies on where he believed the most good could be done.
In particular he asked for both sides, if a cease fire could jot be achieved to at a minimum cease the practice of targeting innocent French and Muslim civilians. For Camus there was no justification for such barbarity and in the end just created more terrorists on both sides.
Critical of the French treatment of Algerians, particularly in lack of employment and educational opportunities, he likewise had no desire to see a Muslim state take the place of the French state.
As Camus points out, Algeria was unique in this era of anti-colonialism in that there were large numbers of French-Algerians who had lived in Algeria for generations and whose rights were just as important as Algerian muslims.
Where Camus could find what he believed was common ground, he argued passionately for both sides to at minimum talk to each other in the hope that they would then find more that they shared in common.
Of course the war dragged on for several bloody years and even a later independent Algeria would face years of terror and hardship.
Camus’s arguments however against torture, for protecting civilians, for providing food, education, and jobs as the best way to avoid these conflicts in the future, transcend this one moment in history. They are a blueprint for all oppressed people and a reminder that mere brutality may in the short term hold a people down, but it will never crush their desire to be free.
“Imagine the lives of hopelessness and desperation that lie behind them. If you find this normal, then say so. But if you find it repellent, take action. And if yo I find it unbelievable, then please, go and see for yourself”
Albert Camus before, during, and after the Algerian war, found himself the subject of intense criticism on all sides.
Some criticized him for not speaking enough. Algerians criticized him for not supporting complete and total Algerian independence while the French were critical of him for condemning their brutality and saying that the Algerians had a right to govern themselves.
In short, his nuanced views on a conflict in which two entrenched sides saw only black and white were unpopular at best and at worst dangerous to himself.
Yet I find something infinitely admirable in Camus’s essays on the conflict in that no war is ever solely black and white. Camus recognized his limitations as an author “people expect too much of writers” and instead of trying to resolve an intractable situation, focused his energies on where he believed the most good could be done.
In particular he asked for both sides, if a cease fire could jot be achieved to at a minimum cease the practice of targeting innocent French and Muslim civilians. For Camus there was no justification for such barbarity and in the end just created more terrorists on both sides.
Critical of the French treatment of Algerians, particularly in lack of employment and educational opportunities, he likewise had no desire to see a Muslim state take the place of the French state.
As Camus points out, Algeria was unique in this era of anti-colonialism in that there were large numbers of French-Algerians who had lived in Algeria for generations and whose rights were just as important as Algerian muslims.
Where Camus could find what he believed was common ground, he argued passionately for both sides to at minimum talk to each other in the hope that they would then find more that they shared in common.
Of course the war dragged on for several bloody years and even a later independent Algeria would face years of terror and hardship.
Camus’s arguments however against torture, for protecting civilians, for providing food, education, and jobs as the best way to avoid these conflicts in the future, transcend this one moment in history. They are a blueprint for all oppressed people and a reminder that mere brutality may in the short term hold a people down, but it will never crush their desire to be free.
April 8, 2024
Wanneer en als we later zullen terugkijken op de 'speciale operatie' van Rusland in Oekraïne, zullen historici hier wellicht ook naar verwijzen als een oorlog, onder welke naam dan ook. Je hoeft niet eens zo ver terug te gaan in de tijd om te zien dat in Frankrijk hetgeen men nu vaak de 'Algerijnse onafhankelijkheidsoorlog' noemt als 'gebeurtenissen' (événements) of 'incidenten' (incidents) wegzette in de jaren '50 van de vorige eeuw. Net als Rusland categoriseerde Frankrijk de crisis immers als een binnenlandse aangelegenheid.
Alleen het voorwoord van deze selectie artikels en teksten over Algerije, het moederland van Albert Camus, is al de moeite van het lezen waard. De Franse schrijver verklaart waarom hij lang gezwegen heeft over de netelige kwestie en vooral waarom hij weigerde standpunt in te nemen of te pleiten voor Algerijnse onafhankelijkheid.
"Het ontbreekt me ten eerste aan de stelligheid waarmee die knoop kan worden doorgehakt. Op dat vlak heeft het terrorisme dat je in Algerije ziet mijn houding sterk beïnvloed. Als het lot van mannen en vrouwen van je eigen bloed al dan niet verbonden blijkt met de artikelen die je met zoveel gemak neerpent in je comfortabele werkkamer, heb je de plicht te aarzelen en de voors en tegens af te wegen. (...) In de recente uitspraak waar zo merkwaardig op is gereageerd heb ik enkel dat overduidelijke gegeven benoemd. Maar wie niet bekend is met de situatie waar ik het over heb, kan er slecht over oordelen. Wie er juist wel mee bekend is en toch heldhaftig van mening blijft dat het beter is als een broeder het onderspit delft dan dat principes dat doen, die zal ik slechts van veraf bewonderen. Zelf zit ik anders in elkaar." (pp. 8-9)
Tijdens dat voorwoord volstaat het trouwens om Frankrijk door Israël te vervangen en Algerije door Palestina (of Gaza) om te zien hoe visionair en up-to-date de artikelen, brieven en standpunten van Camus wel zijn. Of het nu gaat over martelingen, collateral damage, represailles, ... zijn ideeën, gedachtegangen en standpunten blijken brandend actueel. Zonder echt standpunt in te nemen en met veel zin voor nuance beschrijft hij de rol van de intellectueel of de journalist. Objectiviteit betekent niet (altijd) dat je geen standpunt kan of mag innemen, maar het vergt juist de denkoefening om de kwestie van beide kanten te bekijken en vooral niet te (ver)oordelen.
"Zelfs al is het zo, althans historisch gezien, dat waarden, of het nu de waarden van de natie of die van de heel mensheid zijn, enkel overleven als ervoor wordt gestreden, dat betekent nog niet dat de strijd (of geweld) op zich die waarden al rechtvaardigt. Eerst moet die strijd zelf met precies die waarden worden gerechtvaardigd en toegelicht." (p. 16)
In de geschiedenislessen over Frankrijk tijdens mijn opleiding was de Algerijnse kwestie een voetnoot in de cursus. Charles de Gaulle zou die kwestie - die voor heel wat spanning zorgde in Frankrijk zelf - daadkrachtig hebben aangepakt, waarmee de Vijfde Republiek een feit was. Probleem opgelost. Dit kleinood geeft heel wat meer diepgang en inzicht in hetgeen zich in de terre natale van Camus heeft afgespeeld. Alleen daarom is het al het lezen waard.
Bovendien is de vertaling van Eva Wissenburg impeccable. Haar recentere vertaling Bruiloft, De zomer van Noces suivi de L'été die ik onmiddellijk na de Franse originele versie gelezen heb, was van eenzelfde hoog niveau als deze 'Chroniques Algériennes'. Het maakt de lectuur van een boek dat inhoudelijk niet zo erg vlot wegleest, een plezier.
Alleen het voorwoord van deze selectie artikels en teksten over Algerije, het moederland van Albert Camus, is al de moeite van het lezen waard. De Franse schrijver verklaart waarom hij lang gezwegen heeft over de netelige kwestie en vooral waarom hij weigerde standpunt in te nemen of te pleiten voor Algerijnse onafhankelijkheid.
"Het ontbreekt me ten eerste aan de stelligheid waarmee die knoop kan worden doorgehakt. Op dat vlak heeft het terrorisme dat je in Algerije ziet mijn houding sterk beïnvloed. Als het lot van mannen en vrouwen van je eigen bloed al dan niet verbonden blijkt met de artikelen die je met zoveel gemak neerpent in je comfortabele werkkamer, heb je de plicht te aarzelen en de voors en tegens af te wegen. (...) In de recente uitspraak waar zo merkwaardig op is gereageerd heb ik enkel dat overduidelijke gegeven benoemd. Maar wie niet bekend is met de situatie waar ik het over heb, kan er slecht over oordelen. Wie er juist wel mee bekend is en toch heldhaftig van mening blijft dat het beter is als een broeder het onderspit delft dan dat principes dat doen, die zal ik slechts van veraf bewonderen. Zelf zit ik anders in elkaar." (pp. 8-9)
Tijdens dat voorwoord volstaat het trouwens om Frankrijk door Israël te vervangen en Algerije door Palestina (of Gaza) om te zien hoe visionair en up-to-date de artikelen, brieven en standpunten van Camus wel zijn. Of het nu gaat over martelingen, collateral damage, represailles, ... zijn ideeën, gedachtegangen en standpunten blijken brandend actueel. Zonder echt standpunt in te nemen en met veel zin voor nuance beschrijft hij de rol van de intellectueel of de journalist. Objectiviteit betekent niet (altijd) dat je geen standpunt kan of mag innemen, maar het vergt juist de denkoefening om de kwestie van beide kanten te bekijken en vooral niet te (ver)oordelen.
"Zelfs al is het zo, althans historisch gezien, dat waarden, of het nu de waarden van de natie of die van de heel mensheid zijn, enkel overleven als ervoor wordt gestreden, dat betekent nog niet dat de strijd (of geweld) op zich die waarden al rechtvaardigt. Eerst moet die strijd zelf met precies die waarden worden gerechtvaardigd en toegelicht." (p. 16)
In de geschiedenislessen over Frankrijk tijdens mijn opleiding was de Algerijnse kwestie een voetnoot in de cursus. Charles de Gaulle zou die kwestie - die voor heel wat spanning zorgde in Frankrijk zelf - daadkrachtig hebben aangepakt, waarmee de Vijfde Republiek een feit was. Probleem opgelost. Dit kleinood geeft heel wat meer diepgang en inzicht in hetgeen zich in de terre natale van Camus heeft afgespeeld. Alleen daarom is het al het lezen waard.
Bovendien is de vertaling van Eva Wissenburg impeccable. Haar recentere vertaling Bruiloft, De zomer van Noces suivi de L'été die ik onmiddellijk na de Franse originele versie gelezen heb, was van eenzelfde hoog niveau als deze 'Chroniques Algériennes'. Het maakt de lectuur van een boek dat inhoudelijk niet zo erg vlot wegleest, een plezier.
October 5, 2022
یادداشتهایی درباره ی الجزایر بین سالهای ۱۹۳۹ تا ۱۹۵۸ از زبان آلبر کامویی که با روحیهای فرانسوی در بطن مردمِ سختی کشیده و رنجدیده ی الجزایر زندگی کردهاست.
درباره ی کتاب :
۱. تجربه ی خواندن این کتاب با تصورات من متفاوت بود. برای شناخت بیشتر کامو خواندن رو شروع کردم و این خوانش با وقایع اتفاقیه ی حال حاضرِ ایران متقارن شد. موج اعتراضات و خشمِ عمومی نسبت به حکومت مرکزی و مقایسه ی ذهنیِ بیوقفهای که در ذهن من بین طبقه ی حاکم ایران و استعمارگران الجزایر انجام میشد. با این تفاوت که اقلا در الجزایر سیطره ی دین و بازی با ایدئولوژی دینی ملت از طرف دستگاه حکومتی درکار نبود. (هرچند احتمالا این کار تا حدودی از طرف گروههای مخالف درجریان بود.)
۲. نکته ی جالب این کتاب (که شاید اگر همزمان یا اعتراضات نبود متوجهش نمیشدم) این بود که کامو به بَعدِ ماجرا توجه داشت. چیزی که امروزه جای خالیاش در میان اعتراضات ایران به چشم میخورد. خب چه اتفاقی قراره بیوفته؟ چه ساختاری برای بعد از سرنگونی در نظر داریم. تمام اینها نیازمند فکر و تعمق روشنفکرانیست که بیطرفانه و با اجماع کامل به موضوع نگاه میکنند. نظرات و انتقادات مفید و سازنده رو میشنوند و با تندروی و افراطیون مقابله میکنند.
۳. این کتاب نکتههای نه زیاد و نه چندان عمیق، ولی جالبی برای یاد گرفتن دارد.
مثل دیدن نمای نزدیک فقرِ حاکم است. ممکناست دیدی عمیق به شما ندهد، اما همین نشان دادن وقایع اتفاقیه باعث مشاهدهی نزدیک و بیپرده و لمسِ الجزایر بین آن سالها میشود.
بخصوص بررسیای که در ابتدای کتاب در مورد منطقه ی القبائل صورت میگیرد و ذکر ما وقعِ آن، دیدی کلی از آنچه در الجزایر میگذشت و پیشزمینه ی شورش مردم شد را به دست میدهد.
همچنین اطلاعاتی اجمالی از قبیل از نحوه ی حکومت و تاثیر استعمارگران بر کشورهای مستعمره، تاثیر فقر بر افزایش خشم جامعه، عدم کارآییِ سرکوبِ محض، همچینن اهمیت اقدام به موقع، با خواندن کتاب به دست میآید. (اگر سالها قبل از شورش ۱۹۵۲ تا ۱۹۶۲ به یادداشتها و اخطار های کامو و دیگر افراد(؟) در مورد سیاستگزاری نامناسب الجزایر و فقر شدید در مناطق و توزیع ناعادلانه ی ثروت وقعی نهاده بودند شاید الجزایر شاهد هیچکدام از جنگهای پیشِ رو نمیشد و یک جدایی مسالمتآمیز و بدون خونریزی را تجربه میکرد.)
درباره ی کامو :
۱. یکی از اصلیترین اعتقادات کامو، باارزش دانستن خودِ زندگی و توجه به اصلِ حیات است! در این کتاب به خوبی مشخص است. وقتی با گذر از خشونت و اغتشاشِ در جریان، سعی در جلب توجهِ سران قدرت به بیگناهان و مردم عادی و غیرمسلح دارد.
۲. این کتاب نشان میدهد کامو در چه بستری رشد کرده و تبدیل به کامو شده. کافهها و خیابانهای انتلکچوال فرانسه، کامو را کامو نکردند. در واقع این آب و خاک و زندگی در الجزایر و دیدن صحنههایی بسیار متفاوت از زندگی پاریسی بوده که "آلبر کامو" را ساخته.
۳. شاید کامو علیرغم سعی در بیطرفی، بیشتر طرف فرانسوی های ساکن الجزایر بود تا خود ساکنان بومی. که کاملا طبیعیست، چون خود او از همین قشر بود. این مسئله صرفا با گفتههای وی تناقض داشت.
... جنگها و آشوبها نهایتا در سال ۱۹۶۲ به استقلال الجزایر از فرانسه میانجامند. دوسال پساز مرگ کامو. ای کاش کامو زنده میماند، این استقلال را میدید و مینوشت چقدر با آرمان هایش درباره ی الجزایر همسو یا غیرهمسو است.
"انفعال، سهلانگاری ناشی از دلزدگی و در برخی مواقع فقدان شخصیت، شکلِ تقلیلیافتهای از قدرت را بوجود میآورند که ستم بر بیگناهان را نادیده میگیرد و گناهکاران را به حال خود رها میکند.
حکومت ممکن است قانونی باشد، اما مشروعیت آن تنها هنگامی به دست میآید که ضامن رعایت عدالت میان منافع عمومی و آزادی فردی باشد.
اگر از چنین رویکردی دست بکشد، بدنه و ریشههایش را از دست میدهد و به یک هرج و مرج بوروکراتیک مبدل خواهد شد."
درباره ی کتاب :
۱. تجربه ی خواندن این کتاب با تصورات من متفاوت بود. برای شناخت بیشتر کامو خواندن رو شروع کردم و این خوانش با وقایع اتفاقیه ی حال حاضرِ ایران متقارن شد. موج اعتراضات و خشمِ عمومی نسبت به حکومت مرکزی و مقایسه ی ذهنیِ بیوقفهای که در ذهن من بین طبقه ی حاکم ایران و استعمارگران الجزایر انجام میشد. با این تفاوت که اقلا در الجزایر سیطره ی دین و بازی با ایدئولوژی دینی ملت از طرف دستگاه حکومتی درکار نبود. (هرچند احتمالا این کار تا حدودی از طرف گروههای مخالف درجریان بود.)
۲. نکته ی جالب این کتاب (که شاید اگر همزمان یا اعتراضات نبود متوجهش نمیشدم) این بود که کامو به بَعدِ ماجرا توجه داشت. چیزی که امروزه جای خالیاش در میان اعتراضات ایران به چشم میخورد. خب چه اتفاقی قراره بیوفته؟ چه ساختاری برای بعد از سرنگونی در نظر داریم. تمام اینها نیازمند فکر و تعمق روشنفکرانیست که بیطرفانه و با اجماع کامل به موضوع نگاه میکنند. نظرات و انتقادات مفید و سازنده رو میشنوند و با تندروی و افراطیون مقابله میکنند.
۳. این کتاب نکتههای نه زیاد و نه چندان عمیق، ولی جالبی برای یاد گرفتن دارد.
مثل دیدن نمای نزدیک فقرِ حاکم است. ممکناست دیدی عمیق به شما ندهد، اما همین نشان دادن وقایع اتفاقیه باعث مشاهدهی نزدیک و بیپرده و لمسِ الجزایر بین آن سالها میشود.
بخصوص بررسیای که در ابتدای کتاب در مورد منطقه ی القبائل صورت میگیرد و ذکر ما وقعِ آن، دیدی کلی از آنچه در الجزایر میگذشت و پیشزمینه ی شورش مردم شد را به دست میدهد.
همچنین اطلاعاتی اجمالی از قبیل از نحوه ی حکومت و تاثیر استعمارگران بر کشورهای مستعمره، تاثیر فقر بر افزایش خشم جامعه، عدم کارآییِ سرکوبِ محض، همچینن اهمیت اقدام به موقع، با خواندن کتاب به دست میآید. (اگر سالها قبل از شورش ۱۹۵۲ تا ۱۹۶۲ به یادداشتها و اخطار های کامو و دیگر افراد(؟) در مورد سیاستگزاری نامناسب الجزایر و فقر شدید در مناطق و توزیع ناعادلانه ی ثروت وقعی نهاده بودند شاید الجزایر شاهد هیچکدام از جنگهای پیشِ رو نمیشد و یک جدایی مسالمتآمیز و بدون خونریزی را تجربه میکرد.)
درباره ی کامو :
۱. یکی از اصلیترین اعتقادات کامو، باارزش دانستن خودِ زندگی و توجه به اصلِ حیات است! در این کتاب به خوبی مشخص است. وقتی با گذر از خشونت و اغتشاشِ در جریان، سعی در جلب توجهِ سران قدرت به بیگناهان و مردم عادی و غیرمسلح دارد.
۲. این کتاب نشان میدهد کامو در چه بستری رشد کرده و تبدیل به کامو شده. کافهها و خیابانهای انتلکچوال فرانسه، کامو را کامو نکردند. در واقع این آب و خاک و زندگی در الجزایر و دیدن صحنههایی بسیار متفاوت از زندگی پاریسی بوده که "آلبر کامو" را ساخته.
۳. شاید کامو علیرغم سعی در بیطرفی، بیشتر طرف فرانسوی های ساکن الجزایر بود تا خود ساکنان بومی. که کاملا طبیعیست، چون خود او از همین قشر بود. این مسئله صرفا با گفتههای وی تناقض داشت.
... جنگها و آشوبها نهایتا در سال ۱۹۶۲ به استقلال الجزایر از فرانسه میانجامند. دوسال پساز مرگ کامو. ای کاش کامو زنده میماند، این استقلال را میدید و مینوشت چقدر با آرمان هایش درباره ی الجزایر همسو یا غیرهمسو است.
"انفعال، سهلانگاری ناشی از دلزدگی و در برخی مواقع فقدان شخصیت، شکلِ تقلیلیافتهای از قدرت را بوجود میآورند که ستم بر بیگناهان را نادیده میگیرد و گناهکاران را به حال خود رها میکند.
حکومت ممکن است قانونی باشد، اما مشروعیت آن تنها هنگامی به دست میآید که ضامن رعایت عدالت میان منافع عمومی و آزادی فردی باشد.
اگر از چنین رویکردی دست بکشد، بدنه و ریشههایش را از دست میدهد و به یک هرج و مرج بوروکراتیک مبدل خواهد شد."
June 27, 2013
This collection of Camus reporting from Algeria in 1939 during the Kabyle famine, in 1945-46, and his writing about the independence struggle in the 50s, seems beautifully translated - a real voice comes through. Unlike some of the yards of Camus I read as a teenager, it is engaged, not "about" engagment, and its high point is the transcript of a speech Camus gave, or tried to give, in Algiers, which advocated to all parties - FLN, its rivals, the French military, the French Algerians, etc. - that they agrree to refrain from killing civilians as they fought one another. There is an account of its reception somewhat later - he was shouted down by the European Algerians in the audience, which was mortifying to him because so many moderate Arabs in the audience risked their lives and reputations (among their fellow Arabs) even to have attended. Reading this allows you to see in a context without the fraught tension of all encounters between Western powers, Arab/Muslim ressentiment and the European powers and mentalities in whose interest it is now, as it was in North Africa in the 50s, to pump up such conflicts. What Camus had the impertinence to propose in Algiers was to ban what is now known as terrorism. At that point it seemed to all parties to occur as a kind of side issue, - civilian massacres occurred when conflict bubbled over. Camus tried to argue that terrorism made politics and warfare more difficult. How wrong he was: people would soon realize that terrorism could replace politics and warfare, if Western powers reacted in the wrong way.
The confrontation of liberals of good will with fanaticism of ill will, with intellectuals who simplify complex issues through deliberate mendcacity in the service of a higher ideal, with the USSR then, China and Russia now, in the background, with the "revolutionary" parties finding the murder of its civilians a useful means to various ends - it's all here. When I was a little boy and began to have dinner with my parents, it was a grim ritual to turn on the TV to watch the Algerian War play out on the 6:00 news - the first world event I was ever aware of. It still goes on, and there is still no easy solution - but the quality of today's Camus' has sadly declined.
The confrontation of liberals of good will with fanaticism of ill will, with intellectuals who simplify complex issues through deliberate mendcacity in the service of a higher ideal, with the USSR then, China and Russia now, in the background, with the "revolutionary" parties finding the murder of its civilians a useful means to various ends - it's all here. When I was a little boy and began to have dinner with my parents, it was a grim ritual to turn on the TV to watch the Algerian War play out on the 6:00 news - the first world event I was ever aware of. It still goes on, and there is still no easy solution - but the quality of today's Camus' has sadly declined.
July 20, 2017
#"C'est le dernier avertissement que puisse formuler, avant de se taire à nouveau, un écrivain voué, depuis vingt ans, au service de l'Algérie."
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Mon cher Camus, je n'arrive pas à te comprendre ..
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Mon cher Camus, je n'arrive pas à te comprendre ..
December 28, 2021
اینکه یک نفر بتواند و جرات این را داشتهباشد تا از چیزهایی صحبت کند که در دورهی خودش نقل محافل نیست - به خصوص اگر مربوط به معیشت، آزادی، نان، کار و دستمزد، رفاه اجتماعی و دوری از هرگونه نزاع داخلی باشد - آنهم بدون شعار و به خرج دادن نگاه کورکورانه، شجاعت و درک بالایی میطلبد.
مقالات و یادداشتهایی که در این کتاب در سال ۱۹۵۸ از نوشتههای کامو در فاصله بیست سال به چاپ رسیدهاست، به قبل از قیام (درست زمانی که کامو بابت رخ دادنشان هشدار میدهد)، و در زمان اوج گرفتن ِ آن است. رنگ بوی نوشتهها از کتاب دوم به بعد به نزاع داخلی، مرگ انسانهای غیرنظامی و بیگناه و قلب تپندهی کامو برای سرزمینی که به آن تعلق دارد، مربوط میشود.
کتاب حاضر حاوی دو نامه، چندین یادداشت و مقاله و یک متن سخنراني است که خواننده را مسحور کاموی غیر داستاننویس میکند؛ اگرچه میتوان داخل بسیاری از داستانها و آثار وی، به وجود این روح دلسوز و نگران پی بُرد، اما در این کتاب هیچ پلی تحت عنوان "داستان" بین خواننده و نویسنده وجود ندارد.
پرداختن به مواردی که چشم من را - بنا به احساس نزدیکی به کلام کامو - ترغیب میکرد بیشتر از یکمرتبه برخی از جملات را بخوانم شامل موارد زیر میشوند:
۱/ کشاورزی فاقد برنامه ریزی برای تامین نیازهای مردم
۲/ ارتباط آرامش و رسیدگی به نیازهای اولیه زندگی مانند تامین غذای مناسب
۳/کسب قدرت و منزلت توسط سیستم حاکم به واسطهی نیاز های اساسی مردم
۴/ واقف بودن کامو به این مطلب که حتی نوشتههای او به طور کامل اصل مطلب را بیان نمیکنند و حقیقت فراتر از یک نوشته یا مقاله است.
۵/ هشدار برای عدم تلف کردن وقت و نجات جان بیشتر از یک انسان
۶*/ اهمیت نحوه نگاه حاکمان به مردم یک منطقه و یا یک کشور؛ نحوهی نگاه سیاستمداران به مردم، نشان دهندهی وضعیتی زندگیِ کنونی آنهاست. یا به بیان دیگر، به شرایطی که برای زندگی عادی مردم به وجود می آورند مربوط می شود.
۷/ دو قطبی شدن جامعه، و اینکه جز اتحاد نمیتوان به درخت آزادی و مدنیت رسیدگی کرد و ریشهی آن درخت با توجه به شرایط موجود خشکیدهاست.
و
۸/ تاریخ خود را تکرار می کند اگر فقط و فقط انتظار بکشیم.
مقالات و یادداشتهایی که در این کتاب در سال ۱۹۵۸ از نوشتههای کامو در فاصله بیست سال به چاپ رسیدهاست، به قبل از قیام (درست زمانی که کامو بابت رخ دادنشان هشدار میدهد)، و در زمان اوج گرفتن ِ آن است. رنگ بوی نوشتهها از کتاب دوم به بعد به نزاع داخلی، مرگ انسانهای غیرنظامی و بیگناه و قلب تپندهی کامو برای سرزمینی که به آن تعلق دارد، مربوط میشود.
کتاب حاضر حاوی دو نامه، چندین یادداشت و مقاله و یک متن سخنراني است که خواننده را مسحور کاموی غیر داستاننویس میکند؛ اگرچه میتوان داخل بسیاری از داستانها و آثار وی، به وجود این روح دلسوز و نگران پی بُرد، اما در این کتاب هیچ پلی تحت عنوان "داستان" بین خواننده و نویسنده وجود ندارد.
پرداختن به مواردی که چشم من را - بنا به احساس نزدیکی به کلام کامو - ترغیب میکرد بیشتر از یکمرتبه برخی از جملات را بخوانم شامل موارد زیر میشوند:
۱/ کشاورزی فاقد برنامه ریزی برای تامین نیازهای مردم
۲/ ارتباط آرامش و رسیدگی به نیازهای اولیه زندگی مانند تامین غذای مناسب
۳/کسب قدرت و منزلت توسط سیستم حاکم به واسطهی نیاز های اساسی مردم
۴/ واقف بودن کامو به این مطلب که حتی نوشتههای او به طور کامل اصل مطلب را بیان نمیکنند و حقیقت فراتر از یک نوشته یا مقاله است.
۵/ هشدار برای عدم تلف کردن وقت و نجات جان بیشتر از یک انسان
۶*/ اهمیت نحوه نگاه حاکمان به مردم یک منطقه و یا یک کشور؛ نحوهی نگاه سیاستمداران به مردم، نشان دهندهی وضعیتی زندگیِ کنونی آنهاست. یا به بیان دیگر، به شرایطی که برای زندگی عادی مردم به وجود می آورند مربوط می شود.
۷/ دو قطبی شدن جامعه، و اینکه جز اتحاد نمیتوان به درخت آزادی و مدنیت رسیدگی کرد و ریشهی آن درخت با توجه به شرایط موجود خشکیدهاست.
و
۸/ تاریخ خود را تکرار می کند اگر فقط و فقط انتظار بکشیم.
May 12, 2016
"People are now planting bombs in the tramways of Algiers. My mother might be on one of those tramways. If that is justice, then I prefer my mother." (18)
"As for those who are familiar with it [the Algerian situation] yet continue to believe heroically that their brothers should die rather than their principles, I shall confine myself to admiring them from afar. I am not of their breed." (25)
"[T]he real question is not how to die separately but how to live together." (29)
"Believe me when I tell you that Algeria is where I hurt at this moment, as others feel pain in their lungs." (113)
"Thus impotent moderation continues to serve the extremes, and our history is still an insane dialogue between paralytics and epileptics." (122)
"Our Mediterranean is something else: a vibrant region, a realm of joy and smiles. ... When you travel in Europe and head south toward Italy or Provence, you breathe a sigh of relief upon encountering the disheveled appearance and robust and vivid customs we all know. I spent two months in Central Europe, in Austria and Germany, wondering why I felt an unaccustomed weight on my shoulders and suffered from a vague anxiety. Recently it dawned upon me. The people there were always buttoned up. They could never let themselves go. They did not know the meaning of joy, which is so different from laughter." (188-9)
"As for those who are familiar with it [the Algerian situation] yet continue to believe heroically that their brothers should die rather than their principles, I shall confine myself to admiring them from afar. I am not of their breed." (25)
"[T]he real question is not how to die separately but how to live together." (29)
"Believe me when I tell you that Algeria is where I hurt at this moment, as others feel pain in their lungs." (113)
"Thus impotent moderation continues to serve the extremes, and our history is still an insane dialogue between paralytics and epileptics." (122)
"Our Mediterranean is something else: a vibrant region, a realm of joy and smiles. ... When you travel in Europe and head south toward Italy or Provence, you breathe a sigh of relief upon encountering the disheveled appearance and robust and vivid customs we all know. I spent two months in Central Europe, in Austria and Germany, wondering why I felt an unaccustomed weight on my shoulders and suffered from a vague anxiety. Recently it dawned upon me. The people there were always buttoned up. They could never let themselves go. They did not know the meaning of joy, which is so different from laughter." (188-9)
May 1, 2021
کتاب به شکل حیرت انگیزی از فقر و سیاست میگه. جنگ و نابرابری و استعمار. مردمی که زیر فشار فقر دارن له میشن و از تدبیر حکومت مرکزی خبری نیست. دو طرف درگیر همدیگه رو مقصر میدونن و دست به کشتارهایی میزنن. تلاشی جان فرسا برای پایان دادن به این وحشیگری. واقعا انسان از جون همنوع خودش چی میخواد؟ چرا این سیاستمدارها نمیتونن ببینن ما یه زندگی آروم داشته باشیم.؟
October 7, 2025
mediterranean nationalism, nationalism of sunshine, two stars because he made fun of Nasser and im a nationalist from 1960 so you can’t do that in front of me
September 29, 2024
Read sections for Fall 2024 Orientalism course
October 20, 2019
وقایع نگاری های الجزایر - آلبر کامو
«برای دستیابی به راهکاری برای نجات وضع مردم، باید به چند اصل توجه کرد: ممانعت از توزیع صدقه، محدود کردن آزمون و خطا، توجه به نیات خیر و در نهایت دوری از کاربرد کلمات بیهوده ای که می کوشند میان قحطی و آلودگی، میان انزوا و نومیدی تعادل ایجاد کنند.»
«در این کشور دوستداشتنی که هم اکنون غرق در شکوفه های بهاری و پرتو خورشید است، مردم گرسنه خواستار عدالت اند. نمی توانیم به رنج های آنها بی اعتنا باشیم.»
«اما هر دو می دانیم که در این جنگ هیچ برنده ای وجود نخواهد داشت و این که چه حالا، چه در آینده، ناچاریم با یکدیگر بر روی یک خاک زندگی کنیم. می دانیم که سرنوشت ما به طور کامل در هم تنیده است و هر اقدام از یک سو باعث ضربتی متقابل از سوی دیگر خواهد شد؛ جنایت منجر به جنایت می شود و جنون منجر به دیوانگی، با این حال اگر یکی از طرفین خوددار باشد، خشم و بی عقلی طرف دیگر نیز فروکش خواهد کرد.»
«اما دست کم یک چیز همه ما را متحد می کند: عشق به سرزمینی که از آن سهم می بریم و پریشانی. پریشانی در مواجهه با آینده ای که هر روز بیش از پیش از دسترس دور می شود، پریشانی بر اثر تهدیدهای جنگی فاسد و بحرانی اقتصادی که همین حالا نیز به اندازه کافی بد است و وضعیتش هر روز وخیم تر می شود، به گونه ای که جبران خسارات آن سالهای متمادی زمان می برد.»
اینها بخش کوچکی از نوشته هایی است که آلبر کامو در متن های کتابش توجه من رو معطوف خودش کرد. چیزی که در طول مطالعه کتاب بیشتر در ذهن من چرخ می زد، مقایسه ناخواسته ای بود میان وضع امروز کشور ایران و برخی کشورهای منطقه خاورمیانه با شرایطی که آلبر کامو از الجزایر اواخر دهه 1960 به عنوان کشوری مسخر استعمار فرانسوی با کوله باری از مشکلات رها شده از آن یاد می کرد.
این کتاب رو خیلی دوست داشتم اگرچه باید اعتراف کنم پنجاه صفحه اول نزدیک بود خسته کننده بشه ولی ادامه دادم و در نیمه دوم کتاب جذابیت زیادی پیدا کردم.
راستش اگه بخواهم این کتاب رو با پنج کلمه کلیدی در خاطرات خودم ذخیره کنم می نویسم: عشق، نفرت، احترام، آزادی و چشمانی کاملا گشوده.
مهرماه 1398
«برای دستیابی به راهکاری برای نجات وضع مردم، باید به چند اصل توجه کرد: ممانعت از توزیع صدقه، محدود کردن آزمون و خطا، توجه به نیات خیر و در نهایت دوری از کاربرد کلمات بیهوده ای که می کوشند میان قحطی و آلودگی، میان انزوا و نومیدی تعادل ایجاد کنند.»
«در این کشور دوستداشتنی که هم اکنون غرق در شکوفه های بهاری و پرتو خورشید است، مردم گرسنه خواستار عدالت اند. نمی توانیم به رنج های آنها بی اعتنا باشیم.»
«اما هر دو می دانیم که در این جنگ هیچ برنده ای وجود نخواهد داشت و این که چه حالا، چه در آینده، ناچاریم با یکدیگر بر روی یک خاک زندگی کنیم. می دانیم که سرنوشت ما به طور کامل در هم تنیده است و هر اقدام از یک سو باعث ضربتی متقابل از سوی دیگر خواهد شد؛ جنایت منجر به جنایت می شود و جنون منجر به دیوانگی، با این حال اگر یکی از طرفین خوددار باشد، خشم و بی عقلی طرف دیگر نیز فروکش خواهد کرد.»
«اما دست کم یک چیز همه ما را متحد می کند: عشق به سرزمینی که از آن سهم می بریم و پریشانی. پریشانی در مواجهه با آینده ای که هر روز بیش از پیش از دسترس دور می شود، پریشانی بر اثر تهدیدهای جنگی فاسد و بحرانی اقتصادی که همین حالا نیز به اندازه کافی بد است و وضعیتش هر روز وخیم تر می شود، به گونه ای که جبران خسارات آن سالهای متمادی زمان می برد.»
اینها بخش کوچکی از نوشته هایی است که آلبر کامو در متن های کتابش توجه من رو معطوف خودش کرد. چیزی که در طول مطالعه کتاب بیشتر در ذهن من چرخ می زد، مقایسه ناخواسته ای بود میان وضع امروز کشور ایران و برخی کشورهای منطقه خاورمیانه با شرایطی که آلبر کامو از الجزایر اواخر دهه 1960 به عنوان کشوری مسخر استعمار فرانسوی با کوله باری از مشکلات رها شده از آن یاد می کرد.
این کتاب رو خیلی دوست داشتم اگرچه باید اعتراف کنم پنجاه صفحه اول نزدیک بود خسته کننده بشه ولی ادامه دادم و در نیمه دوم کتاب جذابیت زیادی پیدا کردم.
راستش اگه بخواهم این کتاب رو با پنج کلمه کلیدی در خاطرات خودم ذخیره کنم می نویسم: عشق، نفرت، احترام، آزادی و چشمانی کاملا گشوده.
مهرماه 1398
January 26, 2016
"An Algeria consisting of federated communities linked to France seems to me unquestionably preferable from the standpoint of justice to an Algeria linked to an Islamic empire that would subject the Arab people's to additional misery and suffering and tear the French people of Algeria from their natural homeland..."
Camus was born in Algeria. In "Algerian Chronicles" he writes of his distress about the tragedies that befell the country between 1939 and 1958.
He was committed to the defense of those who suffers colonial injustices yet he was unable to support an independent Algeria from France. He has been seen as wrong or naive for his views by subsequent critics.
I found this book informative as I didn't know much about the subject matter and love the writing. His writing is as always economical yet factual and elicits compassion from the reader.
Camus was born in Algeria. In "Algerian Chronicles" he writes of his distress about the tragedies that befell the country between 1939 and 1958.
He was committed to the defense of those who suffers colonial injustices yet he was unable to support an independent Algeria from France. He has been seen as wrong or naive for his views by subsequent critics.
I found this book informative as I didn't know much about the subject matter and love the writing. His writing is as always economical yet factual and elicits compassion from the reader.
July 13, 2016
Albert Camus was a bit of a Cassandra with respect to the Algerian crisis. There's so much he got right about the war for Algerian independence, but ultimately he was extremely naive with little understanding of the indigenous Algerian people. (Camus seemed to agree that there actually wasn't such a thing as an Algerian people, as there had never been an Algerian nation. A very illiberal statement from Camus.)
Although Camus's heart was clearly breaking over the situation, as a pied noir himself, he had a certain sense of what is now called white privilege that projected itself into a certain moral ambiguity in the end. His legacy is actually tarnished by the articles in this book.
Although Camus's heart was clearly breaking over the situation, as a pied noir himself, he had a certain sense of what is now called white privilege that projected itself into a certain moral ambiguity in the end. His legacy is actually tarnished by the articles in this book.
January 20, 2016
This collection of short articles, letters, and essays reminded me why I enjoy the writings of Albert Camus. Thoroughly thought provoking and insightful, Camus's words remain relevant for us today. There is much wisdom in these pages.
Read
January 15, 2025Infuriating and exasperating to read. Even its moments of lucidity were coupled with folly. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I don't mean to be entirely disparaging, and I appreciate Camus' earnestness, but his admonishments on justice and ethics with respect to the war in Algeria are terribly patronizing–if not totally preposterous. In his effort to advance alternatives to the situation in Algeria, he succumbs to the ego and colonial psychology of his predecessors. Perhaps my harshness is an allowance of presentism, yet in witnessing the ongoing injustices in Israel-Palestine, as well as the arguments advanced by liberal Zionists to remedy them, I am affirmed in my critique.
“For the master’s tool will never dismantle the master’s house." - AL
I wonder what a conversation between Camus and Fanon would've looked like.
His writings on the misery and suffering in Kabylia (a consequence of French colonial policy) was exemplary journalistic work.
“For the master’s tool will never dismantle the master’s house." - AL
I wonder what a conversation between Camus and Fanon would've looked like.
His writings on the misery and suffering in Kabylia (a consequence of French colonial policy) was exemplary journalistic work.
dnf
April 6, 2021dnf at 14%
This is actually kind of sad, but I've been on a digital reading slump recently- if it's not a physical copy of a book, I can't get through it. It's almost impossible to find a physical copy of Algerian Chronicles anywhere near me, so until I do it's going to be put to rest in the 'dnf' shelf. And it was really interesting too ;/
This is actually kind of sad, but I've been on a digital reading slump recently- if it's not a physical copy of a book, I can't get through it. It's almost impossible to find a physical copy of Algerian Chronicles anywhere near me, so until I do it's going to be put to rest in the 'dnf' shelf. And it was really interesting too ;/
August 21, 2025
An excellent collection of essays that, despite the Algerian revolution being over in the 60s, are still incredibly poignant in relation to our modern conflicts. Nobody listened to Camus then and we ignore similar arguments now, much to a multitude of people's detriment.
May 14, 2019
Tres instructif ce livre, mais je ne crois pas que les articles et les statistiques est ma tasse de the.
October 21, 2024
El libro, sobre todo su inicio, tiene información muy interesante y que sí que me ha gustado conocer y aprender. Sin embargo, está repleto de reflexiones que no me han gustado, por lo que, en su conjunto, me ha resultado complicado de leer.
May 16, 2025
هنگامی که مظلوم به نام عدالت سلاح به دست میگیرد، گامی بزرگ به سمت بیعدالتی برمیدارد.
June 25, 2025
Read “letter to an Algerian militant” in the Algerian Chronicles
October 2, 2013
It is fascinating how a book published in such an untimely manner can be even more relevant than it was in its time. Released in 1958, Algerian Chronicles was, much like Camus' personal views on the Algerian Uprising, not particularly popular. It didn't appeal to patriotic nationalism of the French right wing or to the left, which supported the National Liberation Front of Algeria.
I found two of Camus' essays particularly invaluable and brilliant: His Preface and Call for a Civilian Truce. In the prescient manner of great essayists, he saw how the end of reason not only threatened the lives of all Algerians, but ours today. Who doesn't recognize FOX television and CNBC in the following quote from the Preface: "It would mean engaging in constant polemics, which would be counterproductive in a society in which clear thinking and intellectual independence are increasingly rare."
Camus never wrote Arab character into his fiction as anything more than silent, passive observers. It would be fair to say that Arab or Berber characters were not part of his imaginative world. But they were very much part of his journalistic world, as we discover in his thoughtful, compassionate writing on the Kabylie region (perhaps best known for the Atlas Mountains). His writing about failures of the French colonial system and the dire conditions the Arab and Berber people lived under contains the suppressed rage of great investigative journalists everywhere. Blackballed by Algerian publishers for this piece, Camus left Algeria for France.Camus most certainly was a colonist, but to say or imply he was imperialist would be a grave mistake.
Perhaps most importantly, he was a pluralist. He believed that people of many different backgrounds could live together. In this day and age when tribalism, nationalism and religious nationalism are the bane of tolerant people everywhere, I leave you with this quote. "In this as in other things, I, for one, believe only in differences, not uniformity, because differences are the roots without which the tree of liberty withers and the sap of creation and civilization dries up."
I found two of Camus' essays particularly invaluable and brilliant: His Preface and Call for a Civilian Truce. In the prescient manner of great essayists, he saw how the end of reason not only threatened the lives of all Algerians, but ours today. Who doesn't recognize FOX television and CNBC in the following quote from the Preface: "It would mean engaging in constant polemics, which would be counterproductive in a society in which clear thinking and intellectual independence are increasingly rare."
Camus never wrote Arab character into his fiction as anything more than silent, passive observers. It would be fair to say that Arab or Berber characters were not part of his imaginative world. But they were very much part of his journalistic world, as we discover in his thoughtful, compassionate writing on the Kabylie region (perhaps best known for the Atlas Mountains). His writing about failures of the French colonial system and the dire conditions the Arab and Berber people lived under contains the suppressed rage of great investigative journalists everywhere. Blackballed by Algerian publishers for this piece, Camus left Algeria for France.Camus most certainly was a colonist, but to say or imply he was imperialist would be a grave mistake.
Perhaps most importantly, he was a pluralist. He believed that people of many different backgrounds could live together. In this day and age when tribalism, nationalism and religious nationalism are the bane of tolerant people everywhere, I leave you with this quote. "In this as in other things, I, for one, believe only in differences, not uniformity, because differences are the roots without which the tree of liberty withers and the sap of creation and civilization dries up."
July 1, 2024
It's hard for me to overstate how cool I think this guy is tbh...
But god damn, he really got everything right. Anyone even vaguely familiar with the Algerian independence will know what an absolute nightmare it was politically for France, and what was different about Camus is that he had this weird almost Cassandra-like ability to predict the future to a pretty concerning degree, even while his contemporaries were trying to downplay the situation. He kept writing that France had to make a choice about Algeria, and France seemed perfectly content just kicking the can down the road over and over again. So eventually it blew up (sometimes literally), and I love love love Camus's attitude here, because it's basically just... "well, yeah... what did you *think* was gonna happen?" which only worked AT THE TIME and can NEVER be reasonably applied to ANY OTHER WORLD CONFLICT that is CURRENTLY HAPPENING 😃😃😃😃😃😃 colonialism is a THING OF THE PAST it does NOT exist anymore 😃😃😃😃
But god damn, he really got everything right. Anyone even vaguely familiar with the Algerian independence will know what an absolute nightmare it was politically for France, and what was different about Camus is that he had this weird almost Cassandra-like ability to predict the future to a pretty concerning degree, even while his contemporaries were trying to downplay the situation. He kept writing that France had to make a choice about Algeria, and France seemed perfectly content just kicking the can down the road over and over again. So eventually it blew up (sometimes literally), and I love love love Camus's attitude here, because it's basically just... "well, yeah... what did you *think* was gonna happen?" which only worked AT THE TIME and can NEVER be reasonably applied to ANY OTHER WORLD CONFLICT that is CURRENTLY HAPPENING 😃😃😃😃😃😃 colonialism is a THING OF THE PAST it does NOT exist anymore 😃😃😃😃
January 5, 2014
Clearly proves Camus' mastery of language and rhetoric. My favorite quotation, relating to both sides (French and Algerian) claiming victim status in Algeria: "What is the point of each side brandishing its victims against those of the other? All the dead belong to the same tragic family, whose members are now slitting one another's throats in the dead of night, the blind killing the blind without being able to see who they are." (pg 142).
July 12, 2013
A wonderful book with Camus's characteristically beautiful prose and searing logic. Even if his agenda for Algeria did not triumph in the end, there is much we can still learn from his analysis of the problem of the west's relationship with the Islamic world.
August 2, 2019
Camus is confident in his solutions for colonial Algeria and comes across as rather arrogant. But one can empathize with his passion for the country and his frustration with simplistic debates without adopting his conclusions.
April 30, 2022
Brilliant insight into both the evolution and constancy of Camus' views on Algeria. While noble in intent, many of his proposals fall flat and seem almost naïve in light of what we now know about Algeria's post-war history.
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