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Albert Camus Facts

Albert Camus Facts
Albert Camus was an Algerian-born, French author and Nobel Prize winner who contributed greatly to the absurdism philosophy, which states that finding inherent meanng is life is impossible. He was born Albert Camus on November 7th, 1913, to Lucien, an agricultural worker, and his mother, a house cleaner. His father died a year after Albert was born in the Battle of the Marne during World War I. Albert went on to study at the University of Algiers' philosophy school. In 1930 he contracted tuberculosis and was forced to quit the Algerian University's football team for which he had been a goalkeeper. His tuberculosis also caused him to be rejected by the French army. His first book L'Envers et L'endroit was published in 1937. It was a collection of essays.
Interesting Albert Camus Facts:
Albert Camus married Simone Hié, but they divorced in 1936.
Albert Camus founded the Worker's Theatre (Théâtre du Travail) in 1935, which lasted until 1939.
Albert Camus wrote for the Alger-Républicain, a socialist paper, from 1937 to 1939.
Albert Camus wrote for the paper Soir-Republicain from 1939 to 1940.
Albert Camus married Francine Faure in 1940. She was a mathematician and pianist. They had twins Jean and Catherine in 1945.
Albert Camus began working for the magazine Paris-Soir in 1940. When the magazine moved to Bordeaux in 1941, following the Wehrmacht occupation of Paris, Albert followed.
In 1941 Albert Camus finished his first novel titled The Stranger, and the non-fiction book The Myth of Sisyphus. The Stranger was published in 1942, and The Myth of Sisyphus was published in 1942 as well.
Albert Camus founded the French Committee for the European Federation in 1944. Its first conference was held in 1945 and those in attendance included Albert Camus, George Orwell, Lewis Mumford, Daniel Mayer and other important people at the time. In 1957 the movement disbanded as Winston Churchill's ideas had come to dominate.
During World War II Albert Camus joined the French Resistance, in the cell called Combat. They published a newspaper called Combat, and Albert Camus was known as Beauchard in the group. Albert became the editor in 1943, and quit in 1947 when the paper became commercial.
In 1949 Albert Camus' tuberculosis relapsed and he spent the next two years in seclusion, writing.
Albert Camus wrote several novels including The Stranger (1942), The Plague (1947), The Fall (1956), A Happy Death (written in 1936 to 1938 but published in 1971), and The First Man (incomplete and published in 1995).
Albert Camus wrote several non-fiction books, short stories, plays, and essays, which were published during his lifetime and after his death.
Albert Camus won the Nobel Prize in Literature when he was 44. He was the second youngest recipient. Rudyard Kipling had won it at the age of 42.
Albert Camus was only 46 when he died in a car accident near Sens, in Villeblevin, France. His publisher and friend Michel Gallimard also died in the accident. Albert had an unused train ticket in his pocket. He had chosen to ride with Michel at the last minute.


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