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  • Essay / The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus: an allegory of the human condition

    There are many reasons why the story of “The Myth of Sisyphus” is important to Albert Camus, on the one hand, it is an allegory of what it means to be human. Camus skilfully dissects the existence of Sisyphus and connects it absurdly to three final consequences of human life; freedom, revolt and passion. The story of Sisyphus is the epitome of the human condition and the fact that human beings cannot escape the condemnation of pointless work. Sisyphus is crowned absurd hero of Camus's story, a title not to be taken lightly. Sisyphus lived his entire life rebelling against death and was fiercely passionate about life, he always chose to fight for life. This passion, this revolt and this freedom are precisely why he was punished for his passions. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”? Get an original essay The absurd is a theme around which much of Albert Camus' work revolves. The absurd is described as the gap between oneself and one's senses, what one thinks one is, and the resistance of the world to human efforts. Camus wrote that “the world escapes us because it becomes itself again. This stage decor masked by habit becomes again what it is.” Camus talks here about the primitive hostility of the world, how dense and strange it is. The absurd is the awareness that the world exists independently of the meaning we try to give it. Camus wrote about routine and waking up: “Getting up, tram, four hours at the office or factory, meal, tram, four hours of work, meal, sleep, and Monday, Tuesday... According to the same rhythm – this path is easily followed… but one day the “why” emerges and it all begins in this weariness tinged with astonishment.” Here, Camus explains that we can only become conscious by asking ourselves "why" we do what we do, usually this happens when we are unhappy, Camus often expresses in "The Myth of Sisyphus" that the experience human is not easy. . Camus further explains that habits conceal the dark nature of the world, where the world may appear to serve our purposes, but the world actually has nothing to do with our purposes, desires, or interests. “Because if I try to take hold of this self of which I am sure, if I try to define it and summarize it, it is only water that slips through my fingers. » Basically, the world resists any attempt at appropriation. The absurd also involves the knowledge and understanding one has. In the grand scheme of things, we cannot understand each other and our actions mean nothing. Camus says that ultimately we know very little and that what we know falls short of what we actually want: "Yet all the knowledge on earth will give me nothing to assure me that this world is mine.” the concept of the absurd and the existence of Sisyphus, one must know a brief summary of the story of Sisyphus. The myth of Sisyphus tells how Sisyphus became the "useless worker of the underworld" tasked with rolling a boulder to the top of a mountain, just to watch it roll back down and repeat the task for all eternity. Sisyphus had a long list of misdeeds he had committed against the gods, from "stealing their secrets", to "putting death in chains", and finally tricking Pluto into allowing him to return to earth from where he quickly runs away to live by the sea and enjoy the “smiles of the earth”. These actions made Sisyphus the absurd hero. Camus wrote that “Sisyphus is the absurd hero, as much by his passions as by his tortures. His contempt for the gods, his hatred of death and his passion for life.