The Fall by Albert Camus

Albert Camus wrote this philosophical novel in which Clamence, a judge-penitent , narrates his story to a drinking buddy in a seedy bar in Amsterdam (or the reader). Clamence used to live the high life and has a "weakness for the subjunctive mood and fine speech in general."
Clamence had "this satisfaction of being right" and on being on the right side of the law, and he felt good, liking heights to look down and around at people.


There are many reviews on the internet,and I like this one which says that the book can be interpreted anyway you want since there is no real authority to interpret the book.



Clamence had his moral crises, and his justification for the way he handles those crises. There is a lot of Christian allegory. Clamence becomes cynical from being once passionate in what he believed in.

I laughed as I read the book, there is much to quote.. "True debauchery is liberating because it creates no obligations. In it you possess only yourself; hence it remains the favorite pastime of the great lovers of their own person" and I thought of the pile of chocolate ice cream on chocolate cake that I indulged last week, no obligations. The witty narrative pokes fun in the bubble of self righteousness and I thought of the people who keep telling me that I am always so right, and as the lady who said last week, she likes my letters because I 'object to so many things'..

A woman asked me last night if i judged people who drank.. do I think they are evil, many have asked because in my anti-alcohol tirades I seem to do as some of the pastors do. I do not like being around people, including those I love, when they are drinking. But then, some of them condemn infidelity as I do, and I have been in an infidel in days when emotions overtook reason .

It is interesting, in the discussion to get parents and teachers to stop beating children, how the people who beat children want to negotiate that they not be seen as 'evil wrongdoers' before they change their behaviour. A woman who thinks that homosexuals are sinners does not want to be called homophobic.  Clamence says it is interesting how many people have committed murder because they were right!

Clamence says "the more I accuse myself, the more I have a right to judge myself" and I think of the "friend" who felt that my apologies were insults and that his granting of forgiveness was somehow going to make me feel more powerful..

It is complex, these human interactions. How then are we supposed to progress? Is it possible to criticise without seeming to be from 'above'? Or do we just shut up and accept everything?