Camus Sisyphus Quotes & Sayings

Grace, you can accept my secrets, my horrors and my friendship but not a simple dress? Robert asked, hearing my thoughts. - Falling From Grace — S.L. Naeole

In "The Myth of Sisyphus", his most important non-fiction work, Albert Camus suggested that if we believed what most people claim to be the purpose of life, we would feel compelled to commit suicide. If, however, we accept that life has no purpose we would be inclined to soldier on in a cussed, stoical manner like Sisyphus, endlessly pushing his rock up a hill only to see it roll down again. — Philip French

My mother says I didn't open my eyes for eight days after I was born, but when I did, the first thing I saw was an engagement ring. I was hooked. — Elizabeth Taylor

Outside of that single fatality of death, everything, joy or happiness, is liberty. — Albert Camus

How strange that in his dread of death, it pumped all the harder, — J.K. Rowling

The thing about having a very young mother who had you at 20 is that you expect that you're going to be old ladies together. — Julianne Moore

You don't always talk with your mouth. Sometimes what you say with your mouth hardly matters at all. You have to signify — Stephen King

The Myth of Sisyphus makes us wonder if we too are like the ones who are so distracted making friends with important people, staying on top of the latest technology, getting good marks in school, and making lots of money, that we never pause to think:

What are we actually living for?

Sisyphus ended up opening his heart to questions of meaning, value and purpose. He himself decided it was best to just make the most of his short time on earth, however meaningless it all may be. Through Sisyphus, Camus is telling us that life is a joke, and the courageous ones will accept that and have a laugh along the way. I know many movies released these days that operate under the same premise. — Jon Morrison

There is only one kind of failure I cannot tolerate: the failure to risk failure. — Richard Marcinko

Interpretation is a task that we repeatedly have to take up and start again from the beginning, Sisyphus-like. But, as Camus said, we must always imagine Sisyphus happy, and this is not so difficult when it's a matter of texts that reveal important truths about being human. — George Pattison

She described how Camus's aphorism "One must imagine Sisyphus happy" helps her fight back against unproductive feelings of meaninglessness.
If we consider, like Camus, Sisyphus at the foot of his mountain, we can see that he is smiling. He is content in his task of defying the Gods, the journey more important than the goal. To achieve a beginning, a middle, an end, a meaning to the chaos of creation - that's more than any deity seems to manage: But it's what writers do. So I tidy the desk, even polish it up a bit, stick some flowers in a vase and start.
As I begin a novel I remind myself as ever of Camus's admonition that the purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself. And even while thinking, well, fat chance! I find courage, reach for the heights, and if the rock keeps rolling down again so it does. What the hell, start again. Rewrite. Be of good cheer. Smile on, Sisyphus! — Fay Weldon

There is but one truly philosophical problem, and that is suicide," the text began. I winced. "Whether or not the world has three dimensions or the mind nine or twelve categories," it continued, "comes afterward"; such questions, the text explained, were part of the game humanity played, but they deserved attention only after the one true issue had been settled. The book was The Myth of Sisyphus and was written by the Algerian-born philosopher and Nobel laureate Albert Camus. After a moment, the iciness of his words melted under the light of comprehension. Yes, of course, I thought. You can ponder this or analyze that till the cows come home, but the real question is whether all your ponderings and analyses will convince you that life is worth living. That's what it all comes down to. Everything else is detail. — Brian Greene

The loves we share with a city are often secret loves. — Albert Camus

The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy. — Albert Camus

The gods had condemned Sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain, whence the stone would fall back of its own weight. They had thought with some reason that there is no more dreadful punishment than futile and hopeless labor. — Albert Camus

One must imagine Sisyphus happy. — Albert Camus

If there is a personal fate, there is no higher destiny or at least there is but one which he concludes is inevitable and despicable. For the rest, he knows himself to be the master of his days. At that subtle moment when man glances backward over his life, Sisyphus returning towards his rock, in that slight pivoting, he contemplates that series of unrelated actions which becomes his fate, created by him, combined under his memory's eye and soon sealed by his death. — Albert Camus

If it were sufficent to love, things would be too easy. — Albert Camus

Thinking is learning all over again how to see, directing one's consciousness, making of every image a privileged place. — Albert Camus

Where would his torture be, indeed, if at every step the hope of succeeding upheld him? — Albert Camus

I had always been scrupulously careful to avoid the smallest suggestion of infant indoctrination, which I think is ultimately responsible for much of the evil in the world. Others, less close to her, showed no such scruples, which upset me, as I very much wanted her, as I want all children, to make up her own mind freely when she became old enough to do so. I would encourage her to think, without telling her what to think. — Richard Dawkins

How far is one to go to elude nothing? Is one to die voluntarily or to hope in spite of everything? — Albert Camus

Camus believes that in rejecting hope, rather than despair, the individual becomes that much closer to being free. It's in the acceptance of the futility of our actions online, even though they may provide both cause (validation, recognition) and value (enriching life via apps, etc.) there will be no change. Activity will continue. Inevitably, our relevancy or level of activity will falter, and eventually change. Camus uses the inevitability of death as cause and reason to eliminate hope. To eliminate hope lets the individual experience fully, without reservation and restriction, the life at hand. I could say the same about our modern condition. — Michael J. Seidlinger

I like Brando's acting ... and James Dean ... and Richard Widmark. Quite a few of 'em I like. — Elvis Presley

The struggle to reach the top is itself enough to fulfill the heart of man. One must believe that Sisyphus is happy. — Albert Camus

It is a matter of living in that state of the absurd I know on what it is founded, this mind and this world straining against each other without being able to embrace each other. I ask for the rule - of life of that state, and what I am offered neglects its basis,
negates one of the terms of the painful opposition, demands of me a resignation. I ask what is involved in the condition I recognize as mine; I know it implies obscurity and ignorance; and I am assured that this ignorance explains everything and that this darkness is my
light. — Albert Camus

There is no longer a single idea explaining everything, but an infinite number of essences giving a meaning to an infinite number of objects. The world comes to a stop, but also lights up. — Albert Camus

What I believe to be true I must therefore preserve. What seems to me so obvious, even against me, I must support. — Albert Camus