The myth of Sisyphus is a model essay to comfort people in those moods of bleak, existential despair that assail us all from time to time. The moral to emerge from this fable is a simple one - life in the post Nietzsche age, with no god, is absurd, there is no overarching meaning outside life itself, but there is still great nobility in fighting the good fight right to the death.

The best part comes for those readers who stick it out through the final appendix: Camus offers a stunning commentary of Kafka's work - the fate of his tragic protagonists in 'The Trial' and 'The Castle', viewed in light of the universal plight of mankind. Very telling is his addendum which acknowledges that he is not precluding aesthetic critiques of Kafka's work. Great art offers so much, yet resolves nothing. Like life.

The Myth of Sisyphus is a treatise on absurdism, and while absurdism is an admittedly interesting topic in its own right, Camus never convincingly demonstrates a connection between the absurd and the impulse to suicide.

The average man could care less about the limits of knowledge, the evasions of nature, and all of the other epistemological concerns that Camus manages to exalt to godlike stature in the concept of the absurd. He posits a sort of ethic in which we are expected to ignore the pointless nature of life, and continue to "play the game", because somehow this is in accordance with his absurd valuations:

"It is essential to die unreconciled and not of one's own free will. Suicide is a repudiation. The absurd man can only drain everything to the bitter end, and deplete himself. The absurd is his extreme tension, which he maintains constantly by solitary effort, for he knows that in that consciousness and in that day-to-day revolt he gives proof of his only truth, which is defiance."

As such, his conclusions are not conclusions as much as an attempt by Camus to impose his values on the reader -- I asked for enlightenment and instead Camus does the intellectual equivalent of taking me to the Church of the Absurd (TM).

In his many theoretical books, Albert Camus tries to answer a question that has bothered him: Whether a human life is worth taking?

In this particular book, he tries to answer the question for a special case - that of suicide.

'The Absrud dictates suicide' is one sentence that echoes throughout the book in various forms. Camus believes that it is the absurdity and meaninglessness of our lives that drives us to suicide.

He compares the absurdity to the myth of the greek hero Sisyphus who was condemned to roll a huge rock uphill for eternity. Camus proceeds to uncover the entire existential psychology of The Absurd, but concludes that one's own life is not worth taking.

He then proceed to demonstrate through a collection of anecdotal essays, how human beings can construct meaning from life. His other essays in the book do give a hint about how to find meaning in life, but may not be persuasive enough for someone too much in the dumps.

The logical connection between his analysis and conclusion is weak, but the analysis is brilliant. And for that reason alone, it is really worth reading.

In this book, Albert Camus speaks to us with much understanding and clarity about the unconscious cause and the rational basis of suicide, and the aspects of belief and atheism. I would say that how he justifies, or by which manner he justifies his atheism, is somewhat clearer or more "decent" (forgive the expression) than that of Nietzsche, Sartre or even Freud.

Here he lists down the different responses on the absurdity of existence, citing that of Kierkegaard and Kafka, among others, and thereafter he inserts his obvervations on their "leaping" acquiesence. In the appendix of the book, Camus blasted the "existentials" with eloquence: "They embrace the God that consumes them." After you read the book, and despite of its many cryptic epigrams, you will carry inside you the clarity of the author's honest reasoning.

And the accompanying essays? "Summer in Algiers" is one of the most beautiful writings by any man that I have ever read. Here is the voice of an indifferent, stammering god. "A hopelessly poignant thing," Nabokov would say.

The other essays in this collection are in same manner, lyrical, and are an essential part of the book as a whole.