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Pastimes : The Literary Sauna (or Tomes in Towels) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Rambi who wrote (220)	7/17/2001 4:20:11 PM
From: Win Smith	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 466

Ok, I had to go look up that post, #reply-16054671 . I think saying "good and bad deeds are equally without meaning" is a little hard to parse in the context of the rest of that article. Maybe it needs to be read strictly in contrast to the preceding statement, "Where the Bible promises an afterlife where good deeds go rewarded and bad deeds are punished". And the following: "To Meursault, this world is all that exists; therefore every moment must be savored." Each moment has its meaning, in its very existence. Relying on an alleged externally imposed order to make sense of it all is where Meursault differs. As a theological aside, I'm not sure that Jews believe in an afterlife, and as there's a certain school of thought that holds that Jesus thought of himself as a Jew, it's possible Jesus didn't either. But that's another story.. Or, as Camus put it in the more explicitly philosophical "Myth of Sisyphus": I leave Sisyphus at the foot of the mountain! One always finds one's burden again. But Sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks. He too concludes that all is well. This universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile. Each atom of that stone, each mineral flake of that night filled mountain, in itself forms a world. The strugg le itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy. ( stripe.colorado.edu ) To put it, um, simplistically, I think what's being said here is that the meaning is in the journey, not the destination. It's all we've got, for sure. You brought up Hemingway elsewhere; I think Camus bears more than a stylistic similarity.. Personally, philosophical existentialism is somewhat beyond me, Kierkegaard is a bit too much the other melancholy Dane. The literary existentialism of Camus and Hemingway has some emotional appeal, though.