10 Philosophy Books For Your Perusal (Part 2)

Ok...so Adam Smith was the first post in the series. That was back in February. I've been a little bit busy. Got a new job, moved to a new state. That kind of stuff. The rest of this list will not take quite as long to arrive on my page. Promise. So, without anymore delay, here is #2:

Albert Camus - The Rebel

“What is a rebel? A man who says no, but whose refusal does not imply a renunciation. He is also a man who says yes, from the moment he makes his first gesture of rebellion.”

So begins Albert Camus’ essay The Rebel. What does it mean to be a rebel? Is rebellion merely a rejection, a renunciation? Not according to Camus. A rebel is a person who affirms the existence of a line that he will not cross. In doing so, this person also affirms his life and existence, that his personal existence has some positive value. The twentieth century was proving that history is a slaughter-bench, drenched with disease, injustice, and especially man-made death. One of Camus' points in The Rebel is to demonstrate the existential problems of man cannot be assuaged by political solutions. The Rebel offers an analysis of how, after 150 years of nihilism, metaphysical revolt has given way to state sponsored terror.

When we rebel, it is because we have decided that a human society has some unquestionable value. Camus emphasized that such defiance is and should be fundamentally social and communal. Life is fundamentally lived with others. Absurdity enters existence not simply because one's private needs go unmet, but because so many conditions exist that destroy family and friends, waste our shared experience, and rob human relationships of significance. The rebel is triggered by individual suffering and the suppression of another: “I revolt, therefore we are.”

The Rebel is Camus’ best, most sustained philosophical work. In it he insists the rebellious and protesting man is what is best in him, not the docile and quiescent. Camus explains how, in both philosophy and politics, the reigning attitude of individualistic nihilism leads to dictatorship (fascism and/or communism). Camus systematically strips bare those who have used Hegel, Nietzsche, Marx, de Sade, et al as justification for abuse of power. It is a book that should be read by people who wish to see the inborn impulse of rebellion inspired by a new spirit of action—by those who understand "that rebellion cannot exist without a strange form of love." 


We will get to stange forms of love when we get to the next book on the list. Kierkiegaard's Purity of Heart Is to Will One Thing.