La Chute et L'Etat de Siege

David Carroll, in speaking about La Chute, picks up on the possibly semi-autobiographical nature of the novel. He says that Camus, by the time he had written La Chute had lost his authority as a dissenting political force, and recognised himself as having fallen. It might be interesting to perhaps tease out which parts of Jean-Baptiste's character we can see in Camus, and the extent to which we think that the novel may be autobiographical. It might also be interesting to look at the way in which Camus adopts the form of Notes from Underground to his own novel, the reasons for using this form, and his manipulation of it.

The allegory in l’Etat de Siege is so clear and two-dimensional that one often finds oneself wondering whether it might have just been more effective (or less cheesy at least) if Camus had cast off the allegorical naming of characters, a technique which detracts from artistic value and seems an insult to our intellect as discerning readers/viewers. Surely a great work of literature is multilateral and leaves space for deeper interpretation? L'Etat de Siege fails on this basic level, and seems comparatively anaemic. What surprises me about L’Etat de Siege is (and maybe this could be something to discuss) how morally reducible it is. From an author capable of a text as (arguably) morally irreducible as L’Etranger, L’Etat de Siege just seems silly and one dimensional. The idea of ‘complete good vs. complete evil’ is an idea I thought Camus would have disagreed with, given his Nietzschean influence, and given his opinions on the death penalty, (where he makes a point of condemning it from the perspective that there is always some humanity in an ‘evil’ act - another idea which is distinctly Nietzschean). Maybe I’m not sure what Camus is trying to get at. Pretty much the whole of mainland Europe knew about the dangers of totalitarianism, from Franco, to Mussolini, to Stalin, to Hitler, so why does Camus tell his audience what they already know, and in such black and white terms...?

p.s. If I can find that quote from David Carroll I'll add it onto this post as a comment.