Helen's Exile

After an early start to the day and to the month of October, we sat down with one of the essays of Albert Camus, "Helen's Exile". It was a lovely, melancholic and reflective way to start to a grey rainy day, and Camus' literary flair is always awe inspiring. We picked out a few of our favourite quotes, some which can make confronting current events feel less lonely, and some of which speak to some of the reflections posted on Comma Directory recently.

"Our Europe, on the other hand, off in the pursuit of totality is the child of disproportion."

"In her madness she extends the eternal limits, and at that very moment dark Erinyes fall upon her and tear her to pieces. Nemesis, the goddess of measure and not of revenge, keeps watch. All those who overstep the limit are pitilessly punished by her."

"In a drunken sky we light up the suns we want. But nonetheless the boundaries exist, and we know it."

"In our wildest aberrations we dream of an equilibrium we have left behind, which we naively expect to find at the end of our errors."

"We, too, have conquered, moved boundaries, mastered heaven and earth. Our reason has driven all away. Alone at last, we end up by ruling over a desert."

"Whereas the Greeks gave to will the boundaries of reason, we have come to put the will's impulse in the very centre of reason, which has, as a result, become deadly."

"Nature is still there, however. She contrasts her calm skies and her reasons with the madness of men. Until the atom too catches fire and history ends in the triumph of reason and the agony of the species."

"But the Greeks never said that the limit could not be overstepped. They said it existed and that whoever dared to exceed it was mercilessly struck down. Nothing in present history can contradict them."

"The historical spirit and the artist both want to remake the world. But the artist, through an obligation of his nature, knows his limits, which the historical spirit fails to recognise. This is why the latter's aim is tyranny whereas the former's passion is freedom."

"[Our era] wants to transfigure the world before having exhausted it, to set it to rights before having understood it."

"Whatever it may say, our era is deserting this world."

"Yet what a temptation, at certain moments, to turn one's back on this bleak, fleshless world! But this time is ours, and we cannot live hating ourselves."

"Admission of ignorance, rejection of fanaticism, the limits of the world and of man, the beloved face, and finally beauty—this is where we shall be on the side of the Greeks."

- Andrea & Marc