In Greek Mythology, Sisyphus was a king punished by the gods to push a large rock up a mountain, only to have it roll back down to the bottom, for eternity. The punishment is thought the direst of fates in the myth. But Camus applies this idea to each of us, considering its embrace the happiest of human decisions. What is any of us doing, really, but our best to push our rock up the mountain?

From The Myth of Sisyphus (Camus):

"There is but one truly serious philosophical problem and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. All the rest--whether or not the world has three dimensions, whether the mind has nine or twelve categories--comes afterwards. These are games."

"Great feelings take with them their own universe."

"If I try to seize this self of which I feel sure, if I try to define and to summarize it, it is nothing but water slipping through my fingers."

"At this point of his effort man stands face to face with the irrational. He feels within him his longing for happiness and for reason. The absurd is born of this confrontation between the human need and the unreasonable silence of the world."

"I don’t know whether this world has a meaning that transcends it. But I know that I cannot know that meaning and that it is impossible for me just now to know it."

"I have seen people behave badly with great morality and I note every day that integrity has no need of rules."

"All systems of morality are based on the idea that an action has consequences that legitimize or cancel it. A mind imbued with the absurd merely judges that those consequences must be considered calmly."

"If the world were clear, art would not exist."

"Without culture, and the relative freedom it implies, society, even when perfect, is but a jungle. This is why any authentic creation is a gift to the future."

"The struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy."



Quotes appropriated from here

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