Albert Camus: Rebellion Against the Absurd, existentialism and Albert Camus, the Realm of Existentialism at DividingLine.com

From this point on, Camus was concerned mainly with exploring avenues of rebellion against the absurd as he strove to create something like a humane stoicism. The Plague (1947; Eng. trans., 1948) is a symbolic novel in which the important achievement of those who fight bubonic plague in Oran lies not in the little success they have but in their assertion of human dignity and endurance. In the controversial essay The Rebel (1951; Eng. trans., 1954), he criticized what he regarded as the deceptive doctrines of "absolutist" philosophies--the vertical (eternal) transcendence of Christianity and the horizontal (historical) transcendence of Marxism. He argued in favor of Mediterranean humanism, advocating nature and moderation rather than historicism and violence. He subsequently became involved in a bitter controversy with Jean Paul Sartre over the issues raised in this essay.

Camus wrote two overtly political plays, the satirical State of Siege (1948; Eng. trans., 1958) and The Just Assassins (1950; Eng. trans., 1958). It can be argued, however, that Camus scored his major theatrical success with stage adaptations of such novels as William Faulkner's Requiem for a Nun (1956) and Dostoyevsky's The Possessed (1959). He also published a third novel, The Fall (1956; Eng. trans., 1957), which some critics read as a flirtation with Christian ideas, and a collection of short stories noteworthy for their technical virtuosity, Exile and the Kingdom (1957; Eng. trans., 1958). Posthumous publications include two sets of Notebooks covering the period 1935-51, an early novel, A Happy Death (1971; Eng. trans., 1972), and a collection of essays, Youthful Writings (1973; Eng. trans., 1976 and 1977) --by John Cruickshank