Camus' Heroes And Heroism

Albert Camus (1913-1960) is an influential French writer in mid. 20^th century enjoying the same reputation as Sartre. Focusing on creation of novels and dramas, his literary works have been generating profound yet extensive influence in the world, though not so many. Since Mr. Wu Dayuan introduced Camus together with his works into China for first time in June 1947, academic study on Camus has become hotter and hotter. In collecting relevant materials, the author found that though domestic study on Camus is fruitful, most of them focus on introducing Camus's life, thoughts and interpreting his individual works in the direction of existentialism, and lack of comprehensive understanding and collective consideration. Different from study from the aforesaid two common directions, this article studies Mersault in The Stranger, Rier in The Plague and Jean-Baptiste Clamence in The Fall, the three masterpieces of Camus, from the direction of "tragic hero" in a collective way, therefore highlighting their characteristics as tragic heroes, concluding the similarities and differences of the three heroes and delineating Camus' ideological evolvement, that is, the development of Camus's humanitarianism."Tragic hero" is the main thread that passes through this article. In the first part, the article defines and interprets the meanings of tragic hero. In the second part, collective yet individual analysis is conducted towards the three masterpieces, which is more than simple informative introduction or specific textual interpretation. In the third part, on the basis of these, comparison is made between the three heroes of Camus' and the heroes of another two French existentialists Andre Malraux and Jean-Paul Sartre, through which Camus' writing characteristics and ideological particulars are further highlighted and the position and value orientation of the three figures under the flag of existentialism are revealed. With the above analysis, we can finally reach an in-depth yet comprehensive understanding on Camus' novel creation and his tragic humanitarianism.