MDC 102: Making of the Modern Mind II: Albert Camus

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Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Algerian-French writer and Existentialist philosopher Albert Camus.

Online chat with William Chafe, Alice Mary Baldwin Professor of History, and Frank Stasio, Host of the "State of Things". Filmed 2/8/2011.

Far from embracing the existentialism he is often associated with, Albert Camus was a social activist and staunch believer in the positive potential of the human race. In this program, excerpts from private film archives and a variety of interviews document Camus’ career as a journalist concerned with social justice. From his early years in Algeria writing about poverty and oppression to the underground newspaper he edited for the French Resistance, the video reveals how Camus’ journalism informed the themes and style of The Stranger, The Plague, and The Myth of Sisyphus. Not available in French-speaking Canada. (Portions with English subtitles, 52 minutes)

This program shows the uprising which succeeded in throwing out the French from the point of view of an Algerian Arab, showing the conditions and following the thought processes and the steps that led to insurrection, and the revolt itself. The words are those of the colonized North Africans—the man in the street as well as the intellectual and politician—and of such radical theoreticians of revolt as Franz Fanon. (14 minutes, b&w/color)