The happy death

This article is about the novel by Albert Camus. For the television thriller of the same name from 2008, see Tatort: ​​The happy death .

The happy death (French: La mort heureuse ) is the first novel by the French writer and philosopher Albert Camus . The existentialist work deals with the human “will to happiness”, the conscious pursuit of one's own happiness, the money and the time that are required for it. The book is based on the author's memories of his own wage work for a port commission in Algeria , his suffering from tuberculosis and his travels in Europe.

Camus compiled and revised the novel between 1936 and 1938, but decided not to publish it. However, it served him as a quarry for the successful novel Der Fremde ( L'Étranger ) from 1942. For example, the main character in La mort heureuse is called "Patrice Mersault", in L'Étranger "Meursault". La mort heureuse was finally published in 1971, over ten years after Camus' death.

content

The novel has about 120 pages and is divided into two main parts.

The first part, Natural Death , describes in a flashback the monotonous and unfulfilled life of the main character, Patrice Mersault , his boring office work and his meaningless relationship. The decisive turning point in Mersault's life is his acquaintance with the rich invalid Roland Zagreus , who gives him the idea of ​​a way out. With the killing of Zagreus, disguised as a suicide, with which the novel begins, Mersault appropriates his money in order to make his fortune. The murder is not recognized as such and Mersault begins his journey through Europe soon after.

The second part, The Conscious Death , describes this train journey through Europe, at the end of which Mersault returns unsatisfied to Algeria. There he initially lives with three young women in a house high above the sea. Furthermore, personal happiness is a central goal for all actors. For Mersault this means going into a kind of "controlled solitude" after a while. He marries the attractive Lucienne , whom he does not love, buys a house in a village by the sea and moves in there alone. He only maintains contact with other people, such as Lucienne, when he needs him. After a short, serious illness, Mersault finally dies a happy death: "And a stone between stones, in the joy of his heart he returned to the truth of the immovable worlds."

expenditure

• La mort heureuse , Gallimard, Paris, 1971.
• The happy death , from the French by Eva Rechel-Mertens , Rowohlt, Reinbek bei Hamburg, 1983, ISBN 978-3-499-22196-5 .

Web links

• Reading report by Anatole Broyard , The New York Times , June 13, 1972
• Notes on A Happy Death by Bob Corbett