The most interesting part of the book to me was the very end, the conversation with the priest. Interestingly, he didn’t notice the difference between his past ‘free’ life and his current ‘unfree’ one. But the prison guard helpfully informs him that he is being ‘punished’ and the manifestation of that punishment is the removal of his ‘freedom’. He needs this explained to him – because life up until then had been about ‘getting used to things’ and one can 'get used to just about anything'. The main point of the book to me is when he realises he is no longer ‘free’. Let’s face it, he is only guilty of having murdered an Arab, and as we have daily evidence, Westerners can murder Arabs with complete impunity. The Priest who comes to him at the end is actually quite certain that he will be freed. In fact, this is not the case – he ends up at the point in his life where he has no idea if he will be freed or not. I had gotten the distinct impression from all of my previous discussions about this book that the guy ends up dead. I’m a little more upset about this one than some of the others, as I’ve been told about this one before, repeatedly, and by people I’d have taken as ‘reputable sources’ – although, frankly, how well one should trust one’s ex-wife in such matters is moot. And given I’ve called this a ‘constant’ theme then you might think I would be less than surprised when a read a new ‘classic’ and it turns out to be completely different to my expectations. I wasn’t in the least bit bored.Ī constant theme in my life at present is that I read ‘classics’ expecting them to be about something and they end up being about something completely different.
I’d always been told it was a ponderous philosophical text – and so, to be honest, I was expecting to be bored out of my skull. I really hadn’t expected this book to be nearly so funny as it turned out. Okay, so it is black humour, but Camus was more or less French – so black humour is more or less obligatory. I particularly liked the man who kept falling behind in the march to the cemetery and would take short cuts. My opinion of the book began to change at his mother’s funeral. He is a man who lives entirely in the present, how terribly Buddhist of him – although, really there doesn’t seem to be all that much to him. It didn’t really get off to the raciest of starts and the character's voice – it is told in first person – was a bit dull. At first I didn’t think I was going to enjoy it. A case where someone does not react in a way that is considered to be ‘socially appropriate’ and is therefore condemned.īut after 30 years of avoiding reading this book I have finally relented and read it. Later I was told that this book was a story about something much like the Azaria Chamberlain case. In high school friends (one of them even became my ex-wife) told me it was a great book about a man condemned to die because he was an outsider. I have done that because for the last thirty years I have known exactly what this book is about and there just didn’t seem any point in reading it. Now, that is what is called a segue, from the Italian ‘seguire’ – to follow.įor the last thirty years I have studiously avoided reading this book. Then I look back and it turns out that that I’ve given four stars to Of Human Bondage and honestly, how could I possibly have thought it was a good idea to give that book less than five stars? It is the absurdity of human conventions that has us doing such things. I give stars to books and then I think, ‘god, you give five stars to everything, people will think you are terribly undiscriminating’ – so then I give four stars or even three stars to some books.
Then I look back and it turns out that that I’ve given four stars to Of Human Bondage and honestly, how could I possibly have thought it was a good idea to give that book less than five stars? It is the absurdity of human conventions that has us doing s I don’t know what to do with these stars anymore. I don’t know what to do with these stars anymore.