Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
A condemned man’s disinterest in anything but life shows that death and the absurd create true freedom.
In plain terms
Facing death makes a person free from everything but living.
What can you take from it?
Awareness of death brings freedom.

Where it applies

  • end of life
  • crisis
  • philosophical reflection

Putting it to work

  • meditation
  • writing
  • therapy

Questions to consider

  • Does death free you?
  • What matters most?

Another view

Not everyone feels free facing death.

More from Albert Camus

  1. The current motto for all of us can only be this: without giving up anything on the plane of justice, yield nothing on the plane of freedom.

    Permalink to quote #195
  2. The doctrines of evolution and the notions of selection that accompany them have made of the future of society a final end. The political utopias that were gra…

    Permalink to quote #197
  3. The contrary of a civilized nation is a creative nation.

    Permalink to quote #194

Related quotes

  1. 'My field,' said Goethe, 'is time.' That is indeed the absurd speech. What, in fact, is the Absurd Man? He who, without negating it, does nothing for the etern…

    Albert CamusAlbert Camus quote #41
  2. Outside of that single fatality of death, everything, joy or happiness, is liberty.

    Albert CamusAlbert Camus quote #54
  3. Give me my freedom for as long as I be All I ask of livin' is to have no chains on me All I ask of livin' is to have no chains on me And all I ask of dyin' is …

    Laura NyroLaura Nyro quote #3