An intellectual? Yes. And never deny it. An intellectual is someone whose mind watches itself. I like this, because I am happy to be both halves, the watcher and the watched. "Can they be brought together?" This is a practical question. We must get down to it. "I despise intelligence" really means: "I cannot bear my doubts.

— Albert Camus

An intense feeling carries with it its own universe magnificent or wretched as the case may be.

— Albert Camus

A novel is never anything but a philosophy expressed in images. And in a good novel the philosophy has disappeared into the images.

— Albert Camus

A novel is never anything but a philosophy put into images.

— Albert Camus

Any country where I am not bored is a country that teaches me nothing.

— Albert Camus

As a remedy to life in society I would suggest the big city. Nowadays, it is the only desert within our means.

— Albert Camus

As a remedy to life in society I would suggest the big city. Nowadays, it is the only desert within our reach.

— Albert Camus

As he himself said, "I will prove it to you, gentlemen, and I will prove it in two ways. First in the blinding clarity of the facts, and second, in the dim light cast by the mind of his criminal soul.

— Albert Camus

As if that blind rage had washed me clean, rid me of hope; for the first time, in that night alive with signs and stars, I opened myself to the gentle indifference of the world. Finding it so much like myself—so like a brother, really—I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again. For everything to be consummated, for me to feel less alone, I had only to wish that there be a large crowd of spectators the day of my execution and that they greet me with cries of hate.

— Albert Camus

As if this great outburst of anger had purged all my ills, killed all my hopes, I looked up at the mass of signs and stars in the night sky and laid myself open for the first time to the benign indifference of the world- and finding it so much like myself, in fact so fraternal, I realized that I’d been happy, and that I was still happy. For the final consummation and for me to feel less lonely, my last wish was that there should be a crowd of spectators at my execution and that they should greet me with cries of hatred.

— Albert Camus