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Existentialism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 1

Existentialism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 1

Existentialism - Essay Example If the tragic hero Oedipus could assert in his conscious pain that "all is well", Camus's concept of 'Sisyphus Happy' must be accurate because, it is true that "there is no fate that cannot be surmounted by scorn" (121). Camus enumerates the passions that define Sisyphus-"his scorn of the gods, his hatred of death and his passion for life." These have gained him the most unspeakable of penalties in which he has to strive with all his heart and might to accomplish nothing. But exerting oneself to accomplish nothing is a classic example of negation, and Sisyphus must have seen that adding the emotion of joy to his labors would be the best way of negating the gods-admittedly, one of his prime interests. Therefore, when Camus says that Sisyphus, the 'proletarian of the gods' is Sisyphus Happy-the statement is irrefutable. For Sisyphus was said to have been the wisest of mortals. Camus reminds us that the fate of modern man in the modern workplace, working every day at the same tasks, is no less absurd than that of Sisyphus.

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