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Neither
Victims Nor Executioners by Albert Camus
- published by Ourside
THIS beautifully designed re-release of French novelist Albert Camus'
famous plea for the repudiation of violence, originally published in 1946
in the French Resistance newspaper Combat and now re-published by Stroud
poets Jeff Cloves and Denis Gould, is a timely one.
At a time when violence is endemic whichever way one looks and the world
is quietly fearful of itself, it is immensely useful to be presented with
such a clear-eyed call for an understanding of what violence and murder
might actually mean to the people involved.
"Who can deny we live in a state of terror?" asks Camus. "We live in a
world of abstractions, of bureaus and machines, of absolute ideas and
crude messianism. We suffocate among people who think they are absolutely
right, whether in their machines or their ideas."
The crux of Camus' argument is not that violence should be eradicated but
that it should not be legitimised: he is hopeful for humanity, but not
foolishly or over-confidently so. He ends by stating: "I have always held
that, if he who bases his hopes on human nature is a fool, he who gives up
in the face of circumstances is a coward. And henceforth, the only
honourable course will be to stake everything on a formidable gamble: that
words are more powerful than munitions."
These are indeed powerful words and this pamphlet is perfect reading for
anyone, of any political persuasion, who believes in peace.
© Adam
Horovitz
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