Love is very important in The First Man, in that [Albert] Camus loves these things he never chose, he loves his childhood experience in a very real way. Their poverty meant that there was nothing else they could think about but what they would eat, how they would clothe themselves. There's just no room for other things in his family. It's difficult for others to imagine the position in which he found himself. There is no imaginary existence in their lives.
Catherine CamusThere are those who will find [Albert Camus] notions about absurdity appealing, and others who will be drawn by the solar side of his work, about Algeria, the heat and so on.
Catherine CamusJust after the war, the liberation of 1945, [Albert] Camus was well known, well loved by [Jean-Paul ] Sartre and all the intellectuals of that generation.
Catherine CamusWhat the articles which have been written about The First Man propose is humility. The acceptance of these contradictions. Seeking an explanation is death. The lie is death in [Albert] Camus. That's why in Camus' play The Misunderstood the son dies, killed by his sister and his mother, because he lied. He never told them who he was. They killed him because they didn't recognise him.
Catherine Camus[French intellectuals] could never address themselves to the working classes. They don't know what it means, and that gives them a bad conscience about it. [Albert] Camus has a greater proximity to those in poverty.
Catherine Camus