Albert Camus - Lyrical and Critical Essays

The Wrong Side
And The Right Side
A Short Guide
to Towns
Without a Past
TWO YEARS ago, I knew an old woman. She was suffering from an
illness that had almost killed her. The whole of her right side had
been paralyzed. Only half of her was in this world while the other was
already foreign to her. This bustling, chattering old lady had been
reduced to silence and immobility. Alone day after day, illiterate, not
very sensitive, her whole life was reduced to God. She believed in
him. The proof is that she had a rosary, a lead statue of Christ, and a
stucco statue of Saint Joseph carrying the infant Jesus. She doubted
her illness was incurable, but said it was so that people would pay
attention to her. For everything else, she relied on the God she loved
so poorly.
One day someone did pay attention to her. A young man. (He
thought there was a truth and also knew that this woman was going
to die, but did not worry about solving this contradiction.) He
had become genuinely interested in the old woman’s boredom. She
felt it. And his interest was a godsend for the invalid. She was eager
to talk about her troubles: she was at the end of her tether, and
you have to make way for the rising generation. Did she get bored?
Of course she did. No one spoke to her. She had been put in her
corner, like a dog. Better to be done with it once and for all. She would
sooner die than be a burden to anyone.
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Part I Lyrical Essays