Notice in the barracks: “Drink drives out the man and brings out the beast.” Which makes men understand why they like it.

He said: “We must have one love, one great love in our life, since it gives us an alibi for all the moments when we are filled with motiveless despair.

Il n’y a pas de soleil sans ombre; et il faut connaître la nuit.

Real generosity toward the future lies in giving all to the present.

You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.

Sometimes it takes more courage to live than to shoot yourself.

I felt that shock and inner turmoil. In order to regain peace I have had, in short, to come to terms with a too generous fortune. And since I cannot live up to it by merely resting on my achievement, I have found nothing to support me but what has supported me through all my life, even in the most contrary circumstances: the idea that I have of my art and of the role of the writer.

On the scene, Camus is described as “pale and worried,” earnest, determined to finish his address, but also increasingly aware of real danger in the taunts, the rocks, the recent death threats; shocked at the hatred coming from the Europeans; and inwardly convulsed at the thought that an initiative for peace might result in further bloodshed. In content his speech resembled his pieces for L’Express, focusing on the importance of showing that an exchange of views was still possible, of agreeing on the single definitive point of saving lives. In tone, his speech was more intimate and beseeching, and in the situation it had a different kind of eloquence, which came from its urgency and its barely muted despair. He painted terrible and knowing pictures of an alternative future in which “because they could not manage to live together, two populations, similar and different at the same time but equally worthy of respect, are condemned to die together, with rage in their hearts.” Camus read his remarks purposefully, his voice sometimes husky, pausing once to embrace his old friend Ferhat Abbas, who arrived late on the dais to represent the moderate nationalists, and also managing a weak grin when the crowd outside began to chant, “Ca-mus-ta-gueuele,” rude argot telling him to shut up.