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A Happy Death Book Review

A Happy Death is a novel by Albert Camus that was written in 1938, but it was only published posthumously in 1972. It’s a solid companion piece to his most iconic work.

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“It takes time to live.

Like any work of art,

life needs to be thought about“

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It tells the story of a young Algerian, Mersault, who defies society’s rules by committing a murder and escaping punishment, then experimenting with different ways of life and finally dying a happy man. This novel was pretty much unknown before it was published in the early seventies, when all of a sudden the world got to read one of Camus’ earliest works, a novel that he initially refused to get published.

It is fascinating getting into the author’s mind here as it’s a great example of witnessing a rising talent and how his craft was rough at first, but then became polished later. This was pretty much a precursor to ‘The Stranger’. The two novels share the basic storyline in many most important plot developments, but also a similar theme of existentialism and how society sees people who have a different mindset than what is the norm.

This might be controversial, but I would say that the two are on par. In terms of literary quality, clearly the latter is a more confident work as this one lacks cohesion and structure, but what was more tolerable in A Happy Death was its messaging as it least this novel isn’t nihilist like ‘The Stranger’ so clearly is. This book is existentialist in nature as it examines all these ideas without imposing the author’s own views on it.

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Zagreus is an interesting character and he states some very truthful things, including how money ultimately is at least somewhat important as it can buy you time and happiness, but that disabilities do significantly impact your quality of life. The importance of time and having the most time for yourself is definitely stated here, which I personally appreciate as it truly is the most valuable thing that we have in our lives.

But I wish that he hadn’t been killed off and that the novel did not have that crime element as it made the protagonist unlikable and he lost all redeeming qualities at that point. Mersault is, thus, not a great character, but at least he was examined properly unlike his girlfriend that is utterly forgettable throughout.

A Happy Death has a different second part that suddenly shifts into a travelogue of sorts where we in particular get interesting descriptions of Prague as a city in all its glory and filth. As somebody who’s visited this city, I really appreciated these passages. The descriptions are actually the strongest element of this entire book as this is where we see Camus’ best and most involving writing. The dialogue is also pretty good.

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But it is the lack of a connective thread that was ultimately most problematic. Camus in this early work failed to structure the novel meaningfully, resulting in many disparate threads that don’t go anywhere. Admittedly, I appreciated the insight into his mind, but too often the novel just felt like a person’s diary of thoughts and experiences without a clear narrative purpose and/or literary achievements. Thus, it was clearly an early work, but one that is still underappreciated.