| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立中央大學 === 法國語文學系 === 100 === The First man is a posthumous novel of Albert Camus published by his daughter in 1994, thirty years after his death. The narrative focuses on Jacques Cormery, a descendant of immigration from France. After visiting the tomb of his father, he started to search the past of his ancestors and recall his own childhood. The early life of Jacques is quite similar to the experience of Camus himself. That is reason why The First man was usually considered as an autobiographical novel or a semi-autobiography.
According to some letters and some notes of Camus, we infer that the author intended to make The First man a novel of education. Therefore, in the first chapter of our thesis, we treat The First man as a Bildungsroman. We compare the autobiography and the Bildungsroman, and point out the standards that make The First man a Bildungsroman. As we know, the nineteenth century was the period of rapid growth of Bildungsroman in France. Accordingly, we make the comparison between the Bildungsroman of nineteenth century and twentieth century in order to pinpoint their dissimilitude.
In the second chapter, we establish firstly the connection between Camus and Jacques because of their similarities. We extend then our analysis by discussing the dilemma of Jacques and the situation of Camus during the Algerian war. The story of the novel and the attitude of Jacques are in fact the projections of the experience of the author himself.
In the last chapter, we begin by studying the preface of L’Envers et l’endroit added in 1958 so as to disclose his intention of writing The First man. Therefore, we can affirm that his position was influenced by his experiences and life in Algeria, and this position was built on the humanism. The humanism of Camus is constructed by two major elements which we can observe in The First man as well: the nature and the solidarity..
In conclusion, we can say that First man is not just a novel created for expressing the author’s attachment to Algeria and his family, it’s also a way to explain and to defend his own position and the principle of his humanist thought.
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