“One must imagine Sisyphus happy. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart... If the descent is thus sometimes performed in sorrow, it can also take place in joy. This world henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile.”
Camus's image of Sisyphus eternally rolling a boulder up a mountain, only to have it roll down again, symbolizes the human condition. Yet Camus insists Sisyphus is happy—not because he finds meaning in the task, but because he accepts its meaninglessness and chooses to persist.
This is Camus's existential response to the absurd: we must neither flee into denial (religion, philosophy) nor despair. We must live fully, lucidly, and with defiance, acknowledging the absurd and creating value anyway.
Commentary
Camus's image of Sisyphus eternally rolling a boulder up a mountain, only to have it roll down again, symbolizes the human condition. Yet Camus insists Sisyphus is happy—not because he finds meaning in the task, but because he accepts its meaninglessness and chooses to persist.
This is Camus's existential response to the absurd: we must neither flee into denial (religion, philosophy) nor despair. We must live fully, lucidly, and with defiance, acknowledging the absurd and creating value anyway.