However, when I do find a spare minute, usually in the half hour before sleeping, I've taken to reading Camus' The Fall. Having thoroughly enjoyed The Outsider, (like all good left-wing students...) I thought I'd give some more Camus a try.
The book was the last work of fiction Camus completed and is made up of a series of monologues documenting the eponymous 'fall' of a judge-penitent, who in turn comes to represent all of mankind. As you make your way through the protagonist's life, you become the unseen listener to whom the story is addressed.
The protagonist, Jean-Baptiste Clamence, provides general insight into his life showing how much of a wonderful person he is/has been/will always be, whilst also documenting some minor incidents that have happened along the way, an incident with a motorcyclist and a woman leaping from a bridge all feature.
I wish I could give some more insight into this novel, but it really proves difficult. The aim is obvious from the start, documenting the fall of man through the metaphor of the judge-penitent. However his flawed and often hypocritical narration proves too alienating; if he's meant to represent the failures of man I little want to have him tell me a story.
I'm all for working outside of the constraints of conventional narrative, it can create some really interesting work, but I think this is exactly what's lacking here. Having this flawed and hypocritical narrator recount events from his past (whilst representing humanities failing), is just too much alienation for me.
Instead of coming to the default desired conclusion, where we all come together and understand the flaws of mankind, the novel kind of peters out, leaving me with little recollection of what even happened, let alone siding with Camus.
Perhaps I've just been spending too much time in the library and wanted to switch my brain off. In my search for this I've turned to Band of Brothers seeing as everyone raves about it and I've never seen it before.
Yeah, that'll do the job.