.بیگانه <> Biganeh (The Stranger)

Once there was a ruler called Sisyphus who ruled over the kingdom of present-day Corinth. He made the kingdom prosperous but was known for his treacherous rule. He killed the guests and travelers in his kingdom for his sadistic pleasure and it went against the tradition of hospitality in Ancient Day Greece. This angered Zeus and thus he sent the god of death to banish him to the Underworld. He tricked the God of Death by chaining him in his own shackles. Death Stopped during that time and no one died on Earth, wars ended up with soldiers turning up just fine. Ares, the God of War intervened because wars weren’t “fun” anymore.

Zeus tried again where he got Sisyphus to Underworld, where he was greeted by Persephone. He complained to her that he hadn’t received a proper funeral and hence would like to come back only after he got one. Sisyphus of course didn’t keep his promise and kept on living. Zeus then took matters into his own hands and brought Sisyphus in front of him. His punishment was simple, he had to roll a massive boulder over a hill. It seemed simple at first but the boulder just rolled down again, making him repeat this action for eternity.

According to several people, this is a metaphor for the changing day and night cycles. But according to Albert Camus, this rolling up a boulder up a hill is familiar to what we experience in our daily lives. Sometimes, the things we do daily might seem mundane and absurd but it is similar to Sisyphus. It might seem like that the absurdity of life is to end when you end with this task or that task, but we fail to realize that we have to continue this for eternity. We still persevere and give a significant amount of time to it, so we must just accept this condition of ours.

Such is the philosophy of this article’s author: Albert Camus