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Sartre split not only because they took opposing sides but because each became his own side’s intellectual leader” (2). Perhaps in less turbulent times the two could have remained friends, but the politics of their everyday lives and the situation in postwar France made that option impossible. In our current moment, many would simply “agree to disagree,” but in a moment characterized by an “unbridgeable gulf between rationality and existence” (Cruickshank 49), this split further accentuated the absurdity of their time. Eventually, the two differing approaches to post–World War II France led to a permanent end to the friendship:
A full explication of the differences between Camus and Sartre is presented in chapter 4; what is significant at this point is that Camus was greatly influenced by the unintended consequences of the action he took in his moment of absurdity. He knew that he and Sartre viewed the world through different lenses, but the significance of these differences was not fully evident until after the publication of The Rebel. Supporting Cruikshank’s suggestion that absurdity can be understood as a longing for clarity, Camus continued to take action without full knowledge of the outcome of his acts.
The final manifestation of absurdity for Camus was the manner in which he died. On January 4, 1960, while traveling with his good friend and publisher, Michel Gallimard, Camus was killed in a car accident that had no apparent explanation (Lottman 698). In some ways it seems appropriate that the life of one who was so deeply influenced by the metaphor of absurdity should be cut off through this tragically inexplicable event.