INTRODUCTION

I have considered the “early writings” of Albert Camus as: the five essays collected in The Wrong Side and the Right Side; the four of Nuptials; the abandoned novella A Happy Death; The Stranger; and the long essay The Myth of Sisyphus. For brevity, i have omitted all but the briefest reference to Camus's plays, The Misunderstanding and Caligula, as discussion of these works would neither add nor subtract greatly from my argument. Finally, because i am interested in Camus's philosophical response to indifference, and in particular his conception of profound indifference, i will not be looking at his journalistic work. The Plague represents a strong shift in Camus's attitude to indifference; the introduction of the social question adds an entirely new dimension to his concept of revolt. since i am interested here in indifference as the origin of revolt, i stop short before this novel.

VARIETIES OF INDIFFERENCE

There are many ways of being indifferent and almost limitless objects to which one can be indifferent. Indifference can be a vice; in the common usage of the label it most often is, but there are forms of indifference that are virtuous. And it is possible for an individual to live a life that is indifferent to some object in a way that is contemptible while at the same time exhibiting indifference to some other object in a way that is commendable. when we say of a person that they are indifferent contra indifferent to some object, what we usually mean is they are apathetically indifferent to some aspect of life in a way dam-aging to character. However, as we shall see, it is possible to be indifferent in a way that is character building. in my discussion of Camus's different uses of indifference, i will be drawing heavily on Lillehammer's work on varieties of indifference in which he identifies eight kinds divided equally into virtues and vices. i will give a brief overview of these indifferences with one or two examples of each taken from Camus's work. My intention here is to lay the ground for discussion of indifference later in this article.