The Fall

Also published as a book review.

The Fall- An Account of Modernity by John the Baptist

There is always a space between the thoughts in a writer’s head and those that the reader is receptive to, yet when it came to The Fall, I found that space to be incredibly small. Camus boils down modernity to one thing: “judgement”. This unique framework for viewing our image of self and relation to others illuminates what otherwise would appear to be simple self-aggrandizement with a desperate attempt to avoid the Last Judgement.

Introduction

Writing four years before his death, Camus completed one of his most impactful novels. In The Fall the main character, by a clever device is the reader. The reader opens the first page and is immediately interrupted by the character, Jean Baptiste Clamence. Through Clamence you realize that you are in a dive bar named Mexico City which is situated in the center of a dank sailors’ district in Amsterdam. Clamence observes that when viewed from above, Amsterdam’s canals resemble Dante’s concentric circles of hell, and the two of you are in the center. From this center of hell, he begins monologues. This Parisian ex-pat is so charming that the main character, that is to say you as the reader, follows him around the town and he tells you his story in a very particular way.

The Name

The first thing worth mentioning is Jean Baptiste Clamence’s name. Jean Baptiste (JB) is an homage to the biblical John the Baptist, whose role was to prepare a way for the Messiah. In the Bible, this is accomplished by exposing people’s hidden sins, calling them to repentance, and, when effective, baptizing them. Jean Baptiste, on the other hand, is a thoroughly modern incarnation of this mission. A prophet whose messiah has ascended to heaven and not yet returned.

An empty prophet for shabby times, Elijah without a messiah, stuffed with fever and alcohol, my back up against this mouldy door, my finger raised towards a threatening sky, showering imprecations on lawless men who cannot endure any judgment.

What’s more, when one is baptized by Jean Baptiste it is a reverse baptism, you enter the water clean and come out a transgressor. The surname Clamence has multiple readings: there is a similar Latin verb ‘clamare’ or “to cry out” which fits with the John the Baptist motif, but there is also the more obvious French word ‘clement’ or “merciful”. This would be a more sarcastic interpretation, as Clamence is anything but merciful to humanity.

The Style

Although this is my favorite of Camus’ books, it is strangely the least quotable, not to say it is not quotable, but when compared with his other works like The Myth of Sisyphus where every line could stand on its own, the Fall requires context, each line is a brush stroke of modernity. It is no secret that Dostoyevsky was one of Camus’ influences, this influence is quite pronounced in the Fall. In many ways you could read this as a retelling of Notes from the Underground. The Underground man could be compared to JB after the completion of the fall. In the Underground man’s terms JB used to be a “man of action” and after his fall he became an honest rodent. One other structural thing to note is that this book doesn’t have chapters; it is organized by conversations. You are in Amsterdam, but are only ever conscious when JB is talking to you.

The Setup

JB initially was a Parisian lawyer with a specialty in what he calls “noble cases” representing the widow and the orphan. According to him, he was gifted with a disposition that found joy in this profession. In almost every way he was “blessed”. He takes pains to inform us that he is past believing in God, yet during that time he unaccountably felt set apart and chosen in some way. How else are we to understand just how wholesome he was?

It is during this setup that we learn about JB’s obsession with height. Height comes up again and again, even in the setting. We are in Amsterdam, one of the lowest cities in the world, having a drink in a bar named Mexico City, known for being one of the highest cities in the world. This “double” theme will haunt the rest of the book.

The Fall in Three Acts

The title ‘The Fall’ is another homage to a Biblical theme, referencing Adam and Eve being cast out of Eden. He likens his lawyer days to being in Eden, shifting paradise from the external reality of Eden to an internal psychological experience of innocence and priority. I find this reinterpretation of the garden compelling. Eden is typically thought of spatially or as some sort of destination, but to JB it is a perch, a high vantage point. Cracks in the supports of this elevated position soon start to form.

Act 1: The Laugh

The seemingly least important of the three events that lead to JB’s fall happened one perfect autumn evening. JB is walking, near the peak of his Edenic experience, when out of nowhere he hears a laugh. His mind instantly interprets this laugh as directed “at” him, but turning and seeing no one, he moves on. This moment is psychologically important for a few reasons, we see first the self pre and then postprocessed. He later says that the laugh itself wasn’t even a derisive laugh, the interpretation, as such, tells us more than if it had been. It is the self that peeks out of the bars of the self, the I before I, that tells the truth. This Freudian repression, or set of wax wings, allowed JB to believe that he believed. Yet there lingered an anxiety that he was all the while a play actor, the beginning of the end.

Act 2: The Traffic Light

The next event happened at a traffic light. He was sitting in his car at a light when a motorcyclist in front of him started having engine problems. The light turns green and instead of moving out of traffic the motorcyclist continues trying to fix his bike, holding up traffic. JB asks the man politely several times to move, each time the cyclist refuses getting more and more frustrated by his bike, finally telling JB that he would give him a “thorough dusting off”. This was enough for JB to get out of his car with the intent of beating the motorcyclist when all the sudden he hears a man behind him say that he wouldn’t let JB strike a man with a motorcycle between his legs as that was unfair, then, immediately following his observation, strikes JB’s ear. Dazed and confused, JB meekly returns to his car without saying a word. Again, the importance of this event, is not the event itself, but the retroactive interpretation it gets from JB. He is unable to forget it, he re-runs it a million times in his head, he fantasizes how it could have gone if only he had done this or that. All this eventually leads him to the realization that instead of being a “predestined defender of the widow and orphan”, what he really wants is to dominate. To be “respected in profession as well as person” to not only win by intellect but also brute force. This discovery made it even more difficult to identify with his previous persona of being a “friend of truth and intelligence”.

Act 3: The River

The finale occurs a couple years earlier than the Laughter. This event further cements the lengths his psyche was willing to go to preserve the false image of himself that he had created. He was again walking through Paris at night animated by Edenic bliss when he notices a woman, alone leaning over the edge of a bridge. A little while after passing her, he hears what is unmistakably the splash of a body hitting the river, followed by a few cries for help that drift downstream, quickly being replaced by silence. Stopping for a moment, he quickly decides that it is “too late, too far… or something of the sort”. Furthermore, he reveals that he never finds out what has happened to the woman because he didn’t read the papers for the next few days. This story highlights the Lacanian insight that events or signifiers only receive their meaning retroactively. By the time he encounters the laughter, this event has been living parasitically below his conscious attention, eroding the foundations of his constructed self. At the time he was able to quickly defend against and dismiss the bridge incident, but this event would in the fullness of time become the foundation of his new identity.

**Judge Penitent **

The culmination of his fall, is the conclusion that we have constructed a society that lives in a constant state of judgment. He had once been able to float above this reality but has now been pulled into it by his own discovered culpability. What follows is his attempt to situate himself in the new reality which he likens to a prison cell so small that it doesn’t allow the occupant to stand or lay down. He first tries to become a misanthropic satirist who can avoid judgment by laughing at everything. When this fails, he then tries to anesthetize himself with debauchery. This would have worked, but it ended up destroying his health, making it impossible to maintain. He eventually settles on this idea he calls a “judge penitent”. He describes this “office” as someone that accuses himself, but in a very particular way. His accusations always have a specific effect in mind, and that effect is reflection. The image that he is painting of himself with his self-incrimination is general enough so that his audience begins to see themselves in its likeness.

Then imperceptibly I pass from the ‘I’ to the ‘we’. When I get to ‘This is what we are’, the game is over and I can tell them off. I am like them, to be sure; we are in the soup together. However, I have a superiority in that I know it and this gives me the right to speak.

In other words, fulfilling his office as the modern incarnation of John the Baptist, he brings his listeners to the water to be condemned. The very act of being a “guide” gives him superiority over the one who is guided, and thus he achieves his domination at last.

Conclusion

As centers of our own universes, we embody a natural level of narcissism that Camus masterfully encapsulates in ‘The Fall.’ Our human struggle to validate our existence referentially hinges on others, with judgment serving as a primary means of asserting dominance. The information revolution has only broadened the number of things available for judgement. Jean Baptiste would have predicted that most social media posts would revolve around people “making stands” and thus electing themselves as a judge. He would have also understood how devastating it would be to those who are subjected to this most wide-ranging judgement in history. He would have anticipated the increasing levels of polarity as individuals try to condemn others for what they are most guilty. After listening to Jean Baptiste, we are left with questions; do I know that I am the subject of judgment? Or do I still believe I am the only exception. If I am fully aware of this, how can it be borne?

…on the bridges of Paris I too learned that I was afraid of freedom. So hurrah for the master, whoever he may be, to take the place of heaven’s law. ‘Our Father who art provisionally here . . . Our guides, our delightfully severe masters, O cruel and beloved leaders . . .’

#book

The Divine Comedy Albert Camus