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Caligula

Published
1944
Language
English

Synopsis

Camus's classic play: the young Roman emperor Caligula, shattered by grief and the truth that "men die and are not happy," pursues the impossible through absolute, murderous freedom. A cornerstone of his cycle of the absurd.

About the author

A
Albert Camus

Albert Camus was a French Algerian author, philosopher, and journalist who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957. He was a key philosopher of the 20th-century and his most famous work is the novel L'Étranger (The Stranger). In 1949, Camus founded the Group for International Liaisons within the Revolutionary Union Movement, which was a group opposed to some tendencies of the surrealistic movement of André Breton. Camus was the second-youngest recipient of the Nobel Prize for L...

Characters

CaligulaProtagonist

Roman emperor whose grief over his sister's death drives him into a campaign of absolute, destructive freedom.

ChereaAntagonist

A patrician who comes to see Caligula's tyranny as intolerable and organizes the conspiracy against him.

CaesoniaSupporting

Caligula's mistress, who stays loyal to him even as his cruelty escalates.

HeliconSupporting

Caligula's confidant and enabler.

ScipioSupporting

A young poet whose father Caligula had killed, torn between hatred and understanding of the emperor.

All characters in Caligula