Albert Camus, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957, always refused the existentialist label with which he is usually associated. For Camus, the world was 'absurd', without purpose, leading only unto death, yet all the more invigorating precisely because of this. Long associated with Left-Bank intellectuals, Camus' real emotional centre was always his native Algeria and the poverty of his youth. This has become even clearer with the publication of his posthumous novel The First Man, which has catapulted Camus back into the public eye after years of excommunication by the Left for his 'un-radical' views during the Algerian war. Introducing Camus portrays a man who was an intellectual in the tradition of the great French humanists, a Resistance fighter during World War II, and also a great sensualist for whom sun, sea, sex, football and theatre were the answer to life's absurdity.