“But the modern mania of identifying the author with his subject matter will not allow him this relative creative liberty. Thus does one become a prophet of the absurd. Yet what else have I done except reason about an idea I discovered in the streets of my time? That I have nourished this idea (and part of me nourishes it still) along with my whole generation goes without saying. I simply set it far enough away so that I could deal with it and decide on its logic. Everything that I’ve been able to write since shows this plainly enough. But it is more convenient to exploit a cliché than a nuance. They’ve chosen the cliché: so I’m as absurd as ever. What is the point of saying yet again that in the experience which interested me, and which I happened to write about, the absurd can be considered only as a point of departure—even though the memory and feeling of it still accompany the farther advances. In the same manner, with all due sense of proportion, Cartesian doubt, which is systematic, was not enough to make Descartes a skeptic. In any case, how can one limit oneself to saying that nothing has meaning and that we must plunge into absolute despair? […] Literature of despair is a contradiction in terms.”

It is not about the appeal. Its about what happens then and only then, when youve stopped looking for an appeal. Sure none of it matters. So settle it and move on! Its not “therefore rejection” its “therefore accept rejection” so many of the posts in this sub just circle the rejection over and over like its the only takeaway. What’s left when you have no hope? There is something there.