All Men Are Mortal by Simone de Beauvoir
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Why have an existential crisis when you can read one instead?! ALL MEN ARE MORTAL is an Existentialist manifesto in the form of a centuries-spanning epic, narrated primarily by Fosca, an immortal man born in the 1200s who is now trying to begin yet another new life in 1900s Paris. The story is at turns chilling, gorgeous, infuriating, passionate, problematic, and profound. Existentialist philosophy argues that every human individual forges their own life’s meaning and value through their freely-chosen actions in the face of certain death and despite the incomprehensible nature of the universe. But without the threat of death, could life have meaning at all? Fosca struggles to answer this question through countless regimes, lovers, bloodlines, landscapes, wars, and ambitions, all the while increasingly mourning the inevitable loss of his humanity. Incredibly thought-provoking.
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