Read The Stranger

Oran quarantined, Dr Rieux at work; Camus's novel of the Occupation and every epidemic since.

Seven years in a Davos sanatorium arguing about Europe before 1914.

Harry Haller, half man and half wolf, and the Magic Theatre; Hesse's midlife crisis.

Roquentin in a Normandy town discovers that existence is absurd, starting with a chestnut root.

The Algerian uprising filmed like a newsreel; the Pentagon screened it in 2003.

A Brahmin's son leaves the Buddha to find his own way, and finds it at a river.

Two tramps wait by a tree for someone who does not come; the play of the century.

Three brothers, a murdered father and the Grand Inquisitor; Dostoevsky's last novel.