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This is the context:

Suicide has never been dealt with except as a social phenomenon. On the contrary, we are concerned here, at the outset, with the relationship between individual thought and suicide. An act like this is prepared within the silence of the heart, as is a great work of art. The man himself is ignorant of it. One evening he pulls the trigger or jumps. Of an apartment-building manager who had killed himself I was told that he had lost his daughter five years before, that he had changed greatly since, and that experience had "undermined" him. A more exact word cannot be imagined. Beginning to think is beginning to be undermined. Society has but little connection with such beginnings. The worm is in man’s heart. That is where it must be sought. One must follow and understand this fatal game that leads from lucidity in the face of existence to flight from light.

I specifically don't understand why he uses "lead" and what "flight from light" means here.

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    An activity which 'leads' is one that guides or carries someone to a new state. The 'fatal game' (thinking) causes people to 'fly' (flee in fear) from figurative 'light' (happiness, positive thoughts) to figurative darkness (death, suicide, self-destruction, abandonment of hope).
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Jul 13, 2020 at 7:31
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    I don't think this is a very good text for a learner to study from. Camus didn't write in English. This is a translation (albeit a very good one) The orgiinal is «Ce jeu mortel que mène de la lucidité en face de l'existence à l'évasion hors de la luminère, il faut le suivre et le comprendre.»
    – James K
    Commented Jul 13, 2020 at 11:26
  • Yes, the translation is more than a little clumsy.
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Jul 13, 2020 at 19:49
  • @JamesK I am interested in Camus's theory and tried to read the Chinese translation but it seemed incomprehensible so I turned to the English translation, which still imposed so much difficulty. I have no choice left. To learn french? lol. btw, How would you interpret the original french text for this one?
    – 周moro
    Commented Jul 15, 2020 at 2:15
  • I see. I assume that you are a native speaker of Chinese. You are not the first person to find Camus hard to understand, and reading him in English just adds another layer of difficulty. I assume the Chinese translation is generally accurate, it is incomprehensible because Camus is incomprehensible.
    – James K
    Commented Jul 15, 2020 at 3:19

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One must follow and understand this fatal game that leads from lucidity in the face of existence to flight from light.

The word leadsin that sentence could be replaced by "takes one from".

Lexico "lucidity" 1.1
1.1 The ability to think clearly, especially in intervals between periods of confusion or insanity. she had moments of lucidity
2. Brightness; luminosity.

The word "lucid" means clarity of mind, using a metaphor of light. The words "flight from light" mean fleeing, moving away from light, in fear.

So, there is a fatal game, a kind of thinking, that leads us from lucidity (light) into darkness, depression, and the danger of suicide.

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  • Reading Camus can lead to a flight from light. I had to read La Peste for French A-level and it took me 6 months to recover.
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Jul 13, 2020 at 7:43

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