Ancient community of dream and fatigue

[hossein31]

not a teacher

Hi, what is the meaning of these sentences? also what is the meaning of the underlined part? What does the word "community" imply here?why is this "community" "ancient"? What is the grammatical function of the underlined part in the sentence?Please answer me in simple and clear English.

"Men who share the same rooms, soldiers or prisoners,
develop a strange alliance as if, having cast off their armor
with their clothing, they fraternized every evening, over and above
their differences, in the ancient community of dream and fatigue."

Thank you in advance.

Best regards
Hossein

[Monticello]

Originally Posted by hossein31

not a teacher

Hi, what is the meaning of these sentences? also what is the meaning of the underlined part? What does the word "community" imply here?why is this "community" "ancient"? What is the grammatical function of the underlined part in the sentence?Please answer me in simple and clear English.

"Men who share the same rooms, soldiers or prisoners,
develop a strange alliance as if, having cast off their armor
with their clothing, they fraternized every evening, over and above
their differences, in the ancient community of dream and fatigue."

Thank you in advance.

Best regards
Hossein

Hi hossein31,

Originally Posted by hossein31

Hi, what is the meaning of these sentences?

The poet here speaks in the language of metaphor. (The preceding bolded word is a link to a wiki article on the topic; for further background, please click on it and review.)

At first, the poet appears to be speaking about just a certain select group of people, i.e., "men who share the same room, soldiers or prisoners," but by the time we have reached the end of his one-sentence verse, we realize that his use of metaphor for the phrase, "the ancient community of dream and fatigue," (i.e., sleep, a nightly experience that all humankind shares) may be applied throughout his verse. And then with that realization, comes the idea that "men who share the same room, soldiers and sailors" is itself an (extremely clever) implicit metaphor. In other words, he wishes his reader to awake to the awareness of our common human condition; that we are all, metaphorically speaking, "men who share the same room, soldiers or prisoners."

With this depth in mind, one can follow each image of the poem as a metaphor for the human condition. What is the "armor" and "clothing" that we each wear and then, "fraterniz[ing]" through some "strange alliance," "cast off" "every evening," "over and above [our] differences?" This is the implied question that the poet is posing to the attentive reader -- through the language of metaphor.

Originally Posted by hossein31

What is the grammatical function of the underlined part in the sentence?

The phrase you have underlined is a prepositional phrase that tells us where the nightly "fraterniz[ing]" he describes occurs.

[Monticello]

By the way, who is the poet author?

- Camus. (- Should have known.)

[Monticello]

Hi Hossein,

Given that the above excerpted sentence is an English translation, I'm curious as to Camus' sentence structure in the original French. An English translation, which I was able to find online, matches the translation you posted, verbatim. And this translation appears to be a somewhat literal one. Nonetheless, it would be interesting to read Camus' original French text in order to see if the original French sentence structure is preserved in this translation.

Do you know of any original French text for this story that can be found online?

[hossein31]

Originally Posted by Monticello

Hi Hossein,

Given that the above excerpted sentence is an English translation, I'm curious as to Camus' sentence structure in the original French. An English translation, which I was able to find online, matches the translation you posted, verbatim. And this translation appears to be a somewhat literal one. Nonetheless, it would be interesting to read Camus' original French text in order to see if the original French sentence structure is preserved in this translation.

Do you know of any original French text for this story that can be found online?

Hi Monticello
Yes You are right. This is a part of a short story by camus which is translated in English. Unfortunately I didn't find any copy of original text in French on the net. Here we in our city there is no place or library to find these kind of books. I wonder if you can find any copy of it. But it is very vital for me to know the meaning of this excerpt. It is a story called "the guest" (original name l"Hote), one of the six storries of a collection by camus called "Exile and the Kingdom" (original name: L’exil et le royaume). I would appreciate you if you could help me. As I said it is very vital for me. Not knowing its meaning would spoil all my work.

Thank you very much

[Monticello]

Originally Posted by hossein31

Hi Monticello
Yes You are right. This is a part of a short story by camus which is translated in English. Unfortunately I didn't find any copy of original text in French on the net. Here we in our city there is no place or library to find these kind of books. I wonder if you can find any copy of it. But it is very vital for me to know the meaning of this excerpt. It is a story called "the guest" (original name l"Hote), one of the six storries of a collection by camus called "Exile and the Kingdom" (original name: L’exil et le royaume). I would appreciate you if you could help me. As I said it is very vital for me. Not knowing its meaning would spoil all my work.

Thank you very much

Hi hossein,

Yes, I'm familiar with Camus' collection of six stories Exile and the Kingdom. (My copy is right now in another location that I won't be able to get to until this weekend.) Though I'm almost certain that there must be a copy of the original French somewhere online, I, too, had difficulty locating one.

As to the meaning of the excerpt you posted, the sentence is taken from a descriptive paragraph, which on its surface serves to expose Daru's discomfort about his privacy, given the circumstance of his having to sleep so closely in the same room with his "guest." Nonetheless, the metaphorical meaning of the excerpted sentence, which I explained above in post #2, still applies. In fact, it is here, within this very sentence, that Camus begins to draw his reader toward his underlying existential theme.

Please let me know if you still need any help with this, or if you are able to locate an online original French text.

- Best.

[hossein31]

Hi. monticello thank you for your reply. As I said I need very much the sentence in simplified English. I mean How you would translate the sentence in simple English without losing any parts of the sentence.Yet still I have problems in getting the Underlined part. Which community? a community of people who have common feelings, interests, ,,,, here "fatigue and dream"? OR community means a connection of two things such as "fatigue and dream"?ie. when fatigue comes then dream comes! What is the meaning of ancient here? What I want is the clear answers to questions like these.

Thank you

[Monticello]

Originally Posted by hossein31

Hi. monticello thank you for your reply. As I said I need very much the sentence in simplified English. I mean How you would translate the sentence in simple English without losing any parts of the sentence.Yet still I have problems in getting the Underlined part. Which community? a community of people who have common feelings, interests, ,,,, here "fatigue and dream"? OR community means a connection of two things such as "fatigue and dream"?ie. when fatigue comes then dream comes! What is the meaning of ancient here? What I want is the clear answers to questions like these.

Thank you

Hi hossein,

Your phrase, which I've highlighted in red above, is a good explanation for how the word, community, is being used here. The previous bolded and blue highlighted word is a link to the word's entry within The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (Fourth Edition). Click on that link now and browse through the word's definition. Definition -- 3b. Sharing, participation, and fellowship. -- from that link applies here.

Once again, Camus' use of the phrase, "in the ancient community of dream and fatigue," is a metaphor that describes sleep. In other words, sleep is something that has been shared by all humankind (i.e., community) since time immemorial (i.e., "extending beyond the reach of memory"; thus, indefinitely ancient). Camus' use of the phrase "dream and fatigue" is an allusion to sleep itself.

- Hope that this explanation helps you.

[hossein31]

Ok, thanks a lot. But What about my other question? I asked how you would rewrite these sentence from beginning to the end (Men who have the same room .... fatigue and dream) in simple English without losing any parts of it. i.e I want you to paraphrase the whole sentence in more simple English. I can't get a a very powerful idea from the whole sentence. What does the whole sentence want to say? I would be very grateful if you answer the above-mentioned questions clearly.

Thank you very much in advance.