SOURCE: “Albert Camus' Concept of the Absurd and Juan José Arreola's ‘The Switchman,’” in Latin American Literary Review, Vol. 6, No. 11, Fall-Winter, 1977, pp. 30-5.

In the following essay, McMurray contends that “The Switchman” is similar in theme to Albert Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus.

In 1942 Albert Camus published his book of essays entitled The Myth of Sisyphus¹ in which he developed his concept of the absurd in an effort to give meaning to human life in a senseless, war-torn world without God. A decade later, in 1952, the Mexican writer Juan José Arreola published “The Switchman,”² a short story that reveals a philosophical position somewhat similar to that of Camus. This essay attempts to delineate attitudes shared by these two authors, the first a kind of pagan moralist and the second an ironic observer of the human condition.

Arreola is only one of many contemporary writers who have demonstrated a...