Correspondencia 1944-1959

On March 19, 1944, Albert Camus and María Casares met at the home of Michel Leiris, when she was only twenty-one years old. She had started her career two years earlier, in 1942, at the Les Mathurins theater. That same year Albert Camus published The Stranger. At that time, the writer lived alone in Paris, as the war had kept him away from his wife Francine, a teacher in Oran. Sensitive to the talent of the actress, Camus entrusted her with the role of Martha for the staging of his work The Misunderstanding. On the night of June 6, the same day as the Normandy landings, they became lovers. It was only the prelude to a great love story that did not have its true beginning until 1948 and that continued until the writer's accidental death in January 1960. In the midst of their public life and creative activity, their cross correspondence reveals the intensity of their intimate relationship, which they lived in the absence, in the enjoyment of the shared days, in the joint work and in the search, formulation and realization of true love.