Albert Camus

Born poor in Algeria to a mother who could neither read nor write, Camus was kept in school by a teacher who argued with his grandmother; he thanked the man publicly on receiving the Nobel Prize at forty-four.

He had a train ticket in his pocket when he accepted a lift to Paris instead. The car left the road and he was killed instantly. In the wreckage was the manuscript of an unfinished novel about his childhood, published thirty-four years later. He lies in the village where he had bought a house.