The Guest

"The Guest" ("L'Hôte") is a short story by the French writer Albert Camus. It was first published in 1957 as part of a collection entitled Exile and the Kingdom (L'exil et le royaume). The French title "L'Hôte" translates into both "the guest" and "the host" which ties back to the relationship between the main characters of the story. Camus employs this short tale to reflect upon issues raised by the political situation in French North Africa. In particular, he explores the problem of refusing to take sides in the colonial conflict in Algeria, something that mirrors Camus' own non-aligned stance which he had set out in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech.