Camille Character Analysis

By then Camille was twenty. His mother still treated him like a spoilt little boy. She adored him because she had struggled to keep him alive through a youth full of pain and sickness. The child had had every imaginable type of fever and illness, one after the other, and Madame Raquin had put up a fifteen-year fight against the sequence of fearful maladies which had threatened to snatch her son from her. She had overcome them all with her patience, care, and adoring devotion.

This life of enforced convalescence made her turn in on herself; she developed a habit of speaking in an undertone, walking about the house without making any noise, and sitting silent and motionless on a chair with a vacant look in her eyes. Yet whenever she lifted an arm or moved a foot forward, it was apparent that she had all the litheness of a cat, with taut, powerful muscles and a store of passion and energy which lay dormant in her inert body.

Camille was irritated by his mother’s constant fussing; he had rebellious moments when he wanted to rush about and make himself ill, just to escape from her cloying attentions which were starting to make him feel sick. Then he would drag Thérèse off and challenge her to wrestle with him in the grass. One day he gave his cousin a push and she fell over; she leapt up at once like a wild animal, with her cheeks red and eyes blazing with anger, and threw herself on him with both fists raised. Camille slid to the ground. He was scared.

The truth was that only stupid ambition had driven Camille to think of leaving. He wanted to be an employee in some large administration, and would go pink with pleasure at the thought of himself sitting in the middle of a huge office, wearing shiny artificial cuffs and with a quill pen tucked behind his ear.

It is true that he found Thérèse plain and did not love her, but then she would not cost him anything; the women he usually picked up cheaply were certainly no prettier, nor any better loved. On grounds of economy alone, it was a good idea to take his friend’s wife. […] Then again, when he came to think about it, an affair like this could hardly lead to any trouble: it would be in Thérèse’s interests to cover it up, and he could easily jilt her when he felt like it; even if Camille did find out and get annoyed, he would just thump him if he started to throw his weight around. Whichever way he looked at it, the prospect seemed an easy and alluring one to Laurent.

He had decided to go there to cover himself in case anyone should suspect him, and to avoid having to break the dreadful news to Madame Raquin in person. That was something he felt peculiarly loath to do, for he fully expected her to be so grief-stricken that he would be unable to summon sufficient tears to act his own part credibly; moreover, he found the thought of her maternal anguish oppressive, although he didn’t really care about it otherwise.

He was relieved to have committed his crime at last. He had killed Camille and now the whole thing was over and done with; nothing more would ever be said. From now on he was going to live in peace and quiet, until it was time to take possession of Thérèse. The thought of committing a murder had choked him at times with panic; now that he had succeeded, a weight had been lifted from his chest, he could breathe easily again, and he was free of the anxiety which fear and hesitation had inflicted.

He turned down his shirt-collar and studied the wound in a cheap, tarnished mirror on the wall. It was a red gash the size of a two-sous coin; the skin had been torn away to expose the pinkish flesh, which had black spots in it; trickles of blood had run down as far as the shoulder, leaving congealed trails which were now flaking off. Against the white of the neck, the bite stood out a deep and powerful brown; it was on the right, below the ear. Laurent stooped forward and stretched his neck out to see, and the greenish mirror distorted his expression into an atrocious grimace.

His visits to the Morgue gave him nightmares and fits of shuddering which left him panting for breath. He shook off his fears and told himself not to act like a child; he wanted to be strong, but, despite himself, his body refused, and his whole being was overcome by revulsion and horror as soon as he found himself in the damp, sickly-smelling atmosphere of the mortuary.

The two lovers no longer made any attempt to see each other on their own. They never sought a rendez-vous or exchanged a furtive kiss. For the moment, the murder had as it were smothered the sensual fire in their flesh; by killing Camille, they had managed to assuage those fierce and insatiable desires which had remained unsatisfied while they had lain locked in each other’s arms. The crime had given them a feeling of acute pleasure which made their embraces seem insipid and loathsome in comparison.

But in the dreadful silence that followed, the two murderers still went on conversing about their victim. […] They could not have understood each other better if they had both screamed in heart-rending tones: ‘We killed Camille, and his body is still here between us, turning our limbs to ice.’ And the terrible confessions went on flowing between them, more visible and resounding than ever, in the calm, damp air of the room.

‘You know,’ he said, ‘I didn’t get married for sleepless nights…We’re behaving like children…It’s your fault; when you put on your graveyard expression like that, it flusters me. Do try and be a bit more cheerful tonight and not scare me to death.’

His remorse was purely physical. Only his body, with its over-stretched nerves and trembling flesh, was afraid of the drowned man. His conscience had nothing to do with the terror he felt, and he did not in the least regret having killed Camille; in periods of calm when the ghost was not there, he would have committed the murder all over again if he had thought it was in his interests to do so. […] His body was suffering terribly but his soul remained absent; the wretched fellow did not feel in the least repentant. Thérèse’s passion had infected him with a terrible sickness, and that was all.

By then Camille was twenty. His mother still treated him like a spoilt little boy. She adored him because she had struggled to keep him alive through a youth full of pain and sickness. The child had had every imaginable type of fever and illness, one after the other, and Madame Raquin had put up a fifteen-year fight against the sequence of fearful maladies which had threatened to snatch her son from her. She had overcome them all with her patience, care, and adoring devotion.

This life of enforced convalescence made her turn in on herself; she developed a habit of speaking in an undertone, walking about the house without making any noise, and sitting silent and motionless on a chair with a vacant look in her eyes. Yet whenever she lifted an arm or moved a foot forward, it was apparent that she had all the litheness of a cat, with taut, powerful muscles and a store of passion and energy which lay dormant in her inert body.

Camille was irritated by his mother’s constant fussing; he had rebellious moments when he wanted to rush about and make himself ill, just to escape from her cloying attentions which were starting to make him feel sick. Then he would drag Thérèse off and challenge her to wrestle with him in the grass. One day he gave his cousin a push and she fell over; she leapt up at once like a wild animal, with her cheeks red and eyes blazing with anger, and threw herself on him with both fists raised. Camille slid to the ground. He was scared.

The truth was that only stupid ambition had driven Camille to think of leaving. He wanted to be an employee in some large administration, and would go pink with pleasure at the thought of himself sitting in the middle of a huge office, wearing shiny artificial cuffs and with a quill pen tucked behind his ear.

It is true that he found Thérèse plain and did not love her, but then she would not cost him anything; the women he usually picked up cheaply were certainly no prettier, nor any better loved. On grounds of economy alone, it was a good idea to take his friend’s wife. […] Then again, when he came to think about it, an affair like this could hardly lead to any trouble: it would be in Thérèse’s interests to cover it up, and he could easily jilt her when he felt like it; even if Camille did find out and get annoyed, he would just thump him if he started to throw his weight around. Whichever way he looked at it, the prospect seemed an easy and alluring one to Laurent.

He had decided to go there to cover himself in case anyone should suspect him, and to avoid having to break the dreadful news to Madame Raquin in person. That was something he felt peculiarly loath to do, for he fully expected her to be so grief-stricken that he would be unable to summon sufficient tears to act his own part credibly; moreover, he found the thought of her maternal anguish oppressive, although he didn’t really care about it otherwise.

He was relieved to have committed his crime at last. He had killed Camille and now the whole thing was over and done with; nothing more would ever be said. From now on he was going to live in peace and quiet, until it was time to take possession of Thérèse. The thought of committing a murder had choked him at times with panic; now that he had succeeded, a weight had been lifted from his chest, he could breathe easily again, and he was free of the anxiety which fear and hesitation had inflicted.

He turned down his shirt-collar and studied the wound in a cheap, tarnished mirror on the wall. It was a red gash the size of a two-sous coin; the skin had been torn away to expose the pinkish flesh, which had black spots in it; trickles of blood had run down as far as the shoulder, leaving congealed trails which were now flaking off. Against the white of the neck, the bite stood out a deep and powerful brown; it was on the right, below the ear. Laurent stooped forward and stretched his neck out to see, and the greenish mirror distorted his expression into an atrocious grimace.

His visits to the Morgue gave him nightmares and fits of shuddering which left him panting for breath. He shook off his fears and told himself not to act like a child; he wanted to be strong, but, despite himself, his body refused, and his whole being was overcome by revulsion and horror as soon as he found himself in the damp, sickly-smelling atmosphere of the mortuary.

The two lovers no longer made any attempt to see each other on their own. They never sought a rendez-vous or exchanged a furtive kiss. For the moment, the murder had as it were smothered the sensual fire in their flesh; by killing Camille, they had managed to assuage those fierce and insatiable desires which had remained unsatisfied while they had lain locked in each other’s arms. The crime had given them a feeling of acute pleasure which made their embraces seem insipid and loathsome in comparison.

But in the dreadful silence that followed, the two murderers still went on conversing about their victim. […] They could not have understood each other better if they had both screamed in heart-rending tones: ‘We killed Camille, and his body is still here between us, turning our limbs to ice.’ And the terrible confessions went on flowing between them, more visible and resounding than ever, in the calm, damp air of the room.

‘You know,’ he said, ‘I didn’t get married for sleepless nights…We’re behaving like children…It’s your fault; when you put on your graveyard expression like that, it flusters me. Do try and be a bit more cheerful tonight and not scare me to death.’

His remorse was purely physical. Only his body, with its over-stretched nerves and trembling flesh, was afraid of the drowned man. His conscience had nothing to do with the terror he felt, and he did not in the least regret having killed Camille; in periods of calm when the ghost was not there, he would have committed the murder all over again if he had thought it was in his interests to do so. […] His body was suffering terribly but his soul remained absent; the wretched fellow did not feel in the least repentant. Thérèse’s passion had infected him with a terrible sickness, and that was all.