Mediating on the absurd, the existential, and the sincere, the poems in Self-portrait In Hospital As Camus struggle with the futility of scientific and philosophical tenets of objectivity as framed by human suffering within the hospital’s walls. In vacillating between praising the wonder of human anatomy and scientific discovery while decrying the senselessness of man’s achievements and ambitions in the face of a meaningless and finite existence, this collection reaches its crescendo in the only reasonable apotheosis: if nothing matters, everything must.
