"The Guest" (sometimes translated as "The Host") is a short story by Albert Camus, published in The Atlantic Monthly in December of 1957, and then in Camus' collection, The Exile and the Kingdom. The events of the short story take place during the outbreak of the Algerian War for Independence, and the novella is often considered one of Camus' most important statements on the war, French Imperialism, Colonialism, and Algerian Independence.
The short story succinctly captures the simmering tensions and underlying contradictions of the French colonies in North Africa, and how they would erupt into a violent and bloody conflict that would tear communities apart around the Mediterranean....
