The contrasting shoreline of Bournemouth on the English South Coast lends an evocative backdrop to Clara Paget’s reading of a passage from philosopher Albert Camus’ essay The Sea Close By, published by Penguin Classics in August. Shot by director and photographer Tom Beard, this visual interpretation of Camus’ text is part of the centenary celebrations of the Nobel Prize-winning writer’s birth. “I always had an image in my head of a chapter from A Happy Death by Camus,” explains Beard, who recently shot music videos for both FKA Twigs and Florence and the Machine. “It’s a sunny, rich portrait of his life growing up in Algiers—the heat, the sea, good weather; he paints an amazing picture. I wanted to try to do this in a very English way and create a sense of being transported through this extract.” Beard turned to rising starlet Clara Paget to narrate Camus’ dense, lyrical text in her husky, cut-glass British tones. “I am very fond of his blunt and honest style of writing,” says Paget, currently involved in the Michael Bay-produced TV drama Black Sails, set for 2014. “I was familiar with Camus’ novels such as The Outsider and The Fall and the smaller essays inspired me to delve further in.”

To celebrate Camus’ centenary, NOWNESS and Penguin Classics are giving away original signed artwork and a set of the author’s works through a competition. Enter the competition here.