The Stranger

Meursault's character is the determining factor in his conviction and sentencing. His social rebellion is deemed immoral and abominable. The reader and the novel's characters both try to rationalize Meursault's actions in order to give his life meaning. But according to Meursault, life is meaningless and consequently needs no justification.

From page fifty-eight to fifty-seven of Albert Camus’s The Stranger he uses the relentless Algerian sun as a motif for the awareness of reality that pursues the main character, Meursault, throughout the passage. When each motif appears in the novel such as this passage, Meursault’s actions change. This exemplifies that the light, heat, and sun trigger him to become debilitated or furious. Albert Camus sets up this motif in the passage to indicate to the reader that this motif shows the major themes of this novel. This motif shows Meursault’s emotion, how the imagery of weaponry affects Meursault’s actions, how the sun is a representation of society, and how the sun weakens Meursault.

In The Stranger by Albert Camus, the murder committed by Meursault is questionably done with no reason. Although the entirety of the second part is spent in society’s attempts to find a cause, Meursault has a durable existential mentality that proves that even he knows that there is no true reason for the crime. Through the use of light and heat imagery and diction in The Stranger, Albert Camus comments on the duality of society trying to find a cause for the murder and Meursault defying this because of his existential mentality. These elements heighten Meursault’s negative outlook on life by

In The Stranger, Albert Camus describes the life of the protagonist, Meursault, through life changing events. The passage chosen illustrates Meursault’s view during his time in prison for killing the Arab. In prison, one can see the shifts in Meursault’s character and the acceptance of this new lifestyle. Camus manipulates diction to indicate the changes in Meursault caused by time thinking of memories in prison and realization of his pointless life. Because Camus published this book at the beginning of World War II, people at this time period also questions life and death similar to how Meursault does.

The conviction of Meursault represents another main point of absurdism, that life is precious. It only takes forty five minutes for an entire jury to unanimously decide to send Meursault to the guillotine, which is unreasonable. Camus is trying to point this out as one of society’s wrongdoings. The prosecutor's argument had appealed to the jury's emotions and society’s standards rather than reason. If the jury had not felt the emotions that were supposed to influence their decision, the prosecutor's argument would have seemed completely irrational. In a rational world, Meursault's emotions regarding his mother or her funeral would not have influenced his verdict. Meursault commits a crime against an Arab, while Raymond, who had also done so earlier in the book, did not get into any trouble. He would still be found guilty, but only for the crime he committed. This would have definitely lightened his sentence; however, Meursault is sentenced to death. Camus proves the court’s hypocrisy and shows how human

In the novel The Meursault Investigation, Kamel Daoud weaves a sister story for Albert Camus’s The Stranger, and has a dialogue of sorts with Camus. At times Daoud’s novel is very critical of Camus, standing in opposition to the attitudes and themes in The Stranger. The existence of The Meursault Investigation and the character of Musa is a criticism of the incomplete picture that Camus paints in his story, and the namelessness of “The Arab” that Meursault killed. Daoud gives a name to Meursault’s victim beyond that of “The Arab.” At other times, Daoud’s book parallels a lot of the ideas put forth by Camus. This can be seen as Harun slowly comes to resemble the man who killed his brother after committing a murder

The core idea of Albert Camus’ philosophy of absurdity centralizes upon the idea that humans exist in a meaningless universe, and follows that humans must simply accept this fact to live life to the fullest. In addition to this absurdist notion, Albert Camus also uses The Stranger to show how humans still strive to create superficial meaning to fulfill their own personal needs. Through the experiences and interactions in Meursault’s life, Camus illustrates that in spite of how events in life follow no rational order, society attempts to futilely create meaning to explain human existence.

Rubin’s dissection of Meursault in The Stranger details that he “is a man condemned to death not so much for a criminal act as for his attitude.” In regard to this statement, the reader is presented with the idea that he is being put to death as a result of his “attitude,” which is that of an outsider, or someone “removed” from society, and his motives were based on an absurdist mentality that leads one to think of death as “just another thing” because of the pointlessness of life, as there is no hope. We are lead to believe that Meursault is some “sick and twisted” person without realizing his indifference to the emotional expectations of society. The murkiness of his conscience is like a black and white film over his eyes that open to the

Albert Camus creates a series of characters in The Stranger whose personality traits and motivations mirror those that are overlooked by the average man. Camus develops various characters and scenarios that are considered rude and unpleasant, but because it has become common, society accepts it as norms. Camus incorporates atrocious personality traits of the characters, variety, consistency, and everyone’s fate through the creation of the characters.

In the novel, The Stranger by Albert Camus, Meursault the protagonist, becomes drawn into a “senseless” murder that has to face the absurdity of life and because of his actions, Meursault is presented as a danger due to his lack of “morality” to society. Meursault who is not able to take control of his life but respond to what life offers him believes in the simplicity of life. He tries to understand the living through logic and objectivity, which ultimately turns futile, as he himself cannot maintain proper control over his thoughts and emotions. From the interactions between Marie, to the murder of the Arab, and the meeting with the Chaplain, Meursault overcomes his indifferent views to form an opinion about what life really means. The central theme presented by Camus is how the threat of mortality becomes a catalyst for understanding the significance of life.

   The Stranger by Albert Camus was published in 1942. The setting of the novel is Algiers where Camus spent his youth in poverty. In many ways the main character, Meursault, is a typical Algerian youth. Like them, and like Camus himself, Meursault was in love with the sun and the sea. His life is devoted to appreciating physical sensations. He seems so devoid of emotion. Something in Meursault's character has appealed primarily to readers since the book's publication. Is he an absurd anti-hero? Is he a moral monster? Is he a rebel against a conventional morality? Critics and readers alike have disputed a variety of approaches to Meursault. I believe he is the embryo

In The Stranger by Albert Camus, the main character, Meursault, is an absurdist who lives in the moment and refuses to be distracted by societal norms. He views the world as random and is indifferent to it. But to many French people living in Algeria, religion, social order and character are intertwined and are imperative to human life. Camus uses the crucifix and the courtroom to convey the idea that religion is man’s desperate attempt to create meaning in life where there is none.

In Meursault’s world, no action needs reasons to explain them. The irrationality of his actions versus the need for others to justify it through moral lenses exemplifies absurdity. In Myth of Sisyphus, Camus writes, “…absurdity springs from a comparison…it bursts from a comparison between an action and the world that transcends it” (“Myth” 10). Absurdity comes when the society tries to explicate an action or an idea that’s not ‘usual’ or ‘normal.’ To Camus, however, there is no ‘normal’ and ‘usual,’ because the universe’s irrationality cannot be explained and categorized. This belief resides within Meursault’s only two active interactions with the universe: his relationship with Marie and his killing of an Arab. When Marie asks him why he wishes to marry her, he writes, “I explained to her that it didn’t really matter and that if she wanted to, we could get married” (The Stranger, 41). Between marrying and not marrying Marie, there is no change and importance to Meursault’s life. In society’s effort to justify marriage, the couple is expected to love each other and the situation Meursault is

In “The Stranger” by Camus, Meursault’s actions throughout the story can be summed up in one word, absurd.

Meursault begins The Stranger devoid of human sympathy and emotions. He demonstrates such blank indifference in the situation when Raymond brutally beats his girlfriend. Marie “asked [Meursault] to go find a policeman, but [he] told her [he] didn 't like cops.” (Camus, 36) When encountering cruel domestic violence, he shows no feelings of sympathy or disgust. He has no motivation to act, allowing a mere dislike of police to trump his ability to end senseless conflict. Meursault also murders a man in cold blood. Not only does he whimsically allow the mere shine of sunlight to give him justification to end a man’s life, he further illustrates a lack of human emotion, calmly firing “four more times at the motionless body where the bullets lodged without leaving a trace.” (Camus, 59) He remains the same blank slate, without any regret or sadness for what he has done nor fear of the consequences. Although Meursault looks human, he is clearly monstrous and lacks all emotions commonplace to people.