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Albert Camus was born into an impoverished family of Mondovi, Algeria in 11. His father was a self educated member of the work force and his mother was illiterate and deaf. His father died in World War One and he and his mother moved to Algiers and lived with his uncle because they could not support themselves. Camus attended the University of Algiers and sustained himself through working odd jobs. He lived there until he publicly criticized the French colonial government of Algiers and was forced to leave the country. Camus, a Parisian in the midst of the Second World War, began writing for an illegal French loyalist newspaper called Combat, the purpose of this paper was to organize sabotages and ambushes against the occupying Germans. This is the setting in which Camus wrote his most famous work The Stranger. It is important to understand the circumstances of which Camus wrote this novel in order to fully understand what it means and what inspired it.
The Stranger was written in a time where, Camus felt, all hope was gone and the remnants of it were useless annoyances, disrupting logical thought. This is noticeably evident as a main focus in the last chapter of the book when Monsieur Meursault refuses to turn to God or the persistent minister for help or faith before his execution. Meursault felt that the Minister's nagging idea of being saved and that hope still existed disturbed him during his final days where he could think freely. This is an extension of The Stranger's main underlying idea of existentialism, a philosophy Albert Camus was famous for.
Existentialism is the idea of human indifference to the rest of the world, the idea that things exist but have no meaning for humans, that there is no true "meaning" of life. This was actively portrayed throughout the book by the main character of Meursault who was indifferent from the world around him, unattached to most emotional feeling. He also displayed another one of Camus' ideas known as Absolute Freedom, this accounts for his "freedom" from emotional concernedness. In the first chapter, during the procession of his mother's funeral, Meursault dwelled on the fact of how hot the sun was. Meursault was a logical man and was concerned with physical things. He was unlike people he considered irrational and deeply concerned with emotions. Things that most people would consider traumatic and "life-altering", Meursault seemed unattached and unchanged. This is most noticeable when Meursault talks of how his life is the same as before his mother died. Meursault also meets his love interest, Marie and spends the day with her, swimming and watching a comedy, the day after his mother's funeral. The next day Meursault smoked a cigarette and looked over the main street of the town, from the balcony of his apartment, watching as people went about there lives, just as they always had.
Meursault befriended his neighbor Raymond Sintes, who was rumored to be a pimp and was a compulsive liar. Raymond wanted to write a letter to his unfaithful ex-girlfriend to make her feel bad for him, however Raymond was unable to produce a letter that would be effective, so he asked Meursault to write it for him. Meursault agreed and wrote the letter and Raymond tells Meursault they are now "pals". This sequence of events sets up the storyline for the rest of the novel, but is irrelevant to the underlying meaning of the book. The main point of this novel is not the events that occur but how Meursault reacts (or does not react) to them.
Raymond told Meursault that he and Marie were invited to go to a friend's (Masson) beach house with him and Meursault accepts. Once at the beach the group had lunch early and Masson, Raymond, and Meursault take a walk down the beach. They notice two Arabs and Raymond recognized one as his mistress's brother. Raymond recalled seeing them while waiting for the bus to the beach and suspected they are following him. All the men, excluding Meursault, get into a fight. Masson and Raymond manage to beat the Arabs to the ground where they laid still until one of them pulled a knife and cut Raymond's arm and mouth. The Arabs retreated and Raymond wanted to see a doctor immediately, and was taken there by Masson. Meursault stayed with the women at the house. Raymond and Masson came back soon after they left, and Raymond was all bandaged up. Raymond wanted to go for a walk on the beach, probably to look for the Arabs, and Meursault followed him out.
They see the Arabs again, Raymond now has a revolver and asks Meursault if he should shoot them, Meursault essentially said no and took his gun from him. Raymond said that he was going to go start a fight with the Arab again and if the Arab pulled a knife for Meursault to shoot him. During this time, the oppressive sun beats down on the main character and the lazy waves lull Meursault into a drunken state.
The Arab does draw the knife and Meursault immediately shoots him, he notices that the shot had shattered the repressive silence of the beach and the harmony of the day, not that he had just killed someone. After pausing for a few seconds Meursault shoots the Arab four more times, completely detached from what he is doing. This part of the novel was written excellently. Camus simply but descriptively painted the entire scene on the beach as long and drawn out, and oppressive, making the sun's heat, the sand, and "lazy, glaring waves" almost into characters in this part of the novel, all working against the main character. Not only does this show Camus' talent as a writer but it also shows Meursault's recurring concern for logical, physical things such as the weather. Meursault kills a man, one he hadn't known at all, and all he can think about is the unbelievable heat of the sun. This is a reiteration of his concern for physical things and lack of concern for emotional or disturbing events that is shown during his mother's funeral.
Meursault was arrested and put on trial for murder; his sentence if convicted would be death. Once on trial the validity of whether or not he killed a man was not questioned, nor were his reasons. Throughout the trial the opposing lawyer was examining Meursault and asking him of his mothers death, how he felt, the fact he saw a comedy the night after, why he had put her in a retirement home, and other questions that were irrelevant to the trial but displayed Meursault as insensitive and a threat to society. Meursault answered all these questions vaguely and seemed disinterested. Meursault's lawyer completely contradicts what the prosecutor had said and told the jury that he was a good citizen, a model son, one who cares for others and grieves for his mother. Meanwhile Meursault sits listening to other people describing him acting as if he was a spectator to the trial and not actually in it. Meursault realizes that his self image is controlled by other people, that despite what he does he cannot control what people think of him.
The jury chose to believe the prosecutor after hearing his negative summary of Meursault. Meursault knows that if the jury had chosen to side with him it still would not be true justice as neither lawyer accurately described him, it was impossible for the Jury to make the "right" decision. The jury really just had picked which story sounded better.
Meursault was put into a prison cell, until his scheduled execution. At first the only thing Meursault could he could think about was
"…escaping the machinery of justice, seeing if there's any way out of the inevitable."(Camus 108)
Later on in his time in prison Meursault recognized these ideas of hope really nuisances and a waste of time. He believed they distracted him from thinking logically and trying to understand his life. In his time in prison before his execution Meursault was finally enlightened with what his whole life meant, nothing. Nothing, and he was happy of it. He understood that everyone dies and when they do doesn't really matter. He understood that he had been accused of a murder and then executed because he didn't cry at his mother's funeral. He understood everybody has or will die, that death is the only certainty in life. He understood his death would have the same impact as his mother's, none, life would be the same. He understood that "Nothing, nothing mattered…" (11).
At the end of the novel Meursault is at one with himself, his life, and the "…gentle indifference of the world."(1).
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