How Does Meursault Follow A Virtue Of Religion?

He has no initial reaction to the news of her death, and at her funeral service he did not bother to even see her before she was buried. His lack of emotion is evident in the very first lines of the book, “Mother died today. Or maybe it was yesterday, I don’t know.” This shows that Meursault is hardly caring for his mother. Society’s standards would result in him to be in absolute mourning and wanting to go as fast as possible to her body. This is not the only example of Meursault’s lack of emotion and care for factors in his life. He does not care for love and marriage after having intercourse with someone; the society standard at this time was to get married if two partners had intercourse. He does not care for promotion and career advancement when his boss offers him a better job opportunity; the standard at that time and right now is to pursue the best career possible. In these scenarios Meursault is living free from the chains, and does whatever he thinks is right to do. Eventually, society rejects him and his ways, and he gets in trouble with the law. He is judged by society and his ways are ridiculed, making Meursault appear to be a monster.

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 answer is simple: it does not relate to the murder of the Arab. Being the representative of society, the jury opposes Meursault and accuses him of not conforming to society's natural ways, and being what we nowadays refer to as the "odd one out". They exclude him from society for his odd clear-cut and sincere demeanor, and for his manifestation of an inexpressive character. Another example is the moment in which the magistrate, a local member of the judiciary having limited jurisdiction, especially in criminal cases, questioned Meursault.

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

“It occurred to me that anyway one more Sunday was over, that Mamam was buried now, that I was going back to work and that really, nothing had changed.”(1.1.15) These are some of the words that ran through Meursault’s mind after his mother’s death. He was very isolated from her so he felt as if nothing had changed. He was not the most outgoing person but the same cannot be said about his love interest, Marie. Throughout the novel, The Stranger, Meursault and Marie reveal just how many similarities and differences they share in the topics of emotion, actions and mannerism.

This shows just how little he cared for such matters, writing off the topic of marriage so trivially. Meursault continues on to say to the reader that “she was the one who was doing the asking and all I was saying was yes.” (Camus 41-42). He justifies his lack of excitement or romance by stating that only Marie asked about, implying that he did not care for having a tight, emotional relationship with his lover, Marie. Marie plays the source of the love between them, while Meursault simply listens and enjoys in the pleasure of having her, but still feeling indifferent to her actual emotions. This downplay on their relationship and her feelings demonstrate that Meursault does not value anything of Marie below surface level and that he lacks the need for a warmer connection between them.

In the climax of The Stranger, Meursault confronts an arabic man on a beach after a violent confrontation. Meursault was carrying his friends revolver at the time and used it on the arab. In his words, the sunś blinding light combined with his pounding headache urged him to fire upon the arab.

This shows just how little he cared for such matters, writing off the topic of marriage so trivially. Meursault continues on to say to the reader that “she was the one who was doing the asking and all I was saying was yes.” (Camus 41-42). He justifies his lack of excitement or romance by stating that only Marie asked about, implying that he did not care for having a tight, emotional relationship with his lover, Marie. Marie plays the source of the love between them, while Meursault simply listens and enjoys in the pleasure of having her, but still feeling indifferent to her actual emotions. This downplay on their relationship and her feelings demonstrate that Meursault does not value anything of Marie below surface level and that he lacks the need for a warmer connection between them.

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.

In Albert Camus’ The Stranger, Meursault is seen as a very unique character, but not in a good way. Throughout the novel, he continually fails to show normal human emotions to things like his mother’s death, Marie’s love, and the man he killed. Most people in his town, along with the reader at first, are not able to reason out his actions but as the final events of the novel unfold, the reader begins to see Meursault in a different light.

Meursault was introduced as a young man whom recently found out his mother, Maman, died. He was not the most emotional person, but he dealt with his feelings the best he knew how. Meursault lived his life on the verge of truth and honesty. He was honest within every aspect of life, from women to freedom. He was never certain about anything in life ,but one thing he was sure of, death was inevitable. After murdering an Arab, he was on trial in front of many people being interrogated with many questions about why he did what he did, but also to evaluate his psyche about the situation. Unlike others, Meursault did not hide from the truth and that is what others could not cope with. Living his life the way others were afraid to, Meursault was the outcast in his society.

What is equally absurd is that Meursault remains passive and detached over the course of a year of interrogations, and despite the pessimistic nature of his situation, he is able to feel a sense of comfort and belonging within the system trying to condemn him. Ironically, those witness testimonies that sought to free him prove to be the most damaging, and the religious people who surround him and purport to love all men unconditionally persecute him for his lack of belief. Everyone is astonished that Meursault has no emotions about the murder --no sense of remorse or desire to repent. Most men in his position find

When he returns home to Algiers, Meursault carries on with life as normal. Over dinner one evening, his neighbor Raymond tells of his desire to punish his mistress for infidelity, and asks Meursault to write a letter to the mistress for him. Meursault agrees, saying "I tried my best to please Raymond because I didn’t have any reason not to please him" (32). While Raymond is a man of questionable morals, he acts with purpose. Meursault, on the other hand, acts with mostly passive indifference, doing things simply because he doesn’t have a reason not to do them.

This easy-going, pleasant hedonism is interrupted permanently by Meursault's murder of the Arab on the beach. Not only is he incarcerated, but also he must examine the reality behind the illusion of his trial and, ultimately, of his life. Introspection has not been his metier. It takes him a while to realize that the judge, the jury, the journalists, even his own lawyer, do not wish him well. Meursault finally realizes that he is going to be convicted, not because he killed an Arab but because he did not mourn his mother's death.

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.