Meursault's View Of Society

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.

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.

1. How does Camus set up Meursault's personality -- how does Meursault respond to others' conversation, to ordinary social situations, and to the death of his mother?

Meursault’s indifference is skillfully used by Camus to reveal societal hypocrisy. Meursault has integrity: he does not display emotions that

In The Stranger by Albert Camus, Meursault undergoes a dramatic transformation from an emotionless, prosaic man to an ardent being after committing an unwarranted murder. His drastic change of personality would suggest that Meursault faked his inability to emote before his crime and that he only changed because he was sentenced to death and was forced to withdraw from his physical desires. However, immediately after Maman’s funeral, Meursault shows that he was too preoccupied with the extreme heat to focus on his emotions. After being forced to withdraw from his physical desires, Meursault adapts from a man who is driven and distracted by physical demands to a fully developed passionate being.

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.

After Maman died, Meursault met his girlfriend, Marie. She was as beautiful as he could imagine and he loved her company. As most people who possess very strong feelings for

Furthermore, the Chaplin, a priest who attends to the religious needs of the accused men, acts as a catalyst of sorts for Meursault’s psychological and philosophical development. The Chaplin tells Meursault to take comfort in God despite his atheism. Eventually, Meursault breaks and becomes enraged, asserting that his life was meaningless. This also triggers a philosophical breakthrough for the character, coming to a conclusion that the universe is meaningless…

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.

Camus describes in detail the street scenes yet never does Meursault become involved in them. Meursault is distant from the messiness of plans, ambitions, desires, hatreds, even love. Marie's protestations of love only puzzle him. When she asks him if he wishes to marry her he agrees only because he sees no real reason to refuse. He helps in Raymond's nefarious schemes for equally bland reasons, and also because Raymond plies him with food, drink, and cigarettes. He is even distant from his own trial. It interests him because he has never seen a trial before.

Meursault’s character from the point of introduction establishes himself to be a deviant from society, as he reveals that his mother has died, stating that it “doesn’t mean anything,” while contemplating it may have been “yesterday” (Camus, 1). Meursault does not react in the same fashion in which one would expect a person to, by showing a lack of emotion towards the news. Instead, he imparts an indifferent attitude, inciting a reaction that makes one wonder: what ever happened to make this individual so cold to his own mother? However, this is just Meursault’s way of being,

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.

Widely recognized for philosophical writings as a French essayist and playwright, Albert Camus is a major contributor to exploring the absurd in modern Western literature. Characterized by highlighting the human condition, Camus’ writing style focuses on the everyday lives and inner psyche of individuals in both ordinary and extraordinary circumstances. Such a character-driven writing style is most notably displayed in his 1946 work, The Stranger, a tale of an emotionally-detached man known as Meursault, who lives in French-colonized Algiers during the intermission of the two World Wars. Consisting of two parts—The Stranger first explores his daily life as a free man, and in the second, delves more into the character’s own philosophy as Meursault contemplates during his remaining time in jail. At its core, the story explores the relationships and interactions of the odd Meursault through the character’s inner monologue and dialogue with those around him. The story itself is very ambiguous in its’ nature, and the idea of contemplating the meaning of life and purpose is prevalent throughout The Stranger. Evidently, Camus writes Meursault as a man who believes that life has no meaning, and therefore people are free to do as they please. To supplement the protagonist’s view, the author also presents Meursault alongside various personalities of key supporting characters, each with their own unique personality, and differing outlooks on life. Doing so thus enables Camus to get readers to contemplate about meaning through multiple perspectives. Stylistically, through many devices that emphasize diction, imagery, and story themes. Ultimately, The Stranger is a way for Camus to convey that there are multiple ways to perceive the meaning of life, using Meursault to directly project a different view than what readers are used to. Surely, with the intent of crafting a protagonist so strange, that Meursault becomes comparable to other characters; less so as a reflection of what the author personally believes the meaning of life is, but more of what such exploration of the idea could be.