The Short Story Of Daru's 'The Guest'

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.

5. This story has as its background a specific political situation - the French Algerian crisis in the years following World War II. How does Daru reflect France's plight? Is the story's meaning limited to this situation? What does the story tell us about good and evil and the nature of moral choice?

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 stories of James Joyce’s “Araby” and John Updike’s “A&P” share identical literary traits from each character which are the protagonist. The main point of the two is that they revolve around a young male who is pressured by his conscience to untangle the difference between the harsh reality and the fantasies of romance that play in his head. The young man does indeed recognize the difference is what turns him in the direction of an emotional catastrophe.

The speaker in James Joyce’s “Araby” has an epiphany that changes his view on the world around him. The short story is about a boy that travels to a bazaar to buy a present for a girl he has a crush on. The journey doesn’t go the way he expected it to go and he has becomes upset and frustrated. The speaker of “Araby” starts out as youth that is ignorant of the world around him and then he has an epiphany that is heightened by irony and presents a universal theme about life.

In his novel, The Stranger by Albert Camus, translated by Matthew Ward, irony within the protagonist’s ( Meursault ) contrasting perception of the human condition is used to illustrate and invoke the reader to question the contradictory nature of societal expectations. His indifferent and unprecedented reactions to experiences - relative to the characters that Camus laid before him - aid in displaying the absurdity of a world constrained by the chains of conventional wisdom. The contrasting nature of Meursault's demeanor in defying conventional wisdom in experiences such as love and death not only reveals the underlying hypocrisy of the human condition but further illustrates the arbitrary essence of defining a human life.

At the start of this realization, Camus displays how the French whites, have a racially segregated perspective towards the Arabs and blacks. Camus first starts of this differentiation by having Meursault dehumanize “ the Arabs” as they were “backing away” from the colonists (56). By not giving the arab men names, Camus demonstrates the idea of “othering” them to reduce the impact of their being from the impressions of their brain. In describing the nameless men, Camus goes further to only express how the Arab men were “ lying down in greasy overalls;” demonstrating the classist view in society between races, and how the only description of the Arab men is to

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.

This emphasises Daru being out of touch from society and other people as he is not accustomed to others presence and he is so alienated he does not spend time around other. To "impose" on someone a sense of "brotherhood" also conveys Daru's estrangement as Daru feels as though he has no choice. This highlights Daru being "out of touch" as he juxtaposes the words "impose" and "brotherhood" which shows he does not understand society's definition of brotherhood and its positive connotation. Daru displays anger and annoyance towards other people which highlights how Daru does not have a positive relationship with another person. After he hears of the Arab's crime Daru "felt a sudden wrath against the man, against all men" (Camus 2315.) Daru's "wrath" indicates an intense emotion of anger directed towards "all men." This means that Daru does not form a relationship with anyone due to his wrath. By feeling that level of anger Daru alienates himself and cannot form attachment to

In the novel, The Stranger, author Albert Camus confronts some important issues of the time, and uses the singular viewpoint of the narrator Meursault to develop his philosophy and effectively weave together themes of absurdity, colonialism, and free will. Through the progressive disruption of Meursault’s life and his characterization, Camus presents the absurdity of the human condition along with the understanding that a person can actually be happy in the face of the absurd. Camus also intentionally sets the story in the colonized country of Algeria, and hints at the racial tensions that exist between French-Algerians and Arabs.

The end of World War II and the start of the Algerian War of Independence defined France during the mid 1900s. Many black intellectuals, including poet Léopold Sédar Senghor and writer William Gardner Smith grappled with the war, colonialism and racism that permeated French culture, whether overtly or subtly. Despite the similar imagery within their prose, the authors showcase two distinct points of view. Both authors describe ugly, inhuman visages, but in Senghor’s work, these twisted faces are merely masks, as removable as the humanly-constructed horror of the era, whereas Smith sees the twistedness as fully ingrained in the human countenance.

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.

this by his refusal to turn the Arab in, and the conflict he goes through when

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.