...In Albert Camus’ The Stanger, Meursault is an outsider basically by choice due to his detached attitude that makes him emotionally indifferent. He is very in touch with his senses, but not his emotions. He experiences his surroundings thoroughly, but does not form deep connections with any of the people in his life. His mother’s death causes no apparent sadness and he feels no strong feelings of love towards his girlfriend, Marie. He seems to be walking through life observing without attachment. The start of the novel shows his extreme detachment from others. At his mother’s funeral the strongest feeling he experiences is a craving for a cigarette. He is almost annoyed by his mother’s friends crying through the night. His behavior is abnormal and it’s Camus’ way of intriguing the readers. As a reader it’s hard to relate to someone who is so emotionless at a funeral therefore the reader wonders Meursault and what caused him to behave this way. Tonio Kröger from Thomas Mann’s Tonio Kröger is different from Meursault because of his frequent experiences of deep admiration for other people. He falls in and out of love with the people he meets. Starting with Hans Hansen as a young boy, followed by Ingeborg in Tonio’s early teens, and then Lisaveta who challenges his...
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...1. Meursault is very aware of his surroundings during the vigil as demonstrated by his use of extremely descriptive details of the older men and women, as seen in this quote, “I saw them more clearly than I had ever seen anyone, and not one detail of their faces or their clothes escaped me” (9, 10). He noticed every little thing about them, their toothless mouths, their fat stomachs, and their nests of wrinkles. He thought they were judging him so he started picking out their flaws. 2. Meursault was unaware of his surroundings and what he was about to get himself into when walking down to the beach to escape the sun. He was walking toward the glob of rocks that he thought would provide shade, unaware that “Raymond’s man had come back” (57)....
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... his case. The prosecutor and Meursault obviously did not have the same kind of relationship that Meursault had with Marie and Raymond. However, this relationship was still a significant part of the book. The difference between Meursault and the prosecutor is that the prosecutor has a ton of confidence while Meursault lacks confidence. As a prosecutor, a trait that one needs to possess is confidence. This helps make the jury think that they are telling the truth. During the case the prosecutor said, “For in the course of what has been a long career I have had occasion to call for the death penalty, never as strongly as today have I felt this...
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...In Part One, Meursault works as a shipping clerk in Algiers, a city in North Africa. He learns of his mother’s death, and although he is somewhat ambivalent upon hearing the news, he travels to the nursing home to attend her funeral and sit in vigil over her body. At the funeral he displays little emotion and is not interested in viewing his mother’s body. The following day, back in Algiers, Meursault meets a young woman, Marie Cardona, and they go swimming together. Because of Meursault’s cheerful attitude, Marie is surprised to learn of his mother’s death. Later, in the evening, they see a comic film together and then return to Meursault’s apartment where they make love. Meursault spends the next day alone in his apartment, eating, and watching...
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...heightened into him actualizing the Absurd. From his carefully chosen first words to his last the narrative of Meursault ends. As Ellison emplores and elaborates upon, Meursault’s journey leading up to actualizing the absurd was the design of his indifferent attitude and outlook on the world conflicting with theirs, on an emotional and judiciary standpoint. “The notion of the absurd as developed in The Stranger depends upon a confrontational relation between the misunderstood and mistreated individual and a society whose rules and laws hover in an abstract realm beyond his control and comprehension”. The development in terms of Meursault laying "[his] heart open to the benign indifference of the universe" and ultimate happiness is interested primarily in the condemnation of Meursault from his incomprehension to consciously recognize or perceive the norms of his society....
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...The Stranger, by Albert Camus, depicts a story about a young man named Meursault whose mother has just died. After his mother dies, he kills an Arab man senselessly so he is put on trial. Throughout the story of his trial, Meursault’s mindset is explored. In Albert Camus’ novel The Stranger, Meursault displays the theme of alienation. The main character isolates himself emotionally, from society, his friends and his significant other, Marie. Meursault does not give an explanation as to why he detaches himself from the world. However, the nonexistence of his father and detachment with his mother are key factors that correlate to his need to alienate himself. The absence of Meursault’s father plays into the one of the reasons why Meursault...
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...world view. The novel tells the story of an emotionally detached, amoral young man named Meursault. In Camus’ opinion there is no ultimate, sense-giving meaning in the world, man must think and act independently. He personifies this view in making Meursault a complete outsider to society. Meursault is shown to be far more interested in the physical aspects of the world around him than in its social or emotional aspects. His attention is focused on his on body, on his physical relationship with Marie, on the weather, and on other physical details of his surroundings. The heat during the funeral procession causes Meursault far more pain that the thought of burying his mother, “with the whole landscape flooded in sunshine and shimmering in the heat, it was inhospitable and depressing.” Enivitably we judge him as heartless and unfeeling, but following Camus’ philosophy, death was a certainty for his mother so Meursault has no reason to grieve. To him the funeral was an everyday event like any other. Similarly, the heat of the sun on the beach torments Meursault, and during his trial he says the sun caused him to kill the Arab. The style of Meursault’s narration also shows his interest in the physical. He gives terse, plain descriptions without mentioning his emotional feelings and his descriptions become more vivid and ornate when he discusses topics such as nature and weather. Meursault, in the opening line of the novel, immediately reveals himself to be indifferent toward...
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...Quicklet on Albert Camus' The Stranger. * * There are five main themes in The Stranger: 1. Alienation. Camus establishes Meursault as an outsider early on in the narrative. The first few pages of the book show Meursault at his mother’s funeral. Meursault watches people and events with no particular connection -- he is distant, feels out of place, feels nervous as he thinks people are staring at him. He does not exhibit any particular sadness at his mother’s death. As the story develops we notice how he comprehends facts but not feelings. He spends more time fixated on trivial physical characteristics than he does on emotional content. He is polite, and passive, but lacks empathy. He is like this throughout the narrative; his character doesn’t really evolve. 2. Time and circumstance. Camus uses some subtle literary tricks to get the reader to imagine that random events strung together are fateful. Meursault’s mother dies, he sees a movie with his girlfriend, he’s walking up a flight of stairs and a neighbor invites him to dinner, a man’s dog goes missing. In between unrelated events like these Camus weaves a simple story about a man who makes the fatal mistake of getting involved with a small-time gangster and ends up murdering someone almost by accident. Camus’ narrative brings the random events full circle as Meursault is convicted for being cold-hearted. In other words, the story reads like a car crash on a highway. All the drivers had some reason to...
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...In Albert Camus' The Stranger the Meursault is clearly disillusioned of life and two examples of this disillusionment occurred in the instances of his mother's death and an offer to be transferred to another work environment. The novel The Stranger by Albert Camus portrays how Meursault is disillusioned about things that seem to be the most normal basic human concepts of understanding such as his mothers death. With his mother's death, he seemed indifferent at the loss of her life in every way possible. He was so uninterested in her funeral that he remarked the following: "...I can be there for the vigil and come back tomorrow night" (Camus 3). His mother appeared to slow him down. As if he felt he had better things to do. He claimed he never went to visit her in the nursing home because she enjoyed it too much. Nonetheless, he admitted, that the visit "took up my Sunday -- not to mention the trouble of getting to the bus, buying tickets, and spending two hours traveling" (Camus 5). This shows the true lack of care in his mothers death. To further define his insensitivity, Meursault shed not even one tear in this part of the novel; moreover, he expressed no form of sorrow whatsoever. Secondly, Meursault's attitude and reaction toward an offer to be relocated to a Parisian location was a monumental indicator of his insensitivity. One would expect him to accept or decline the offer graciously and respectfully. Meursault proved, again, to be unpredictable when he states, in...
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...of death. It is at the conclusion of the night that Meursault could be picked up for his execution. He is unable to sleep due to fear that each night may be his last: “After midnight, I would wait and watch” (113). There is some irony in this use of darkness because normally Meursault is comforted by the dark, but here it portends his greatest fear, his execution. () Sounds: Meursault is hyperaware of himself within his environment while awaiting execution. “Footsteps”, “small sounds”, “slight shuffling” are the sounds Meursault feels are a threat to his life. They intensify his anxiety, which causes him to be acutely aware of even the sounds he produces such as his breathing and his heart beat. The words of sounds are used ironically because Meursault is usually looked at to be insensitive to things. He notices his surroundings, but usually doesn’t connect with them. In this case, he notices and connects with them in the sense that noticing the little sounds intensify his anxiety....
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...demonstrate his philosophy of the world with the protagonist, Meursault. The society described in the novel, much like our own, has varies overwhelming influences from the media and the society towards the general public. This statement may seem paradoxical, but it is one of the vital factors in the protagonist, Meursault’s, development and realization of Camus’s philosophy, existentialism. Furthermore, it is this influence from others that separates Meursault from others and truly defines him as an outsider to society. The novel begins with an interesting event where the antagonist, Meursault’s mother dies. Then as the story goes on Meursalt continues on a romantic appointment with a women the very next day. From these events the readers find them under the impression that Meursault is someone that shows very little emotion and is very detached from the world around him. Later we find out that this is not entirely true. Although it is not stressed often, it is revealed in varies situations that Meursault does have emotions and show them very honestly. The author in some cases even purposely avoids mentioning Meursault’s emotion upon situations as in the first sentence of the book “Mother died today. Or maybe yesterday, I don’t know.” (P1)This gives a very strong impression that he cares little for his mother. However, later in as in the book “I wanted to see mother right away.” This quote explains that Meursault does care fore his mother, but it is written in such a way that...
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...The Irrationality of the Universe Though The Stranger is a work of fiction, it contains a strong resonance of Camus’s philosophical notion of absurdity. In his essays, Camus asserts that individual lives and human existence in general have no rational meaning or order. However, because people have difficulty accepting this notion, they constantly attempt to identify or create rational structure and meaning in their lives. The term “absurdity” describes humanity’s futile attempt to find rational order where none exists. Though Camus does not explicitly refer to the notion of absurdity in The Stranger, the tenets of absurdity operate within the novel. Neither the external world in which Meursault lives nor the internal world of his thoughts and attitudes possesses any rational order. Meursault has no discernable reason for his actions, such as his decision to marry Marie and his decision to kill the Arab. Society nonetheless attempts to fabricate or impose rational explanations for Meursault’s irrational actions. The idea that things sometimes happen for no reason, and that events sometimes have no meaning is disruptive and threatening to society. The trial sequence in Part Two of the novel represents society’s attempt to manufacture rational order. The prosecutor and Meursault’s lawyer both offer explanations for Meursault’s crime that are based on logic, reason, and the concept of cause and effect. Yet these explanations have no basis in fact and serve only as attempts to...
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...of Camus’ works are representative of the philosophy of existentialism. His well-known fictional piece is “The Stranger”. Meursault, the narrator of The Stranger, is an existential anti-hero. Locked into the routine of daily existence, his life is a shapeless void without ideas, preferences, goals, or emotions. Like a robot, Meursault responds to everything automatically, neither feeling nor caring. When he is offered a job transfer to Paris, Meursault says he does not care where he works; yet he does not go because moving would be too much trouble. His mother’s death is met with similar lack of response: he feels no despair or grief. Occasionally, Meursault lacks motivation to do anything, so he spends the day sitting at his bedroom window, smoking cigarettes more out of habit than desire. Meursault utilizes all of the six existential themes: Freedom, Contingency, Individuality, Existence, Reflection, and Nihilism. The first existential theme is freedom. Freedom means that whatever happened prior to now does not influence what your next choice in life will be, we are free to make any choice we want. Meursault displays Freedom by just doing as he wishes to do. Meursault’s mother dies so he attends the funeral. While at his mother's funeral, Meursault decides to smoke cigarettes, drink a cup of coffee, and also he fails to cry. This just shows how Meursault is displaying his free will, he does not let the influence of his mother dying effect what he...
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...novel, Meursault, feel a lack of remorse over his mother’s death? Why did Meursault choose to shoot and kill “the Arab” after attempting to convince his neighbor Raymond not to shoot? Lastly, if what Meursault believes is true, that the world and human existence has no rational purpose or higher meaning, then what is the reason...
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...establishes thru many ways. Primarily in the texts structural level, Camus established the tone with the use of short, declarative sentences with no emotion. The narration is done in a matter of fact way creating the detached tone which resonates throughout the whole chapter. The detached tone allows no medium for which emotion is to pass. No matter the event the text maintains this structure of declarative, short clauses bearing no emotion- thus adhering to the tone of detachment. Secondly, Camus also uses digression as a method of establishing the detached tone. Digression serves as a method for Meursault to go to his own world: one he could call his own, with his own norms and beliefs. The motif which recurs as a medium for Meursault’s digression is the weather. This is witnessed initially in the bus trip as he dozes off from glaring at the sky (Pg4). This occurs just pages after when Meursault wakes up to the day of the funeral, as he refers to the day as “beautiful” (Pg12), which directly contrasts the supposed mood of sadness due to the death. Finally, he digresses again at the time of the funeral. He impatiently waits for it to be over- as he claims that he cannot concentrate because of the heat. (Pg15). These digressions to weather have enforced the...
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