Albert Camus - "The Stranger"

(Been meaning and forgetting to post this for months now - apologies for the delay)

Albert Camus’s “The Stranger” was first published in 1942 and translated into English in 1946. It is set in French occupied Algeria and is written from the perspective of Meursault whose perspective of the world can be likened to that similar to an existentialist. The translation I read was by American Matthew Ward in 1988, whose style was different to previous translations in that it was Americanised to fit in with Camus’s more American Literary style. It also differs in tone; whilst other translations can be considered cold, Ward’s is thought to be more curious and less insincere. Whilst the book is considered a great example of existentialism, it is said that Camus did not consider himself an existentialist. Albert Camus won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1957 "for his important literary production, which with clear-sighted earnestness illuminates the problems of the human conscience in our times".^[1]

The initial concept of the book is a little jarring. Whilst it is written from the protagonist’s (Meursault) point of view, the way it reads is quite matter of fact. This quite alien concept threw me to begin with, but highlights beautifully the novel’s link to existentialism. Meursault lives his life in the moment, much like existentialists & phenomenologists such as Husserl taught; by not thinking about the past or future, he does not feel either angst or despair. But it is this lack of forethought that eventually creates trouble for him. In terms of existentialism, Meursault is right to consider himself an individual and not to allow himself to be defined by things such as his job or that he is his mother’s son, but ends up in prison for two reasons. The first is that he anticipates that everyone else thinks and lives in the same way. Whilst for him, it is not essential for him to be grief-stricken at his mother’s funeral, society expects him to be in mourning as he is her son. By not conforming to his role or “essence,” he is considered an outsider of society. The second is that whilst he makes choices, he does not consider the impact of these. In terms of some types of existentialism, this would be the correct move to make. Many existentialists think you should live your own life and try to get to where you want to be. The problem is that you may never get there as other people could get in the way of this. For this reason, Meursault is right not to worry about consequences as, essentially, you should focus on yourself and not worry about others as they are not worried about you. However, others would argue that it is wrong not to consider the impact your actions have on others as if you limit someone’s freedom they cannot make a choice and lead a life according to existentialist values. You could also argue that it would be easier to live life if we all tried to help one another out by thinking about the consequences of our actions, which is reflected by society and further by the jury.

As well as an existentialist, Meursault can be considered an empiricist in the sense that he does not seem to deal with emotion but facts and measurements. When talking about going to his mother’s funeral, he describes it as being “about eighty kilometres away.” For most people, this could seem cold and callous but as you read further into the book, this neutral tone starts to become more and more natural. As you begin to realise how normal the unfeeling attitude begins, you realise how unsettling it is that distancing emotion and being absorbed into something, similar to Heidegger’s ideas about being dasein. This is not the only way, though, that the book links back to existentialism; some of the other characters in the book that contrast with Meursault serve to show how being dasein and dasman affect your life from an existentialist’s point of view. Salamano and his dog show that you should live for yourself to be dasein. Because he has made his dog his world, Salamano is not happy; he constantly swears at and beats the dog but, when he loses his dog, he is still dasman as he has lost his life’s purpose which he assigned to the dog. Contrary to this, the relationship between Salamano and his dog can also highlight the existentialist idea that we assign our own values to things as there are no inherent values or meaning in life. Another person that lives in the same apartment block to Meursault and Salamano is Raymond Sintès; it could be argued that Raymond’s outlook on life is similar to Meursault and that both could be considered existentialists to some degree. However, unlike Meursault, Raymond seems keen to live up to others expectations. For example, at the beach, the existentialist side of Raymond would have shot the Arab as that is what he wanted to do but as he was so keen to please Meursault, he did not. These characters’ social normalcy directly contrasts Meursault’s arguably more modern outlook.

At the end of the book Meursault’s thoughts become more obviously similar to an existentialist’s viewpoint. As he waits in prison, he stops hoping to be freed and begins to be almost content that he is to be executed as he realises that, in his mind, there is no real point to life. As he opens himself “to the gentle indifference of the world,” he concludes that nearing the end of life gives you a kind of freedom and with this knowledge he finds happiness. This links back to his mother and the way she acted in the time leading up to her death; originally, Meursault finds it difficult to understand why his mother “took a fiancé” whilst at the care home but as he realises the brevity of his existence, he understands the freedom that comes with this finality. It is debatable that his view point at this stage is almost nihilistic, depending on your interpretation of the text, in that aside from not finding any inherent meaning in the world he seems content to resign himself death, almost as though this lack of definite value makes living pointless. However, the fact that he imparts his own meaning onto the things he can see from his cell directly contradicts this idea.

It is easy to apply absurdism to Meursault’s perspective. Meursault applies his own values and meaning to things that generally differ greatly from that of others; for him it is reasonable to shoot someone accidently due to the heat of the sun and almost expects others to understand. Similarly, he does not try to apply meaning to his relationship with Marie. Whilst she attempts to find meaning with him by asking if he loves her and if he would marry her, Meursault appears indifferent. This indifference, it could be said, is not due to a lack of feelings for his girlfriend, but instead is him showing that he does not need to apply a meaning or label to the two of them as these differ from person to person and therefore are, to him at least, unnecessary.

Whether or not an existentialist would consider Meursault’s life authentic or not is difficult to decide. On one hand, you can argue that he does not allow his facticity (his past) to affect his life. This is seen at the beginning of the book when he says, “it occurred to me that anyway one more Sunday was over, that Maman was buried now, that I was going back to work, and that, really, nothing had changed.” However, existentialists could also say that to entirely disregard your facticity is also to live an inauthentic life as you deny yourself. Plus, for existentialists, the future is the most important dimension as we are creatures of the possible; the very next decision we make is the most important in existentialism. As Meursault does not seem to consider the future at all, you could argue he does not live as an existentialist would. However, if he dwelled too long on the future, his life would also be inauthentic so it is difficult to work out if he has got the balance correct or not, particularly as this would differ with each fraction of existentialism and, indeed, each individual person has their own nature, as stated by Nietzsche; as “God is dead” there is not universal human nature so we are free to find and follow our own thoughts and ideals.

In terms of ethics, Meursault does not seem interested in the utility of others so is unlikely to subscribe to utilitarian thoughts on the subject, seen both in his lack of compassion when he discovers Salamono’s dog is lost but particularly when writing the horrible letter to Raymond’s girlfriend on his behalf. Neither does he seem to think transcending will is good, seen in the way that he indulges pleasures such as smoking and sleeping with Marie. Arguably, if he had transcended self and led a Christian life, as depicted in Kierkegaard’s concept of moral ascent, he could have avoided his fate and been happy. By marrying Marie or showing grief and following Christian observations at his mother’s funeral, the jury and therefore society, would have been less inclined to see him as a threat and believe that the shooting was in fact an accident. However, Meursault’s existential view point extends to his morality and he at least appears to try to live and authentic life.

When reading “The Stranger,” the factual tone and emotional distance of the protagonist to his account of the day, the immediate comparison I drew was to “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” by Mark Haddon. Both novels are written from the main character’s perspective and both are very factual in their accounts of the story. However, the major difference between them is that Meursault has the ability to understand emotion, he seems to deliberately distance himself from them whereas Christopher Boone from Haddon’s book is autistic and therefore finds it very difficult to understand and process emotion. Another similarity they share is that others do not understand them and in many ways, they do not understand other people. When Christopher is questioned by the police about the dog, his answers do not make sense to what the police officer expected; similarly, Meursault’s lawyer does not understand why he wants to tell the truth. Also, neither understands the thought process of those asking the questions. However, whilst Meursault cannot understand the necessity for certain questions to be asked, Christopher struggles to understand the questions or how he is supposed to respond which is seen in the way these characters describe these difficult conversations. Comparing these two characters is quite interesting; you could argue that, potentially, these similarities give an insight into the way both characters think and, in turn, how the mind of an autistic person works.

You could argue that, as both characters see life in quite a linear fashion, an autistic person’s brain is hard wired to think like an existentialist might. For example, a common part of autism is having fixations or obsessions with things such as a television show or computer game. This could be equated to their dasein as it is the person’s involvement with this that makes them happy. Of course, this concept could never be proved as there is not real way of telling how anyone’s brain works, per say, besides which, there are as many differences as there are similarities. For example, the nihilism of Meursault’s thoughts differ greatly to that of Christopher’s; whilst there is no meaning to life or a necessary natural progression of history for Meursault, you could easily argue that Christopher sees the world in a more teleological light. As he investigates the death of his neighbour’s dog, he indirectly uses the idea of ends and beginnings to history, which seems to be an intrinsic part of his thinking, to work back through time to find out who the killer was.