Book Review: "The Stranger" by Albert Camus

 "The Stranger" by Albert Camus

I recently read a book called “The Stranger” by Albert Camus because I love to think about big questions like, “Is there a purpose to life?” and “Why do bad things happen?” “The Stranger” is a famous book that talks about these things. I really like books that make you think and wonder. It’s fun to figure out why a book is so good and share my ideas with other people who love books too.

In this blog, I’ll talk about “The Stranger” by Albert Camus. It’s a really cool book that starts with a simple story but goes deeper into big questions about life and death. I’m excited to share my thoughts on it, and I hope you like it too!

Through the story of an average man who becomes accidentally involved in a meaningless murder on a beach in Algeria., Camus explored what he termed 

“The nakedness of man faced with the absurd.”

Meursault, an indifferent French Algerian, is the protagonist of The Stranger, to whom the novel’s title refers.

The novel begins:

“Maman died today. Or yesterday maybe, I don’t know. I got a telegram from the home: “Mother deceased. Funeral tomorrow. Faithfully yours.” That doesn’t mean anything. Maybe it was yesterday.”

Right from the start, we can see Meursault’s emotional indifference and detached personality. An aspect that is often lost in translation is that he uses the child’s word “Maman”, literally “Mommy”, instead of the more adult “Mother”. Camus wrote in his notebooks that:

“The curious feeling the son has for his mother constitutes all his sensibility.”

Meursault is asked if he wants to see his mother who is sealed in the coffin. He declines the offer. During the vigil, he drinks coffee and smokes cigarettes next to the coffin, showing his indifference to his mother’s death.

That night, he happily arrives back in Algiers. The next day he goes to the beach for a swim. There he runs into Marie, his former co-worker, they go watch a comedy at the movie theatre that evening and spend the night together.

Throughout the novel, Marie asks him if he loves her, and he simply replies that: “it didn’t mean anything”, but probably not. She also asks him if he wants to marry her, he replies indifferently but says that they can get married if she wants to, so they become engaged.

Meursault has an encounter with one of his Neighbours who curses and beats his mangy dog. One day, he laments that his dog has run away and can be heard weeping in the night longing for its return. This strong grief over someone losing his dog contrasts with Meursault’s indifference at losing his mother.

The climax of the novel takes part on a Sunday trip to a beach house.

“The sun was starting to burn my cheeks, and I could feel drops of sweat gathering in my eyebrows. The sun was the same as it had been the day I’d buried Maman, and like then, my forehead especially was hurting me, all the veins in it throbbing under the skin. It was this burning which I couldn’t stand anymore, that made me move forward. I knew that it was stupid, that I couldn’t get the sun off me by stepping forward. But I took a step, one step, forward. And this time, without getting up, the Arab drew his knife and held it up to me in the sun. The light shot off the steel and it was like a long flashing blade cutting at my forehead […] My whole being tensed and I squeezed my hand around the revolver. The trigger gave […] I knew I had shattered the harmony of the day, the exceptional silence of a beach where I’d been happy. Then I fired four more times at the motionless body where the bullets lodged without leaving a trace. And it was like knocking four quick times at the door of unhappiness.”

Meursault kills a man whom he did not know, an involuntary and absurd act. The sun merely struck his knife, sweat was running in his eyes. From this moment he enters the world of judgment. And the world of judgment is the discovery of man.

Meursault is arrested and thrown into jail. His lack of remorse over his crime, and, in particular, his lack of grief at his mother’s funeral makes people think of him as a complete stranger.

In prison, he is tormented by the isolation from nature, women, and cigarettes.

“When I was first imprisoned, the hardest thing was that my thoughts were still those of a free man. For example, I would suddenly have the urge to be on a beach and to walk down to the water.”

He eventually adapts, sharing his mother’s attitude that “after a while, you could get used to anything”.

In the courtroom Meursault is seen as a monster and people believe that the emptiness of his heart threatens to swallow up society. His lack of belief in God, gives him the nickname “Monsieur Antichrist”.

Meursault is afflicted by the madness of sincerity, distinguished by his never wanting to say more than he feels. When asked if he grieved at his mother’s burial, he neither admits nor denies having grieved. It is this tenacious refusal, this fascination with the authenticity of what one is and what one feels that gives meaning to the entire novel.

When asked why he had killed the Arab, he says that it was because of the sun. People laugh at him. Eventually, he is found guilty and is sentenced to death by guillotine. This shows one of the forms of the Absurd, a young man who wants to live but is condemned to die.

While waiting for his execution, he struggles to come to terms with his situation, and he has trouble accepting the certainty and inevitability of his fate. He is visited by the Chaplain who tries to make him renounce his atheism and turn to God, but he refuses. Instead, he declares that he is correct in believing in a meaningless, purely physical world.

One thing that really struck me about this book is how it makes you question your own beliefs and actions. How much of what we do is because we really want to, and how much is because it's what society expects? Are we really free if we're always worrying about how others see us? Meursault might seem cold and uncaring at first, but is there something admirable about his honesty and refusal to pretend?

The book also makes you think about justice. Meursault is on trial for killing a man, which is clearly wrong. But the trial focuses more on what kind of person he is rather than the crime itself. Is that fair? Should we judge people for not following social norms, even if they're not hurting anyone?

In the end, "The Stranger" is a book about being true to yourself, even when that puts you at odds with the world around you. It's about facing the absurdity of life head-on, without trying to hide from it. It's not always an easy journey, but it's one that can lead to a kind of freedom. And isn't that something we're all looking for?

Thank You!!