The Stranger by Albert Camus Book Analysis

Have you ever wondered the purpose of the writing of The Stranger? In Albert Camus’ novel The Stranger is about this character named Meursault who defies society's attempts to create and enforce reasonable justifications for his actions and ideas and that he is a distant individual who shows little or no interest, care, or emotion, and who lacks a moral sense, uncaring about the rightness or wrongness of everything that occurs in the novel. Albert Camus wrote The Stranger to express a message of human actions that are illogical and that there is no meaning or order to human existence and that life is a terrible universe in which nothing matters.

When Meursault's mother died, Meursault attended his mother's burial but refused to see her. "We put the cover on, but I'm supposed to unscrew the casket so you can see her." He was moving toward the casket when I stopped him. He said, "You don't want to?" I answered, "No" (6). Meursault was adamant about not seeing his mother because he didn't have a good relationship with her and was estranged from her. Meursault showed little emotion in the wake of his mother's death. Camus wanted to prove that death has no meaning and that you don't go anywhere after you die and he wanted to demonstrate this inconsistency in Meursault's actions and sentiments toward his mother. 

Meursault had found new acquaintances and reconnected with an old lover after the death of his mother, but that all changed when he fought against a group of arabs who allegedly attacked Meursault and a companion, leading to Meursault killing one of them with five revolver shots to the body. "The trigger gave; I felt the smooth underside of the butt; and there, in that noise, sharp and deafening at the same time, is where it all started. I shook off the sweat and sun. I knew that 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" (59). Meursault killing the Arab made him believe that his attempts at emotion were sufficient for the rest of the world to accept him as a normal person. The message of this for Camus was that life has no real significance or order.

After the killing of the man, Meursault was apprehended and brought to court to face criminal accusations and imprisonment of manslaughter and sentenced to death by the guillotine. “The judges came back in. Very quickly a series of questions was read to the jury. I heard "guilty of murder" . . . "premeditated" . . . "extenuating circumstances" (105-106). “I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again. For everything to be consummated, for me to feel less alone, I had only to wish that there be a large crowd of spectators the day of my execution and that they greet me with cries of hate” (123). Meursault was always a ridiculous character in the story, and Camus wanted to show that everyone who has ever lived will die at some point, and that whether you make a great or tiny difference in the world, it won't matter in the end.

The Stranger was a showing of the trait or state of being absurd or irrational and a remote character who observes and explains much of what goes on around him from afar. Camus wrote this book to teach readers that life will not matter from the beginning to the finish. Everything humans have done in this world, including their acts, decisions, suffering, objectives, and accomplishments, will be useless in the end. I've always believed that life is an opportunity to reveal who you really are, and that no matter what you do, you'll suffer to find the true meaning of your life. Life decisions affect behavior, form goals, provide a sense of direction, and create meaning.