Books to Read if You Like the Stranger by Albert Camus

1942 novel by Albert Camus

The Stranger

Embrace of the first edition
Author	Albert Camus
Original title	L'Étranger
State	France
Linguistic communication	French
Series	Collection Blanche
Genre	Philosophical novel
Set in	Algeria
Publisher	1942 (Gallimard, French) 1946 (Hamish Hamilton, English)
Pages	159

The Stranger (French: Fifty'Étranger [l‿e.tʁɑ̃.ʒe]), also published in English as The Outsider , is a 1942 novella by French author Albert Camus. Its theme and outlook are often cited every bit examples of Camus' philosophy, absurdism, coupled with existentialism; though Camus personally rejected the latter label.^[1]

The title character is Meursault, an indifferent French settler in People's democratic republic of algeria described as "a citizen of France domiciled in North Africa, a human of the Mediterranean, an homme du midi notwithstanding one who inappreciably partakes of the traditional Mediterranean culture."^[2] Weeks after his mother's funeral, he kills an Arab man in French Algiers, who was involved in a conflict with one of Meursault'southward neighbors. Meursault is tried and sentenced to death. The story is divided into 2 parts, presenting Meursault's first-person narrative view earlier and after the murder, respectively.

In January 1955, Camus wrote this:

I summarized The Stranger a long time ago, with a remark I admit was highly paradoxical: "In our society any homo who does not weep at his mother'south funeral runs the risk of being sentenced to death." I but meant that the hero of my book is condemned because he does non play the game.^[3]

The Stranger 's first edition consisted of only 4,400 copies, which was then few that it could not be a best-seller. Since the novella was published during the Nazi occupation of French republic, at that place was a possibility that the Propaganda-Staffel would censor it, but a representative of the Occupation government felt information technology contained nix damaging to their cause, then it was published without omissions. Still, the novel was well received in anti-Nazi circles in addition to Jean-Paul Sartre'southward article "Explication de 50'Étranger ".^[4]

Translated four times into English, and also into numerous other languages, the novel has long been considered a archetype of 20th-century literature. Le Monde ranks it as number one on its 100 Books of the Century.

The novel was twice adjusted equally films: Lo Straniero (1967) (Italian) by Luchino Visconti and Yazgı (2001, Fate) past Zeki Demirkubuz (Turkish).

Plot [edit]

Part one [edit]

Meursault comes to know of the death of his female parent, who has been living in an old historic period home in the country. He takes time off from work to attend her funeral, merely he shows no signs of grief or mourning that the people around him expect from someone in his state of affairs. When asked if he wishes to view her body, he declines, and he smokes and drinks regular (white) coffee - not the obligatory blackness coffee - at the vigil held by his mother's coffin the night before the burial. About of his comments to the reader at this fourth dimension are about his observations of the aged attendees at the acuity and funeral, which takes place on an unbearably hot solar day.

Back in Algiers, Meursault encounters Marie, a former secretarial assistant of his firm. The ii become re-acquainted, swim together, watch a one-act motion picture, and brainstorm to have an intimate relationship. All of this happens on the twenty-four hours after his mother's funeral.

Over the next few days, Meursault helps Raymond Sintès, a neighbor and friend who is rumored to be a pimp, simply says he works in a warehouse, to get revenge on a Moorish girlfriend he suspects has been accepting gifts and coin from another homo. Raymond asks Meursault to write a letter inviting the girl over to Raymond'south apartment solely and then that he can accept sex with her and and then spit in her face and throw her out. While he listens to Raymond, Meursault is characteristically unfazed by any feelings of empathy, so he does not express concern that Raymond's girlfriend would be emotionally hurt past this plan and agrees to write the letter of the alphabet. In general, Meursault considers other people either interesting or annoying, or feels nothing for them at all.

Raymond's girlfriend visits him on a Sunday morning, and the police get involved when he beats her for slapping him after he tries to kick her out. He asks Meursault to testify that the girlfriend had been unfaithful when he is called to the police station, to which Meursault agrees. Ultimately, Raymond is let off with a warning.

While this is going on, Meursault's boss asks him if he would like to work at a branch their firm is thinking about opening in Paris and Marie asks him if he wants to get married. In both cases, Meursault says that he does not have stiff feelings about the matter, just he is willing to motion or get married if it will please the other party. Also, Salamano, Meursault and Raymond'due south curmudgeonly old neighbour, loses his abused and diseased dog and, though he generally outwardly maintains his usual spiteful and uncaring attitude toward the creature, he goes to Meursault for condolement and advice a few times. During 1 of these conversations, Salamano, who says he adopted the dog as a companion shortly after his wife's death, mentions that some neighbors had 'said nasty things' about Meursault after he sent his mother to a retirement habitation. Meursault is surprised to learn about this negative impression of his deportment.

I weekend, Raymond invites Meursault and Marie to a friend'due south beach motel. There they come across the brother of Raymond'due south spurned girlfriend along with another Arab, who Raymond has mentioned have been following him around recently. The Arabs confront Raymond and his friend, and the brother wounds Raymond with a pocketknife before running away. Afterwards, Meursault walks dorsum forth the beach alone, armed with a revolver he took from Raymond to prevent him from interim rashly, and encounters the brother of Raymond's girlfriend. Disoriented and on the edge of heatstroke, Meursault shoots when the Arab flashes his pocketknife at him. Information technology is a fatal shot, but Meursault shoots the man four more times afterward a pause. He does non divulge to the reader any specific reason for this act or what he feels, other than being bothered by the rut and intensely bright sunlight.

Part 2 [edit]

Meursault is now incarcerated. His general detachment and ability to adapt to whatsoever external circumstance seem to brand living in prison tolerable, especially afterwards he gets used to the idea of being restricted and unable to have sexual activity with Marie, though he does realize at one point that he has been unknowingly talking to himself for a number of days. For almost a year, he sleeps, looks out the modest window of his cell, and mentally lists the objects in his old apartment while he waits for his twenty-four hours in courtroom.

Meursault never denies that he killed the Arab, then, at his trial, the prosecuting attorney focuses more on Meursault'southward disability or unwillingness to cry at his mother's funeral than on the details of the murder. He portrays Meursault'south quietness and passivity as demonstrating his criminality and lack of remorse and denounces Meursault as a soul-less monster who deserves to die for his crime. To the reader, Meursault acknowledges that he has never felt regret for any of his deportment considering, he says, he has always been too absorbed in the present moment. Although several of Meursault's friends bear witness on his behalf and his attorney tells him the sentence will likely be light, Meursault is sentenced to be publicly decapitated.

Put in a new cell, Meursault obsesses over his impending doom and entreatment and tries to imagine some fashion in which he can escape his fate. He repeatedly refuses to see the prison chaplain, but one day the chaplain visits him anyway. Meursault says he does not believe in God and is not even interested in the subject, but the chaplain persists in trying to pb Meursault abroad from atheism (or, maybe more precisely, apatheism). The chaplain believes Meursault's appeal volition succeed in getting him released from prison, but says such an outcome will not get rid of his feelings of guilt or fix his relationship with God. Eventually, Meursault accosts the clergyman in a rage. He attacks the chaplain'south worldview and patronizing attitude and asserts that, in against the certainty of the nearness of his decease, he has had insights well-nigh life and death that he feels with a conviction beyond what the chaplain possesses. He says that, although what we say or do or experience tin can cause our deaths to happen at different times or nether different circumstances, none of those things can change the fact that we are all condemned to dice one day, and then nothing ultimately matters.

After the chaplain leaves, Meursault finds some comfort in thinking about the parallels between his situation and how he thinks his female parent must take felt when she was surrounded by expiry and slowly dying at the retirement home. Yelling at the clergyman had emptied him of all hope or thoughts of escape or a successful appeal, so he is able to open his eye 'to the beneficial indifference of the universe,' after which he decides that he has been, and still is, happy. His last assertion is that a large, hateful oversupply at his execution volition end his loneliness and bring everything to a consummate cease.

Characters [edit]

• Meursault (pronounced [møʁ.then]) is a French settler in People's democratic republic of algeria who learns of his mother's death by telegram. Meursault's indifference to his female parent's death demonstrates some emotional detachment from his environment. Other instances are shown. Meursault is also a truthful person, speaking his mind without regard for others. He is estranged from society due to his indifference.
• Meursault's mother was sent to an sometime people'southward home three years prior to her death, every bit noted in the opening lines of the novel. As Meursault nears the time for his execution, he feels a kinship with his mother, thinking she, as well, embraced a meaningless universe.
• Thomas Pérez was the fiancé of Meursault's mother while she was in the home. He brings up the rear in the funeral procession for Meursault'due south mother, and Meursault describes in a bang-up amount of particular the quondam homo's struggle to keep up. He is chosen to bear witness at Meursault'due south trial.
• Céleste is the owner of a café that Meursault frequents. He testifies at Meursault'southward trial.
• Marie Cardona was a typist in the same workplace as Meursault. A 24-hour interval later on he attends his mother'southward funeral, she meets him at a public pool, and they begin a relationship. Marie, similar Meursault, enjoys sexual activity. She asks Meursault on i occasion if he loves her, and on another if he would like to marry her. To the get-go he responds with no, the 2nd he seems indifferent to the thought. Marie visits him in one case in prison house, but is not permitted any farther visits since she is not his married woman. She testifies at Meursault's trial.
• Salamano is an former homo who routinely walks his domestic dog. He abuses it simply is still attached to it. When he loses his canis familiaris, he is distressed and asks Meursault for communication. He testifies at Meursault's trial.
• Raymond Sintès is a neighbor of Meursault who beats his Arab mistress. Her brother and friends try to take revenge. He brings Meursault into the conflict, and the latter kills the brother. Raymond and Meursault seem to develop a bond, and he testifies for Meursault during his trial.
• Masson is the owner of the beach house where Raymond takes Marie and Meursault. Masson is a carefree person who likes to live his life and be happy. He testifies at Meursault's trial.
• The Arabs include Raymond's mistress, her brother, and his assumed friends. None of the Arabs in The Stranger are named, reflecting the distance between the French colonists and native people.
• The Arab (the blood brother of the mistress of Raymond) is a human shot and killed by Meursault on a beach in Algiers.

Critical analysis [edit]

In his 1956 analysis of the novel, Carl Viggiani wrote:

On the surface, Fifty'Étranger gives the appearance of being an extremely simple though carefully planned and written volume. In reality, it is a dense and rich creation, total of undiscovered meanings and formal qualities. It would accept a book at least the length of the novel to make a consummate assay of meaning and class and the correspondences of meaning and form, in L'Étranger.^[v]

Victor Brombert has analysed L'Étranger and Sartre's "Explication de L'Étranger" in the philosophical context of the Absurd.^[6] Louis Hudon dismissed the characterisation of Fifty'Étranger every bit an existentialist novel in his 1960 analysis.^[7] The 1963 study by Ignace Feuerlicht begins with an exam of the themes of alienation, in the sense of Meursault beingness a 'stranger' in his society.^[8] In his 1970 analysis, Leo Bersani commented that L'Étranger is "mediocre" in its endeavour to be a "'profound' novel", just describes the novel equally an "impressive if flawed exercise in a kind of writing promoted past the New Novelists of the 1950s".^[9] Paul P. Somers Jr. has compared Camus's L'Étranger and Sartre's Nausea, in light of Sartre's essay on Camus's novel.^[ten] Sergei Hackel has explored parallels between L'Étranger and Dostoyevsky'southward Crime and Penalisation.^[11]

Terry Otten has studied in item the relationship between Meursault and his mother.^[12] Gerald Morreale examines Meursault'southward killing of the Arab and the question of whether Meursault's action is an act of murder.^[13] Ernest Simon has examined the nature of Meursault'south trial in L'Étranger, with respect to earlier assay past Richard Weisberg and jurist Richard A. Posner.^[14] René Girard has critiqued the relative nature of 'indifference' in the character of Meursault in relation to his surrounding lodge.^[15]

Kamel Daoud has written a novel The Meursault Investigation (2013/2014), first published in Algeria in 2013, and and then republished in French republic to critical acclamation. This postal service-colonialist response to The Stranger counters Camus's version with elements from the perspective of the unnamed Arab victim's brother (naming him and presenting him as a real person who was mourned) and other protagonists. Daoud explores their subsequent lives following the withdrawal of French authorities and most pied-noirs from Algeria afterwards the determination of the Algerian War of Independence in 1962.

Publication history and English language translations [edit]

On 27 May 1941, Camus was informed near the changes suggested by André Malraux after he had read the manuscript and took his remarks into account.^[16] For case, Malraux thought the minimalist syntactic structure was too repetitive. Some scenes and passages (the murder, the conversation with the clergyman) should likewise be revised. The manuscript was then read by editors Jean Paulhan and Raymond Queneau. Gerhard Heller, a German editor, translator and lieutenant in the Wehrmacht working for the Censorship Bureau offered to help. The book was eventually published in June 1942–4,400 copies of it were printed.

• 1942, Fifty' Étranger (French), Paris: Gallimard
• 1946, The Outsider (translated by Stuart Gilbert), London: Hamish Hamilton
• 1946, The Stranger (translated past Stuart Gilbert), New York: Alfred A. Knopf
• 1982, The Outsider (translated by Joseph Laredo), London: Hamish Hamilton, ISBN 978-0-141-18250-half dozen
• 1989, The Stranger (translated past Matthew Ward), New York: Vintage, ISBN 978-0-679-72020-1
• 2012, The Outsider (translated by Sandra Smith), London: Penguin, ISBN 978-0-141-38958-5

Éditions Gallimard offset published the original French-language novel in 1942. A British writer, Stuart Gilbert, first translated Fifty' Étranger into English in 1946; for more 30 years his version was the standard English language translation. Gilbert's choice of title, The Stranger, was changed by Hamish Hamilton to The Outsider, considering they considered it "more striking and advisable" and considering Maria Kuncewiczowa's Polish-linguistic communication novel Cudzoziemka had recently been published in London as The Stranger.^[17] In the Us, Knopf had already typeset the manuscript using Gilbert'south original title when informed of the name change so disregarded information technology; the British–American difference in titles has persisted in subsequent editions.^[17]

In 1982, the British publisher Hamish Hamilton, which had issued Gilbert's translation, published a translation by Joseph Laredo, also as The Outsider. Penguin Books bought this version in 1983 for a paperback edition.

In 1988, Vintage published a version in the United States with a translation by American Matthew Ward under the standard American title of The Stranger. Camus was influenced by American literary style, and Ward'south translation expresses American usage.^[xviii]

A new translation of The Outsider by Sandra Smith was published by Penguin in 2012.^[19]

A disquisitional difference amongst these translations is the expression of emotion in the sentence towards the close of the novel: "I laid my heart open to the benign indifference of the universe" in Gilbert's translation, versus Laredo'south "I laid my centre open up to the gentle indifference of the universe" (original French: la tendre indifférence du monde ; literally, "the tender indifference of the globe"). The Penguin Classics 2000 reprint of Laredo'due south translation has "gentle" changed to "beneficial".

The catastrophe lines differ also: Gilbert translates "on the day of my execution there should be a huge oversupply of spectators and that they should greet me with howls of execration", which contrasts with Laredo'southward translation of "greet me with cries of hatred." This passage describes a scene that would serve equally a foil to the prior "indifference of the world". In French, the phrase is "cris de haine" . Ward translates this equally "with cries of hate". Gilbert juxtaposes "execration" with "execution".

"Aujourd'hui, Maman est morte" is the opening judgement of the novel. English language translations have rendered the kickoff sentence equally 'Mother died today', 'Maman died today', or a variant thereof. In 2012 Ryan Bloom argued that information technology should be translated as 'Today, Maman died.' He believes this meliorate expresses the character of Meursault, equally developed in the novel, as someone who 'lives for the moment', 'does non consciously dwell on the past', and 'does non worry about the hereafter'.^[20]

Adaptations and allusions [edit]

Pic adaptations/allusions [edit]

Straight adaptations [edit]

• 1967 Lo Straniero by Luchino Visconti (Italian)
• 2001 Yazgı (Fate) past Zeki Demirkubuz (Turkish)

Allusions [edit]

• 2001 The Man Who Wasn't There by Coen brothers^{[ citation needed ]}
• 2015 Mad Men – Season seven – Episode 12 – Ending

Literature [edit]

• The Meursault Investigation (2015) by Kamel Daoud is a novel created counter to Camus'due south version, from the perspective of an Arab man described as the brother of the murdered man. Referred to only as "The Arab" by Camus, in this novel he is said to have been named Musa, and was an actual human who existed and was mourned by his brother and female parent. Information technology was a New York Times Notable Book of 2015.
• In Camus' "The Plague", published in 1948, Camus mentions a woman who "started airing her views about a murder case that had created some stir in Algiers. A young commercial employee had killed an Algerian on a beach".

In song [edit]

• "Killing an Arab", the 1979 debut unmarried past the Cure, was described by Robert Smith as "a short poetic attempt at condensing my impression of the cardinal moments in 'l'entranger' [sic] (The Outsider) past Albert Camus".^[21]
• "Noch koroche dnya", from the 1995 anthology of the same proper name by the Russian heavy metallic band Aria, is based on Meursault'southward see with the chaplain in the final scene of the novel.^{[ citation needed ]} It is narrated from Meursault'southward first-person perspective and includes (in Russian) the line, "The cries of hate volition be my reward / Upon my expiry, I will not be alone".
• At the end of "Asa Phelps Is Expressionless", from the album Ghost Stories past The Lawrence Arms, the passage in which Meursault accepts his impending execution is read by Chris McCaughan. It parallels certain themes in the song's lyrics.^{[ citation needed ]}
• Folk singer-songwriter Eric Andersen has a vocal called "The Stranger (Song of Revenge)", one of four songs based on Camus's works on his 2014 EP The Shadow and Light of Albert Camus.
• Tuxedomoon's third single was titled "The Stranger" and was reworked in 1981 as "50'étranger (Gigue existentielle)" for the Suite en sous-sol EP. The lyrics to both versions include direct references to the protagonist'south female parent's expiry and the expectation that he cry at her funeral.^[22]

See also [edit]

• Absurdism
• Existentialism
• Character evidence
• La Veuve Couderc
• Le Monde 's 100 Books of the Century

References [edit]

1. ^ Camus, Albert (1969). Lyrical and disquisitional essays. Thody, Philip, 1928–1999. New York: Knopf. ISBN0-394-43439-0. OCLC 16016438.
2. ^ From Cyril Connolly's introduction to the commencement English translation, by Stuart Gilbert (1946)
3. ^ Carroll, David. Albert Camus the Algerian: Colonialism, Terrorism, Justice. Columbia University Printing. p. 27.
4. ^ McCarthy, Patrick (2004). The Stranger (Albert Camus). New York: Cambridge University Printing. p. 12. ISBN0-521-8321-01.
5. ^ Viggiani, Carl A (Dec 1956). "Camus' L'Etranger". PMLA. 71 (5): 865–887. doi:10.2307/460515. JSTOR 746766.
6. ^ Brombert, Victor (1948). "Camus and the Novel of the "Absurd"". Yale French Studies (1): 119–123. doi:10.2307/2928869. JSTOR 2928869.
7. ^ Hudon, Louis (1960). "The Stranger and the Critics". Yale French Studies (25): 59–64. doi:10.2307/2928902. JSTOR 2928902.
8. ^ Feuerlicht, Ignace (Dec 1963). "Camus's Fifty'Etranger Reconsidered". PMLA. 78 (five): 606–621. doi:ten.2307/460737. JSTOR 460737.
9. ^ Bersani, Leo (Spring 1970). "The Stranger'southward Secrets". Novel: A Forum on Fiction. 3 (three): 212–224. doi:10.2307/1344914. JSTOR 1344914.
10. ^ Somers Jr, Paul P (April 1969). "Camus Si, Sartre No". The French Review. 42 (five): 693–700. JSTOR 1344914.
11. ^ Hackel, Sergei (Spring 1968). "Raskolnikov through the Looking-Glass: Dostoevsky and Camus's L'Etranger". Gimmicky Literature. ix (2): 189–209. doi:10.2307/1207491. JSTOR 1207491.
12. ^ Otten, Terry (Jump 1975). ""Mamam" in Camus' The Stranger". Higher Literature. 2 (2): 105–111. JSTOR 25111069.
13. ^ Morreale, Gerald (February 1967). "Meursault'south Absurd Human action". The French Review. twoscore (4): 456–462. JSTOR 385377.
14. ^ Simon, Ernest (Leap–Summertime 1991). "Palais de Justice and Poetic Justice in Albert Camus' The Stranger". Cardozo Studies in Law and Literature. iii (i): 111–125. doi:10.2307/743503. JSTOR 743503.
15. ^ Girard, René (Dec 1964). "Camus'southward Stranger Retried". PMLA. 79 (5): 519–533. doi:10.2307/461137. JSTOR 461137.
16. ^ Camus, Albert, Malraux, André, Albert Camus, André Malraux, Correspondance 1941–1959, Paris, Gallimard, 2016, 152 p. (ISBN 978-2-07-014690-1), p.42
17. ^ ^{a b} Kaplan, Alice (14 Oct 2016). "L'Étranger – stranger than fiction". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 14 October 2016.
18. ^ Mitgang, Herbert (18 April 1988). "Classic French Novel is 'Americanized'". The New York Times . Retrieved 9 September 2006.
19. ^ Messud, Claire (2014). "A New 'L'Étranger'". The New York Review of Books. 61 (10). Retrieved 1 June 2014.
20. ^ Ryan Bloom (11 May 2012). "Lost in Translation: What the First Line of The Stranger Should Be". The New Yorker . Retrieved three July 2016.
21. ^ janie (October 1991). "inspirations". Cure News (eleven).
22. ^ https://www.lyricsera.com/1083788-lyrics-letranger.html

External links [edit]

• L'Étranger (French version) at Faded Folio (Canada)
• L'Étranger, ebooksgratuits.com ; HTML format, public domain in Canada
• The Stranger" information visualization and learning guide from LitCharts.

hardenfiveraver.blogspot.com

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Stranger_%28Camus_novel%29

Share this post