Literature Analysis #2

The Stranger by Albert Camus

1.  The Stranger by Albert Camus is divided into two parts.  The main character, Meursault, shows how his life starts to change from the time his mother died, to the time he is sentenced to death..  In the beginning of the novel, his mother dies.  He doesn’t show any emotions of grief at her funeral.  Meursault does not seem to care about anything though.  He helps Raymond take revenge on a girl.  Later, Meursault, Raymond, and their friend go to a beach house for a weekend where they meet two Arabs on the beach.  They all start to fight; Raymond is stabbed, Meursault takes the two Arabs out, and he shoots the person that hurt his friend.  The second part begins with Meursault explaining his arrest and his trial.  In the trial, Meursault does not show any emotions in court.  Meursault says that he was never able to fill remorse for his actions.  At the end, he is found guilty and is put to death. 

2. The theme of this novel is how life is meaningless.  Throughout the whole novel, Meursault has no care for anything.  Albert Camus says that life is the unavoidability of death.  Since everyone will eventually die, there is no meaning to life.

3. The author’s tone in the novel is very plain and detached to everything and everyone.

“We just sat there like that for quite a while.  The woman’s sighs and sobs were quieting down.  She sniffled a lot.  The finally she shut up.”

“He went down.  I was about to help him up but he started kicking me from there on the ground.  So I kneed him one and slugged him a couple of times.”

“There are some things I’ve never liked talking about.  A few days after I entered prison, I realized that I wouldn’t like talking about this part of my life.”

4. The literary elements/techniques that help strengthened my understanding were:

Symbols: “The four o’clock sun wasn’t too hot, but the water was warm, with slow gently lapping waves.”

Diction: “He asked if I had felt any sadness that day.  The question caught me by surprise and it seemed to me that I would have been very embarrassed if I’d had to ask it.”

Syntax: “I could feel the blood pounding in my temples.  After that, everything seemed to happen so fast, so deliberately, so naturally that I don’t remember any of it anymore.”

Tone: “Maman died today.  Or yesterday maybe, I don’t know.”

Characters: “…The strange feeling I had when I noticed that the young perfect reporter had turned his eyes away.  I didn’t look in Marie’s direction.  I didn’t have to…”