The Stranger Literary Analysis

In Albert Camus’ novel The Stranger, readers follow the story of Mersault, a young man living in Algiers who is dealing with his mother’s death. Right away readers can look at Mersault and see his careless and unemotional life. He clearly does not care for what people think about him, and he would never lie about himself to be recognized. He does not accept the society’s idea of happiness by the way he deals with the moments in his life. He does not believe in life after death and has no religion to support his beliefs, which make his life poor and empty. In The Stranger, Camus uses character Mersault to illustrate that life is an absurd and pointless by the reaction to his mother’s death, the interaction with his friends, the treatment with

The same can be said about the promotion his boss offer to him. He has a big promotion in front of him where he would move to Paris and consequently would have a better salary and life. This is an offer that everyone dreams about and would never refuse, but not Mersault. He tells his boss that he was prepared to move and start this new job, but he really does not care much about it. This part of the novel clearly shows his personality. He is not against the idea of promotion, but clearly he feels that his life would be the same with the promotion or not. Even though a promotion can change any life in good ways, Mersault does think this way. A promotion, or even a marriage and death of his mother would not be able to influence him in any

He is sentenced to execution for killing the Arab man, and when he was about to die he says “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 hates.” (123). At this point he is starting to think about his mother for the first time and realized that she even living in a that wistful house she must have felt free and ready to live again. He says that no one can cry over her death and that he is ready to live again. He is about to be executed and he realizes that his entire life was meaningless and he could have done a better job in every situation in his life. The readers take the affirmation of he would live it all again as a repentance for the way he carried his life. His only desire at the end of his life is people greeting him in the moment of his execution with, showing him their emotions through their