Meursault's Indifference to His Mother's Death
Meursault is a young man from Algiers who has just received word that his mother has died. As a result, he takes a bus to Marengo, where his mother is residing in an old people's home. As he arrives, he discovers his mother's body and spends the entire night guarding it. He then buries his mother and returns to Algiers. In The stranger, Meursault is a unique character who fails to show human emotions to the people around him and to everything that happens to him. Meursault is indifferent to every situation and everyone in his life throughout the story because he is untouched and unperturbed by the people around him and the events in his life.
Meursault's Lack of Grief for His Mother
Meursault had lost his mother after being away from him for a very long time. However, after receiving the telegram about his mother's death, he shows no signs of pain, tears, and grief from the death of the woman who gave birth to him. According to McCarthy, the telegram meant nothing important to Meursault (17). To make it worse, when he arrives at the home where his mother was staying, the coffin was sealed, and when it is about to be opened, Meursault insists that it is not important because he tells the keeper "not to trouble." Who behaves this way after his mother's death? Meursault could not even remember the age of the woman who gave birth to him when his employer asked him about it because he says "roundabout sixty" (Camus 17). Moreover, after her burial and he goes back to Algiers, he acts as if nothing serious happened. The death of his mother did not have any effect on his life because, the day after her burial, he goes ahead to have fun with a woman like everything was normal.
Meursault's Indifference to Marie's Love
Meursault is a character with indifference throughout the novel. This is evident with his encounter with Marie Cardona, a former co-worker at the beach on the day after her mother's burial. The narrator says Marie Cardona used to be a typist and he "was rather keen on her those days" (Camus 19). Nonetheless, for some time, he had not thought of Marie at all, but when he meets her at the beach, he spends time with her there swimming. Afterward, they watch a movie, and they end up sleeping together like they were a couple. Nonetheless, while at his apartment, Marie asks him if he loves her, Meursault shows his indifference by saying "I told her that it didn't mean anything, but that I didn't think so" (Camus 35). Meursault spent his time with Marie, but it is funny that he acts as if he feels nothing for the woman by his replies. In fact, Meursault shows partial feelings for Marie. According to the text, it is evident that Meursault does care for his co-worker Marie; nonetheless, his expressions say something different (Scherr 10). Meursault is a character who shows no human emotions to Marie despite her love for him. He takes everything for granted and with insignificance.
Meursault's Indifference to Marriage
Meursault's indifference becomes more evident with his reaction to a marriage with Marie where he disregards marriage as insignificant. When asked about his marriage to Marries, Meursault claims "...Marie came by to see me and asked me if I wanted to marry her. I said it didn't make any difference and we could if she wanted to," and that is the only explanation he gives (Camus 41). Meursault reacts indifferently to everything Marie asks him because he never saw her love for him being important.
Meursault's Indifference to Spiritual Matters
Additionally, Meursault is indifferent to spiritual matters, and this is evident when he says to the magistrate "he does not believe in God" when the magistrate asked him to put his faith in God, and this earns him the name "Monsieur Antichrist" (Camus 102). Even after his death sentence, Meursault is urged by the chaplain to turn to God and renounce his atheism, but he reacts indifferently to the chaplain. He even attacks the chaplain and shouts at him to him that human existence has no meaning and so believing in God is meaningless. In the end, he loses all hope in the future by accepting his "indifference," and this makes him happy. In addition, earlier in the text, when Marie left him all alone on Sunday, he says "I remembered it was a Sunday, and that put me off; I've never cared for Sundays." Scherr notes that Meursault never cared about spiritual matters at all (189). Besides, Meursault is offered an opportunity by his boss to cultivate his life by transferring to Paris, but again, he just does not want to shift to Paris. He says, "I said people never change their lives. He never saw anything to be significant in his life.
Meursault's Indifference to Society and His Actions
In the story, Meursault lacks the basic concern of following the normal social conventions, and this is present when he shoots Arab four times with no remorse or guilt for his actions. He kills a man yet he shows no human emotions after his actions. Meursault is a character who is completely emotionally detached from the society because even though he realizes his fault, he is still unruffled with what has happened. In fact, since Meursault is always untouched by the people and the events around, during the trial, he never saw it as important because he failed to defend himself, which resulted in the verdict of death by guillotine (Kitai-Sangero 85). His indifference on events and people led him not to defend himself during the trial because he could have explained to the judges why he acted the way Meursault did and maybe he could have gotten a shorter sentence or even set free. Nonetheless, he shows no guilt or remorse for what he has done; moreover, he does not even care if he goes to jail. Everyone, including Marie, the lawyer, and the magistrate, could not understand his actions or his indifference.
Meursault's Overall Indifference
Meursault is a character with unresponsive behavior towards everything in his life. He is a character who is not disheartened by death or get remorseful after killing and even emotional to the love he got from Marie. Charles notes that he is a dissolute, callous, and lacks appreciation for other people because he has alienated himself from everything that is happening (Cliff notes). He feels no pain or guilt for anything in his life because despite going through life-changing issues, he displays his indifference to everything. As the story is about to end, everyone notices his weird character. While in the courthouse, instead of the trial, everything shifted to discussing his character where everyone who has encountered Meursault is called to testify. Despite everything said in the court, Meursault did not show any sign of remorse or grief for everything that happened to him and for that, the judge declared him cold and callous with no moral feelings and that he was a threat to the society. Meursault is an absurd character that does not care about what is happening to him or the people around him because of his deficient character.
Conclusion
In conclusion, The stranger by Albert Camus tells the story of a young man named Meursault. He is a character despite losing his mother; he shows no grief and tears to the situation. Meursault is a character who fails to demonstrate any emotions to events that happen in his life including the people around him. He is unperturbed what is happening to him, and even he has to face his mother's death, everything was normal to him. Even when he encounters Marie, a woman who loved him, Meursault does not show any feelings for this woman. In fact, when she needs some serious answers from him about their relationship, he is indifferent to every detail. Throughout the story, Meursault is indifferent to every situation, and this ultimately leads to him being sentenced to death because he refused to defend himself during the trial. He even had a chance to make things right by turning to God, but he turns down the Chaplain by insisting that human life has no meaning. In essence, The Stranger is a story about a passive protagonist who shows indifference to every situation and the people in the story, including the death of his mother.
Works Cited
Camus Albert. The stranger. New York: Vintage International, 1989. Print.
Charles, Scott. Quicklet on Albert Camus' The Stranger (Cliff Notes-like Summary and Analysis). Hyperink, 2012. Web.
Kitai-Sangero, Rinat. How does Meursault get Arrested? (Albert Camus's L'Etranger)(Character Overview). Akron Law Review 49.1 (2016): 62-89. Web.
McCarthy, Patrick. "The Stranger." Albert Camus: The Stranger. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004. 14-71. Web.
Scherr, Arthur. "Marie Cardona. An Ambivalent Nature-Symbol in Albert Camus's L'etranger.(Report)." Orbis Litterarum 66.1 (2011): 1-20. Web.
Scherr, Arthur. "Camus and the Denial of Death: Meursault and Caligula." OMEGA — Journal of Death and Dying 69.2 (2014): 169-90. Web.
