In The Stranger, Albert Camus describes Meursault’s outlook on the
physical world as belittling and violent in order to foreshadow and push
Meursault towards committing murder. This sharp, intense vocabulary, as well as
poetic prose and style, parallels Meursault as a human. These parallels extend
to the development and unfolding of Meursault’s true emotions. Furthermore, the
murder scene starts with Raymond walking with Meursault, who was, “naturally”
(58) gripping the gun firmly. Meursault has the thought that “…all I had to do
was turn around and that would be the end of it. But the whole beach, throbbing
in the sun, was pressing on my back.” (58). It seems as if he is using the heat
as a motivation to commit this crime. This can be seen more when he says “It was
the burning, which I couldn’t stand anymore, that made me move forward. I knew
that it was stupid…” (60). At this point Meursault’s morality feels strong, but
nature is exerting physical pressure to tempt him into murder. At this moment
in the book, Camus starts to speak with forceful words and extremely vibrant
images. “All I could feel were the cymbals of sunlight crashing on my forehead
and, indistinctly, the dazzling spear flying up from my eyelashes and stabbed
at my stinging eyes… The sea carried up a thick, fiery breath. It seemed to me
as if the sky split open from one end to the other to rain down fire.” (60).
Camus uses words like “crashing, dazzling spear, stabbed, stinging, fiery,
split, and rain down fire.” All of these words have violent connotations, both
foreshadowing the murder, and implying that the simple, boring Meursault has
more layers than previously thought. After witnessing his gun shoot the Arab,
Meursault flashes a few minutes back to the happiness he had on the beach. Old
uninteresting Meursault now seems psychotic because he is thinking about what
makes him happy after murder; immediately after, he felt the need to fire “four
more times at the motionless body where the bullets lodged without leaving a
trace. And it was like knocking four quick times on the door of unhappiness.”
(60). Not only is this written with more verve than usual for Merusault, but he
is also having strong enough feelings to the point where he feels the need to
shoot this dead body, not one, not two, not three, but four more times. Moving
to Party Two, Meursault does not immediately recognize the severity of his
actions. He even finds that the fact the court will provide an attorney was
“very convenient” (61). After some short questioning, Meursault finally remembers
that he had killed someone. Meursault seems to not make very much of this
murder; he acts as if it was not that big of a deal. Merusault’s spike of
feelings certainly decline when asked about his mother. “… I would rather Maman
hadn’t died.” (65). As the reader, it certainly is nice, and expected, to know
that if he had to choose, he would choose her to be alive; however, he strays
from normality with the word “rather” and with his dismissive tone. He has no
passion, no feelings for his mother; anyone else would beg and trade anything
to get their mother back. Meursault, in my opinion, is guided morally
correctly, but he just is not in touch with his feelings enough to recognize
that what he says may cause others confusion. Meursault, again, forgets that he’s
a criminal, and admits “It was an idea I couldn’t get used to.” (70). The
reader can tell that he recognizes his wrong doing, but the reader, nor
Meursault, nor anyone in the book, can understand why he did what he did. The
reader, at this point, is skeptical about Meursault’s emotions, and questioning
whether they exist at all. That being said, he saves himself by recognizing “the
tone of the questioning gradually changed.” (70). Meursault is able to recognize
the change in tone, thereby implying that he may be more attentive and
analytical than previously thought.
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